Painted Lady:
American-way,
CIA -sponsored entrepreneurship: Multi-millionaire MediaBistro founder
Laurel ToubyI
How MediaBistro's Laurel Touby Learned to Love Neo-Con Martin Peretz
MediaBistro's Kate Coe really has it out for her late "friend" Theresa Duncan. The always amused "FishBowl LA" commentator has been ridiculing the former since the "Golden Suicides" in July. She can't get enough of trashing Theresa Duncan, because Kate Coe KNOWS that "conspiracy theory" is for the certifiable ... like Theresa ... absolutely without substance.
Duncan, of course, decided to commit "suicide" at the moment she was working on a story that tied Jim Cownie, founder of Heritage Communications, cum TCI, now AT&T Cable, to heinous CIA/Republican Party crimes in Omaha.
Those Omaha allegations are soooooooooo side-splitting ... Who hasn't had a good laugh over those unlikely tales of organized credit union thievery, child prostitution networks, ties to Warren Buffett and the Omaha "elite," the CIA, upper-tiers of the Republican Party ... and, of course, the many unexplained "suicides" of witnesses and investigators, the unexplained fatal "accidents" ...
Very amusing.
Let's take another look at the money behind MediaBistro ... which comes back repeatedly to the CIA (what would "paranoid" Theresa make of it? One can only imagine ... ).
Laurel Touby founded MediaBistro. In
her own words:" ... I wrote a business plan with the help of business advisors."
Laurel may want to have a good talk with those advisors ...
"... My goal was to raise $1 million, even though I didn’t need half of that."
Where did she go for the needed half-million? To the liberal Hollywood community that MB serves with entertainment news commentary and lucrative job listings? ...
----> " ... The funding came from a venture private equity hedge fund called GOTHAM PARTNERS. A small portion of it came from MARTIN PERETZ, who owned the New Republic back then, and some of THESTREET.COM. At that time, I kept ownership of more than 70% of the company. ... "
www.nyreport.com/index.cfm
Visit
the site, revel in celebrity worship, absorb the skewed political
"opinions," note that MediaBistro gathers intelligence on people living
in Hollywood and pays its "reporters" (or "useful idiots" to MB's CIA
investors) poorly ...(Don't even try to do the math ... She didn't have half the funding needed, sold a minority stake to raise it ... and wound up with 70% ownership ... But Touby isn't terribly competent, if the truth be known: "Laurel Touby's Inability To Use The Internet Creates Mayhem" - "Last night, Mediabistro founder Laurel Touby wonderfully displayed her utter inability to use email. (Once again, we question how this woman founded an internet company and sold it for $23 million. Rebecca Fox, Mediabistro's managing editor, had sent out an email alert that News Corp. had bought Beliefnet.com. Rebecca did not bcc the email list—and so her boss Laurel replied to all. ... " http://gawker.com/tag/rebecca-fox/)
Peretz & Co.: They bought into that 30% of Bistro. "Marty," as Ms. Touby refers to him, Peretz fits the Mockingbird profile - he is an obvious facilitator of CIA (and fascist) propaganda. He also belongs to front operations with CIA financing, eg. the GPSG (see below), is tight with now-defunct Gotham Partners (see below) - which was in bed with the CIA and Mafia (part three of this series) - and has employed CIA Mockingbirds, eg. the avuncular Fred Barnes, etal.
----> Peretz in The Middle: MediaBistro's funding sources are not, in fact, distinct, as they seem in Touby's account - they each come back to Martin Peretz, who has strong ties to the Gotham Fund AND TheStreet.com, which he co-founded with financial consultant Jim Cramer, a regular on cable TV state propaganda channels:
" ... Peretz is co-founder and was co-chairman of the Board of TheStreet.com, a publicly traded company on the NASDAQ, and he remains a Director. The NASDAQ has a 20% interest in The Marker, a financial e-mail publication of Ha'aretz. ... He has served for several decades as a director of 11 mutual funds in the Dreyfus-Mellon Group. Previously, he served on the Board of Directors of the Bank Leumi of New York and the Carmel Container Corporation. He was a co-founder of Leukosite, a biotechnology and pharmaceutical company, which, after it became a public company, was merged into Millennium Pharmaceuticals.""
http://www.tnr.com/columnists/Martin_Peretz.html
Peretz and Gotham Partners: "... Bill Ackman. Mr. Ackman is a 36-year-old Harvard M.B.A., the son of real-estate mogul Larry Ackman and a rising force in Democratic Party politics. His investors now include New Republic publisher Marty Peretz. ... "
http://www.tnr.com/columnists/Martin_Peretz.html
----> How Peretz came to be wealthy and invest in MediaBistro: ”[T]he key thing to know about Peretz is that his entire position in the world of politics is due to the fact that he purchased TNR with money his wife inherited from her SINGER SEWING [M]ACHINE FORTUNE. Peretz is always viciously attacking people who have earned their intellectual or journalistic credentials, rather than purchased them, and I wonder if his own precarious position is this world is the key to the frequent slander to which he subjects those with more genuine literary accomplishments. (Peretz has never written a book, or any other significant work of scholarship or reportage).”
http://rittenhouse.blogspot.com/2002/05/unfortunate-confluence-of-events.html
MediaBistro.Com
investor "Marty" Peretz----> AT New Republic, MARTIN PERETZ OPENED THE DOORS TO CIA MOCKINGBIRDS. Touby could turn to no one else in the world for MediaBistro financing but this notorious neo-conservative: " ... In reality ... the New Republic had been taken over by neocon Martin Peretz in the 1970s, and he had turned it into a home for neocon and right-wing pundits, such as Charles Krauthammer and Fred Barnes."
http://baltimorechronicle.com/2007/073007Parry.shtml
Neo-Conservative Propaganda and The New Republic: "Is Peretz taking orders from the Scaife family foundations? If so, that would explain a lot about what's up with The New Republic. ... "
http://www.mahablog.com/oldsite/2005.02.13_arch.html
----> Peretz and the Fascist Right: Peretz was a member of The Committee for Peace and Security in the Gulf (CPSG): http://www.geocities.com/tom_slouck/iraq/cpsg_98_letter_iraq.html
"In February 1998, the CPSG asked Clinton "to go beyond a military strike on Iraq and to help overthrow Iraqi President Saddam Hussein and replace his regime with a provisional government. ... Signatories included the current ultra-unilateralist undersecretary of state for arms control and international strategy, John R. Bolton, Gary Schmitt and several AEI 'scholars', including the current chairman of the Defense Policy Board, Richard Perle. PNAC's two co-founders, William Kristol, editor of Rupert Murdoch's The Weekly Standard, and neocon commentator Robert Kagan, also signed the letter."
----> Martin Peretz and PNAC:
Led by Richard Perle, chairman of the Pentagon's Defense Policy Board,
and Deputy Secretary of Defense Paul Wolfowitz, this group still
"occupies several dozen key posts in the White House, the Pentagon, and
the State Department."Dreyfuss also noted a Washington think tank developed: "Project for the New American Century" Members include Richard, Perle, strategist Robert Kagan, William Kristol, NEW REPUBLIC publisher, Martin Peretz, and ex-CIA Director James Woolsey and are "tied to a web of similar neo-conservative, pro-Israel organizations." Dreyfuss quoted Diplomat Akins: "It's a team that looks all too familiar, seeking to implement the plan first outlined back in 1975.
http://globalresearch.ca/articles/MIL410A.html
... Editor-in-Chief and co-owner Martin Peretz's personal stance on Iraq. ....
www.counterpunch.org/leopold02212003.html
----> The CPSG was funded by the Bradley Foundation, one of the better-known CIA conduits: " ... co-chaired by Bush chickenhawk Richard Perle along with former New York Democratic Rep. Stephen Solarz. CPSG teamed up with the Bush Senior administration to mobilize support for Iraq Attack, version I. According to Jim Lobe of the Project Against the Present Danger, CPSG received a sizable grant from the Wisconsin-based Lynde & Harry Bradley Foundation, a major funder of both PNAC and AEI. Obviously, these folks like [to] share the same bed. ... "
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Committee_for_Peace_and_Security_in_the_Gulf
----> Friend of Scooter Libby: "Let me concede: I am a friend of Scooter Libby. ... I like Scooter, who is quite brilliant, very honest, and brave. Also funny. I've contributed to The Libby Legal Defense Fund and have joined the fund's advisory committee, which is not large because in Washington old pals dessert when even their college roommate gets into trouble. In a time when self-styled civil libertarians are giving money to defend Muslim terrorists, I am happy to help defend an American patriot, some of whose politics I do not share and some of whose politics I do, from a cynical onslaught of the special prosecutor who put journalists into jail for not telling him what he already knew."
http://www.richardsilverstein.com/tikun_olam/2006/09/12/martin-peretz-blogger/
----> Friend of Joe Lieberman:
"It was then that people like Joe Lieberman emerged, muscular on
defense, assertive in foreign policy, genuinely liberal on social and
economic matters, but not doctrinaire on regulatory issues. He had
marched for civil rights and is committed to an equal opportunity
agenda with equal opportunity results. He has qualms about affirmative
action."http://www.sadlyno.com/archives/003529.html
Background notes about Martin Peretz: " ... In the mid-1960s Peretz was one of now-Democratic presidential candidate Al Gore's Harvard political science professors (E.g., see Melinda Henneberger, "A Test of Character, The New York Times, 21 June 2000) and became one of (if not the most influential of Gore's "mentors." (E.g., see Howard Kurtz, "The Publisher's Winning Ticket," Washington Post, 17 August 2000).
"Just hours before casting his Senate vote to support sending U.S. troops to fight in the Persian Gulf, then-Tennessee Senator Al Gore consulted Peretz (John Aloysius Farrell," (Allegation Revived: Simpson Says Gore 'Shopped' Gulf Vote, Boston Globe, 5 February 2000)."
http://www.casi.org.uk/discuss/2000/msg01113.html
* Peretz is a long-time advocate for Israel and Zionism (E.g., see Martin Peretz, "Zionism: the 'God' that did not Fail: if it succeeded, it did so not least because it was not a God. It was a morality, and a politics, of worldliness," (The Gazette (Montreal) 25 April 1998, SECTION: THE REVIEW; Pg. B4 LENGTH: 2558 words).
-----> For more on the CIA, Iraq war politics and Peretz-in-context, see: "Harvard in Service to the National Security State." by John Trumpbour, CAIB site.
http://www.cia-on-campus.org/harvard.edu/harvard.html
----> TNR Sold: Note the handoff to another right-wing extremist, Canada's answer to Rupert Murdoch, Leonard Asper: "New Republic Sold, to Drop Weekly Publication Schedule," by Ben Smith, February 23, 2007: "The Canadian media giant CanWest has taken a majority stake in the 92-year-old New Republic, and plans to relaunch the weekly as a thicker, glossier – and half as frequent – magazine with a more robust Web site. The new ownership and redesign completes a period of change at the magazine, which shifted markedly to the political left under its new editor, Franklin Foer, and has sought to shake off its association with the Bush administration’s pursuit of the Iraq war."
http://dyn.politico.com/printstory.cfm?uuid=F03A1B72-3048-5C12-00C67B9F359A44FA
"
... GOTHAM PARTNERS [a key investor in Laurel Touby's MediaBistro.com]
owns Crescent Investments, which oversees GW Bush's blind trust.
Richard Rainwater is at Crescent/Gotham, and is close to Bush: " ...
Rainwater founded Columbia Healthcare, which merged with HCA and became
the country's biggest for-profit hospital company (Scott was later
forced out as CEO amid a federal fraud investigation). Even George W.
Bush kept an office, when he and Rainwater were putting together the
Texas Rangers stadium deal. ... " (SOURCE: money.cnn.com, see below)II MediaBistro's Nanotech Bio-Chip Connection
---->
After MediaBistro sold to JupiterMedia for eight figures in July 2007,
one week after the body of Theresa Duncan - a critic of CIA crimes,
subject to much disdain and ridicule at Touby's web site - was
discovered, the quirky founder thanked her investment consultants,
among them "Marty Peretz" for "letting
me into his old-boys club and funding my wildly ambitious
business plan." (We met neo-con Peretz's old boys' bund in part two.)----> She was especially grateful to attorney Wayne Martino of Brenner, Salzman and Wallman:
" ... our corporate lawyer, who has been with me through every crazy spin-cycle of this business, from pre-funding 1998 to today's sale. Wayne thought of every angle, considered every possible permutation of every deal. I am ever indebted to you, Wayne."
http://www.mediabistro.com/news/breaking/mediabistrocom_merges_with_jupitermedia_a_marriage_of_minds_media_resources_63233.asp
----> Who is Wayen Martino?
- (Of particular relevance here is his background in nanotechnology,
because in the next few steps we will find him in alliance with the CIA
and corporations with fascist histories to advance the nascent
technology): "Born Danbury, Connecticut, April 18, 1959; admitted to
bar, 1984, Connecticut. Education: American University (B.A., cum
laude, 1981); University of Connecticut School of Law (J.D., with
honors, 1984). Practice Areas: Corporate; Mergers and Acquisitions;
Finance; Venture Capital; Business Start-Ups; Strategic Alliances;
Internet; NANOTECHNOLOGY; Technology Transfers; Technology Licensing;
Executive Employment."----> Some clients of Wayne Matino's New Haven law firm, Brenner, Salzman and Wallman: GE, IBM, Nortel Networks, Williams Communications, US West, and Pasteur-Merieux-Connaught.
http://www.bswlaw.com/Attorneys/Attys_page.htm
----> Wayne Martino and nanotechnology
- He is president and co-Founder, Connecticut Nanotech Initiative, in
close alliance with the National Nanotechnology Initative. Also,
attorney for the initiative.http://www.zoominfo.com/Search/PersonDetail.aspx?PersonID=58982085
http://www.lawyers.com/Connecticut/New-Haven/Brenner,-Saltzman-and-Wallman-LLP-328713-f.html
----> A nanotech symposium hosted by Wayne Martino and the CNI "boasted" a "'who's who' in nanotechnology leadership to include James Murday, Naval Research Laboratory and acting director for the National Nanotechnology Coordination Office; Mark Modzelewski, founder and executive director of the world's fastest growing technology association - the NanoBusiness Alliance; Robert Hwang, director, Center for Functional Nanomaterials at Brookhaven National Laboratory; and Mark Reed, professor of engineering and applied science at Yale University."
http://www.nanotech-now.com/CNI-release-10142003.htm
The Nanotech Capitol of the World: "Connecticut is poised to become the nanotechnology capital of the world, so believe the invitation-only members of a new organization called the Connecticut Nanotechnology Initiative, which met for the first time over the weekend at Yale University. ... "
http://www.infowars.com/archives/2003/Feb/02-25-03.htm
Industrial interest in nanotech: " ... Lt. Governor M. Jodi Rell adds that nanotechnology is a win-win for Connecticut. ... [W]e’re home to industry leaders like General Electric, Pfizer, United Technologies, and more. ... "
http://www.ct.gov/governorrell/cwp/view.asp?A=11&Q=257674
----> Inframat Corp. of Connecticut is a leading sponsor of Martino's CNI. Inframat is a military contractor:
eg., Army, see: http://www.dodsbir.net/selections/abs032/armyabs032.htm
----> Regional Alliances of the International Nanotechnology Alliance include Martino's organization: Franklin Institute, Pennsylvania, Texas Nanotechnology Initiative, Virginia Nanotechnology Initiative, Denver Nano Hub, Silicon Valley, San Diego and Michigan Nano Hubs, Massachusetts Nanotech Initiative, Connecticut Nanotechnology Initiative. (Source: "The Future of NATIONAL NANOTECHNOLOGY INITIATIVE," National Science Foundation)
www.nano.gov/
----> CIA and military intelligence interest in nanotechnology drives the industry - Intelligence community interest in the technology is clearly evident in lists of conference attendees, as found in this 2001 symposium report:
List of Attendees
Alan Baily, Central Intelligence Agency
Eric Baker, Central Intelligence Agency
Ramesh Bapat, RAND Science, Technology and Policy Institute
Dave Barlow, Advanced Materials and Manufacturing Technologies Working Group, National Ground Intelligence Center, Military Technologies Division
Beverly Brown, National Ground Intelligence Center
Jeanne Brown, National Ground Intelligence Center
Gene Cheney, Air Force Technical Applications Center
Ken Crelling, U.S. Department of Defense
Joey Crider, National Ground Intelligence Center
Gary Curral, DuPont
And many more - in fact, intelligence people turned up in hordes:
http://www.nap.edu/catalog.php?record_id=10253#description
----> Some of those funding the nanotechnology initiative movement: NIST, DOD, DOJ, DOS, NASA, NRC (Nat. Research Council, a CIA front),
http://209.85.173.104/search?q=cache:bJXSHXjWJhAJ:www.nano.gov/html/res/roco_aiche_48slides.pdf+Connecticut+Nanotechnology+Initiative&hl=en&ct=clnk&cd=4&gl=us
----> The CIA had a quieter role in Martino's Initiative - also THE WHITE HOUSE - and these federal sources were funding Martino:
From "Small Wonders, Endless Frontiers: A Review of the National Nanotechnology Initiative" - TABLE 2.1 Estimated Funding for Nanotechnology from FY 1999 to FY 2003 (million dollars)
... Funding figures for four additional entities (the Departments of State and Treasury, the CIA, and the Nuclear Regulatory Commission) that are also joining the NNI are not yet available. ... Currently represented on NSET are the Departments of Defense (DOD), Energy (DOE), Justice (DOJ), Transportation (DOT), Agriculture (USDA), State, and Treasury; the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA); the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) ... the CENTRAL INTELLIGENCE AGENCY (CIA); and two White House offices (the Office of Management and Budget (OMB) and OSTP).
http://www.nap.edu/openbook.php?record_id=10395&page=11
The Nanotechnology Initiatives developed MICRO-CHIPS - in large part, with open and hidden channels of CIA/military funding:
Nanotechnology Initiative
Fundamental nanoscale science and engineering
Principal Areas of Investigation (Fiscal year 2002) Biosystems at the Nanoscale 14% – biostructures, mimicry, bio-chips
http://209.85.173.104/search?q=cache:bJXSHXjWJhAJ:www.nano.gov/html/res/roco_aiche_48slides.pdf+Connecticut+Nanotechnology+Initiative&hl=en&ct=clnk&cd=4&gl=us
That is, 14% of the advances made by the Initiative run, in part, by Martino, were in bio-chips.
III
Mixing with the Mafia & Bush Family
In section one, Ms. Touby "explained" the early funding of MediaBistro: "My goal was to raise $1 million, even though I didn’t need half of that. ... The funding came from a venture private equity hedge fund called GOTHAM PARTNERS. A small portion of it came from MARTIN PERETZ, who owned the New Republic back then, and some of THESTREET.COM. At that time, I kept ownership of more than 70% of the company. ... "
www.nyreport.com/index.cfm
Martin
Peretz----> Not quite. The funding from Gotham Partners shakes out like this: "Party Girl Makes It Big," By Howard Kurtz, Washington Post, October 22, 2007: " ... In 1999, Touby asked her readers to contribute $100, and quickly amassed $4,500. With the dot-com boom in full force, she got $250,000 in backing from MARTY PERETZ [the "small portion"], then the New Republic's owner, and $750,000 from GOTHAM PARTNERS. ... "
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/blog/2007/10/22/BL2007102200452_pf.html
In other words, Touby, in the interview above, obfuscated the sources and percentages of MediaBistro financing with a favored MB strategy - lying.
----> Gotham, the MediaBistro investor, makes the "Hedge Fund Hall of Shame": " ... Gotham Partners, which had grown to $300 million by 2003, implode[d] in a spectacular display of business wrangling and SEC investigations. That, of course, was only the beginning. What’s worse than losing $300 million and having Eliot Spitzer breathing down your neck? Being in Pensions & Investments Magazine’s Hedge Fund Hall of Shame. ... "
http://www.02138mag.com/tribe/spotlight/762.html
Key name to know in connection with the now-defunct Gotham Partners. From NameBase:
----> Mobbed-up, CIA'ed-up WILLIAM FRIEDMAN (N.Y.LAWYER). See:
• Brewton, P. The Mafia, CIA, and George Bush.
1992 (34)• Pizzo, S. Fricker, M. Muolo, P. Inside Job. 1989 (247)
• Stein, B. A License to Steal. 1992 (78, 81-2)
http://www.namebase.org/main4/William-_28n_2Ey_2Elawyer_29-Friedman.html
----> William Friedman? - William Friedman was an executive for a failed S&L/investment house known as Southmark - a target for looting by the CIA and Mafia (seeInside Job, by Fricker, etal.):
" ... William Friedman was Southmark’s Vice Chairman ... "
http://www.fool.com/Industry/RealEstate/RealEstateWeekly.htm
This places him well within the CIA-Mafia Beebe network that included the likes of Adnan Khashoggi, Peter Munk (business partner of Khashoggi, Rupert Murdoch and GHW Bush); Stefan Halper (co-founder with fellow George Bush supporter Harvey McLean of Palmer National Bank, which was financed by H K Beebe and funneled private donations to the Contras; former son-in-law of past CIA deputy director Ray Cline); Ben Barnes (former Texas Lt. Governor); Gov. John Connally; Clint Murchison Sr.; Charles Keating, and a host of others.
SEE: http://www.jailhurwitz.com/beebe.html
---->How it Happened: The trail leading up through the arches over the Redwood courthouse steps started in the late 1960s in Gaffney, South Carolina. By 1973, at age 36, Gene Phillips filed a $30 million bankruptcy -- the largest real estate Chapter 11 in recorded South Carolina history. By 1980, Phillips had recovered, taken over the company of a former creditor, and met a talented and resourceful deal-lawyer/wheeler-dealer named WILLIAM FRIEDMAN. The two found a weakness in the financial structure of an Atlanta-based REIT. Manipulating a forgotten pool of outstanding warrants, they took control of a former affiliate of Citizens & Southern Bank, now known as Southmark. As time went on Phillips’s companies bought a company Lear Jet which was later replaced with a DC-9, and generally they flew about as high over Texas as a financier can.
"The next collapse was even more spectacular. Southmark bought San Jacinto Savings & Loan, which the regulators finally took over. Drexel Burnham ponied up with $915 million in two tranches of last-ditch financing. With that money, Phillips’s Southmark Corporation made investments that reportedly scared even Michael Milken. Finally, in 1987 Southmark wrote off over $1 billion in one month and the centerpiece to a $9 billion pile of assets headed into another bankruptcy court.
"Before that collapse, Southmark had taken over control of a number of partnerships originally syndicated by Robert McNeill, and in 1987 the principals of the wounded Southmark succeeded in rolling up four of those partnerships. They ultimately contributed most of the assets of the newly formed, AMEX-traded National Realty.
"The tale then leads to an eight-year court battle in Judge Jenkin’s court with allegations of huge fees and conflicts of interest being hurled by investors’ counsel, and rejected by those representing Phillips and his associated entities. The story involves three other publicly traded REITs controlled by Phillips’ associates, as well. The other REITs are CONTINENTAL MTG. & EQUITY TRUST (Nasdaq: CMETS), TRANSCONTINENTAL REALTY INVESTORS (NYSE: TCI), and INCOME OPPORTUNITY TRUST (AMEX: IOT). All these stocks have elements of common ownership and control with other Phillips entities. Interestingly, all have also been pretty hot performers in the first quarter of 1997, though none tied American Realty.
"NATIONAL REALTY LP UNITS ($100 MM in Market Cap) + 33%
CONTINENTAL MTG. & EQUITY TRUST (CMETS) -($66 MM) + 30%
TRANSCONTINENTAL REALTY INVESTORS (TCI) -($49 MM) + 14%
INCOME OPPORTUNITY (IOT) - ($22 MM ) + 36%
AMERICAN REALTY TRUST (ARB) - ($196 MM) + $157%"
http://www.fool.com/Industry/RealEstate/RealEstateWeekly.htm
How to Loot a Bank - The Enron Strategy : [E]xaminer R. Neal Batson, acting under the authority of a Dallas federal bankruptcy judge, concluded that Southmark created 'illusory' sales and 'phantom' profits by buying massive real-estate portfolios and selling them to limited partnerships in deals Southmark financed. Many partnerships defaulted, helping drive Southmark into bankruptcy. The report said the chairman, Mr. Phillips, and the vice chairman, Mr. FRIEDMAN, were chiefly responsible for the collapse and reaped 'substantial benefits' at Southmark's expense. These included general-partnership fees from affiliates, Southmark advances to 'insider partnerships' and personal loans. ... "
----> Follow the Money: " ... Messrs. Phillips and Friedman themselves eventually resigned from Southmark -- but only after a three-day meeting in a Dallas hotel in which board members agreed to transfer the right to advise Transcontinental and six other companies from a Southmark unit to a closely held company controlled by Messrs. Phillips and Friedman ... "
The transfers of Southmark/San Jacinto holdings take us to Cotham Partners:
----> Friedman in partnership with the Chicago Mob: National Realty and TRANSCONTINENTAL ("TRI") were picked up by Gotham Partners:
UNITED STATES DISTRICT COURT affidavit: " ... Gotham acquired a total of
approximately 1,835,000 shares of TRI (for which it paid about $10.5 million). Based upon such acquisitions, it is my understanding that Gotham presently owns approximately 21 percent of the issued and outstanding shares of TRI. ..."
http://www.secinfo.com/dREsz.5t.d.htm
Gotham Partners made a sizable profit on TRI, according the the Wall Street Journal: " ... Recent Transcontinental/Income Opportunity board moves have, if anything, shored up Mr. Phillips's control since the indictment. In June, the Transcontinental/Income Opportunity board, acting for Transcontinental, voted to lend $12 million to help Basic Capital and American Realty meet their margin calls. And in October, the same board, acting for Income Opportunity, agreed with American Realty to buy Gotham Partners' stake in Transcontinental for $16.50 a share, roughly three times what Gotham paid for it. ... "
----> After Southmark assets were looted and transferred away, misspent and otherwise evaporated into thin air: "Southmark's 2 Top Officers Step Down," New York Times, January 19, 1989: "The Southmark Corporation said today that its two top officers and major shareholders, Gene E. Phillips and WILLIAM S. FRIEDMAN, had resigned from the ailing real estate and financial services company and several affiliates. ... "
But the disgraced officers of Southmark were handsomely rewarded:
" ... In return for stepping down, a move that industry experts said would appease Southmark's creditors, the men will not only retain their 21.7 percent share of the company's stock, but will also have five years to repay a $10 million personal loan from Southmark that was due last month. ...
'''It looks like a substantial part of their empire will remain in their hands,' said Jon A. Fosheim, the president of Green Street Advisers Inc., an investment research group based in Newport Beach, Calif. ... Under the settlement, which Southmark said had been made to avoid potential litigation, Mr. Phillips and Mr. Friedman will continue to control hundreds of millions of dollars in assets held by realty trusts and partnerships."
http://query.nytimes.com/gst/fullpage.html?res=950DE3DE123DF93AA25752C0A96F948260&sec=&spon=&pagewanted=print
----> Southmark owned San Jacinto Savings lead to Keating, Silverado and the Bush family:
"San Jacinto, a subsidiary of the Dallas-based real-estate investment firm Southmark Funding, is now on the verge of collapse. When San Jacinto topples, federal regulators say its bailout could cost taxpayers more than the estimated $2 billion that was paid to bail out Charles Keating's Lincoln Savings of Irvine, Calif., which urrently holds the honor of being the most expensive S&L failure.
"Brewton reports that in September 1988 an S&L regulator in Dallas wrote to Darrel Dochow, a federal bank regulator, expressing concerns about the "significant number and volume" of loans between Silverado Savings of Denver (Neil Bush's failed S&L) and M.D.C. Holdings of Denver (owned by Colorado GOP fundraiser Larry Miezel) and between San Jacinto Savings of Houston and Lincoln Savings of Irvine, Calif. The regulator also said he was concerned about "the apparent shifting of such loans among those institutions."
http://christiancommonlaw-gov.org/pipermail/conspiracywatch_christiancommonlaw-gov.org/2007-April/000377.html
----> Another name to know - The Mafia's JOSEPH GROSZ, who was employed by THOMAS GAUBERT: "Chicago mob associate; worked for Gouletas family; ran Southmark's San Jacinto Savings; director of THOMAS GAUBERT's Telecom."
http://209.85.173.104/search?q=cache:81yjVNH7ARYJ:osdir.com/ml/culture.discuss.cia-drugs/2005-11/msg00018.html+southmark+and+%22inside+job%22&rfp=dta
----> SO THE MOB'S JOE GROSZ WORKED FOR THOMAS GAUBERT - A FORMER BOARD MEMBER OF THE CENTER FOR DEMOCRACY - A CIA FRONT modeled after the American Family Foundation, another CIA front: "FUNDING: The Center claims that its funding comes from private sector members of its board of directors, individual donations, foundations and corporations, and the Agency for International Development (AID)." (AID is a major CIA conduit and fronts for Agency covert operations, and the same can be said for NED, below, another major funder of the Center.) Specific financial information on the Center is not available, but it is believed that a major portion of the Center's funding comes from AID. In 1988 the Center received $465,000 to support the "institutional and logistical development of the National Congress of Guatemala." This AID funded project agreement with the Center ran through July 1990 and involved total funding from AID of $1,765,000. The AID agreement included $236,174 in matching funds from the Center, bringing the total for the 3-year project in Guatemala to more than $2 million. (6,9) The Center also received $250,000 from AID for election monitoring activities during the 1990 Nicaraguan elections. In 1989 the Center also received $75,000 from the NED for election monitoring and observation of the Nicaraguan elections.
SOURCE GROUPWATCH, http://rightweb.irc-online.org/gw/1585.html
----> On the Mob's Mr. Grosz and the
genesis of the San Jacinto/Bush family connections:" ... In another Chicago suburb, Chicagoan Joe Grosz, alleged to be a mob associate, bought control of Home Savings of Waukegan with $1 million he was accused of fraudulently obtaining from a Kansas S&L that failed.
The lawsuit against Grosz alleges he and others persuaded the Home Savings board to spend S&L money on junk bonds of Las Vegas casinos, financed through Michael Milkin's Drexel Burnham Lambert empire, investments which lost millions.
"The Chicago law firm that approved these transactions had a partner named Herbert L. Stern, Jr., husband of Democratic State Sen. Grace Mary Stern. He's a defendant in the lawsuit against Grosz and others.
"Grosz is an Illinois link to the notorious national S&L scandal involving Charles Keating, Herman Beebee and other convicted criminals. He's been convicted of bank fraud at San Jacinto S&L in Houston, which he ran for Beebee's Southmark Co.
"The law firm sued in civil court over losses at San Jacinto S&L is Akin, Gump, Strauss, Hauer & Feld, where former chairman of the Democratic National Committee Robert Strauss is a partner. Strauss also was a business partner with James A. Baker III and friend of former President George Bush, who named him U.S. Ambassador to Moscow.
"Though such links could keep an army of investigators busy for decades, the Resolution Trust Corporation went out of business on December 31, turning its files over to the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation. That agency could drop the lawsuit against Hyde, and is said to be unlikely to investigate Illinois any further.
"The RTC records on the failed S&Ls, seized when they took over the institutions, were boxed up and sent to a Kansas City warehouse more than a year ago. A freedom of information request to the RTC asking about the fate of these records has never received a response. ... "
http://www.monitor.net/monitor/2-18-96/hydecharged.html
----> Gotham Partners owns Crescent Investments, which oversees GW Bush's blind trust. Richard Rainwater is at Crescent/Gotham, and is close to Bush:
" ... Rainwater founded Columbia Healthcare, which merged with HCA and became the country's biggest for-profit hospital company (Scott was later forced out as CEO amid a federal fraud investigation). Even George W. Bush kept an office, when he and Rainwater were putting together the Texas Rangers stadium deal. ... "
http://money.cnn.com/magazines/fortune/fortune_archive/2005/12/26/8364646/
----> BTW, who is Thomas Gaubert of Telecom, which employed the Mafia's Joe Grosz: " ... big Democratic fundraiser from Dallas; former head of Independent American Savings, which purchased 20 branch offices from Hurwitz' USAT; owned a piece of Sandia Federal Savings in Albuquerque; head of Telecom; A right-wing flag waver. ... "
http://www.jailhurwitz.com/beebe.html
Chairman Quits At Telecom
September 22, 1992
The Telecom Corporation, a Dallas-based maker of equipment for the food, pharmaceutical and chemical industries, announced yesterday that Thomas M. Gaubert had resigned as chairman, chief executive and a director effective last Friday.
Gaubert steps down fromTelecom: " ... The company said the resignation had been prompted by recent federal indictments involving Mr. Gaubert. Larry Marek, a company spokesman, would not provide details of the indictments yesterday ... "
http://query.nytimes.com/gst/fullpage.html?res=9E0CE2DC1231F931A1575AC0A964958260
----> On Gotham founder William Ackman: "Bill Ackman is the managing member and portfolio manager of Pershing Square Capital Management, L.P., a concentrated research-intensive fundamental value investor in long and occasionally short investments in the public markets, with assets under management of approximately $6 billion. Pershing Square has played an active role in creating value at companies including Wendy’s International, McDonalds, Ceridian Corporation, and Sears Canada."
http://www.hedgefundintelligence.com/Event.aspx?ProductID=7086&ElementID=5198
----> BTW, Gotham-owned Ceridian is "Scandal-Plagued": "Ceridian Fires Exec for Passing Secrets to Hedge Fund " ... between activist funds and the management and boards of their targets. Ceridian Corporation, the scandal-plagued payroll-services company, announced on Monday ... "
http://www.cfonet.com/search/?author=&qr=ceridian&sort=date_desc&source=all
----> "Affable" Richard Rainwater is the 335th wealthiest person in the world, according to Forbes:
#335 Richard Rainwater
Age: 61
Fortune: self made
Source: Investments
Country Of Citizenship: United States
Residence: Fort Worth, Texas, United States, North America
Industry: Finance
Marital Status: married, 3 children
University of Texas Austin, Bachelor of Arts / Science
Stanford University, Master of Business Administration
Affable investor got start managing BASS FAMILY'S $50 million portfolio in 1970; lost money first 2 years, better tidings buying large Disney stake in 1984. Left 2 years later, cofounded Columbia Hospital 1987; bought Thomas Frist's (see) Hospital Corp. of America 1994. Recently shedding certain assets: "Natural resources and oil have been good to me, but the big money to be made in those sectors is all over." Owns 7.5% of beleaguered telecom GLOBAL CROSSING, chairs CRESCENT Real Estate Equities; REIT owns 75 office buildings in Houston, Dallas. Wife, Darla Moore, dealmaker in her own right, managing sizable assets since 1994; donated more than $70 million to U. of South Carolina's business school.
http://www.forbes.com/lists/2006/10/EKO5.html
RAINWATER IS RESPONSIBLE FOR BUSH'S WEALTH: "What George does to make a Bush buck is called "Crony Capitalism" by commentatorJim Hightower. Case in point: Dubya's financial relationship with RICHARD RAINWATER during his tenure as Texas governor. ... It's well known that Rainwater has been a major financial backer of Bush's political career, but it's a little-known fact that he's also largely responsible for Bush's personal wealth. He's put Bush into various profitable deals, from oil and gas to real estate, but the big one was the Texas Rangers baseball franchise. Rainwater and Bush sold the baseball team to another Texas high roller and Bush campaign contributer, billionaire Tom Hicks. But their relationship didn't stop there. When Bush became Guv in '95, he put all but his Texas Rangers stock into a blind trust managed by--surprise--Rainwater. Hightower implies the financial relationship wasn't a one-way street: 'Bush is nothing if not loyal to Rainwater, who has done very nicely while his pal has been governor. Among the favors Rainwater has enjoyed: *State buildings sold to Rainwater's real estate company at bargain basement rates; *State college and public school funds invested in Rainwater's company; *A Bush-sponsored tax cut that failed, but would have cut millions in annual taxes for Rainwater; and *A stadium-financing bill backed by Bush that gave a $10 million bonus payment to a Rainwater company.' Politex, May 1999"
http://www.bushwatch.com/bushmillions.html
IV
MediaBistro.Com and the Omaha, Franklin Cover-Up Connection
Now it gets really interesting ...
Names
to keep an eye out for in this entry - linking MediaBistro indirectly
but tellingly to the death of Theresa Duncan - are in caps: We recall
that Theresa Duncan was about to tie Jim Cownie to the OMAHA scandal,
which revolved around one LARRY KING, a high-profile CIA-Republican and
pedophile, when she decided to "suicide." Cownie founded Iowa's
Heritage Communications at the behest of the CIA's Tom Murphy
(CapCities' founder), the company that went on to become TCI, bought
out by Rupert Murdoch and in turn acquired by AT&T. See:
http://alexconstantine.blogspot.com/2007/08/murder-of-theresa-duncan-jim-cownie.html)King's stolen millions were channeled through FIRSTIER BANK. (Stephen PIzzo's Inside Job: The Looting of America's Saving & Loans details the multitude of CIA-Mafia hands behind the S&L heists of the '80s.)
The following string of connections alone constitute the motive for MediaBistro's continuous defamations of the late Theresa Duncan - protecting other CIA-Republicans (and a smattering of political mongrels from the upper-tiers of the Democratic Party) figures, not just Cownie, from exposure in the Omaha case, especially DAVID E. WIT OF CECI (CALIFORNIA ENERGY)/LOGICAT:
MediaBistro.com -> Logicat -> CECI/AT&T -> FirsTier -> Larry King.
MediaBistro's Kate Coe, a producer at Murdoch's NewsCorp., a fascist CIA state propaganda network, snickers at Theresa's Omaha allegations - even concerning missing children and child prostitution networks - a comprehensive job of defamation based on misrepresentation and ridicule ... and the web site that she writes for is but a couple of short steps from the Franklin Credit Union scandal, by way of key business connections.
There is severe conflict-of-interest in MediaBistro's reporting on the "suicide" of Theresa Duncan.
We turn to ...
----> OMER ALGAR, Chief
Technology Officer & Chief Operating Officer at
MediaBistro.Com. Mr. Algar Hails from LOGICAT, Inc.
"Omer,
our chief technologist and our chief operating officer, is responsible
for maintaining and growing mediabistro.com. ... Formerly at LOGICAT,
INC., he managed the development and operations of educational data
services, including the College Board's Enrollment Planning Service and
Predictor Plus. He grew up in lovely Istanbul, finished high school at
Robert College, and then came to the U.S. to earn a B.A. degree in
computer science and economics from Hamilton College."http://www.interbiznet.com/ern/archives/070718.html
----> Logicat was Founded by DAVID WIT
----> ANOTHER AT&T CONNECTION
(We've seen AT&T ties earlier, and I will group them in an
upcoming
section): Mr. Wit's stepdad is Michael I. Sovern, president of Columbia
U. and a director of AT&T since 1995 - " ... Michael I. Sovern,
director since 1984, the former president of Columbia University who
established Joseph Califano's CASA at Columbia. ... "http://www.smokershistory.com/cummins.htm
Herbert A. Allen" ... Mr. Wit, a summa cum laude graduate of Hamilton (note that Mr. Algar graduated from Hamilton, too), where he was elected to Phi Beta Kappa, is a co-founder and the managing partner at Logicat Inc., a software and test development company in New York. His mother is a sculptor. His father is a managing director at Allen & Company, investment bankers in New York (named for Herbert A. Allen, a director of The Coca-Cola Company since 1982). His stepfather, Michael I. Sovern, is the president of Columbia University. ... "
http://query.nytimes.com/gst/fullpage.html?res=950DE5DA113CF933A05754C0A96F948260
----> "David E. Wit 32. Mr. Wit has been a director of CECI since April 1987. He is co-founder and Co-Chief Executive Officer of Logicat, Inc., a software development/publishing firm. Prior to working at Logicat, Inc. Mr. Wit worked at E.M. Warburg, Pincus & Company, where he analyzed seed-stage financing and technology investments."
OMAHA CONNECTION
----> The principal executive offices of CECI and CE Sub [CALENERGY] are located at 10831 Old Mill Road, Omaha, Nebraska. [THIS IS ALSO THE ADDRESS OF THE MIDLAND BIG BROTHERS, BIG SISTERS CHAPTER - https://www.kintera.org/site/apps/ka/sd/donor.asp?c=khLOKXPFLqF&b=3599395&en=oiJPJVMEIbIIKTPyFbKYIfNLKfJPKWNDJjISL0OKInJ7G - chilling in light of King & Co.'s pedophilic interactions with children from Boystown, as described by John DeCamp in The Franklin Cover-Up]
David E. Wit 32 Director.
http://www.newsmakingnews.com/archive7,24,00,7,29,00.htm
DAVID E. WIT, Director. Mr. Wit has been a director of CalEnergy since
April 1987.
http://www.secinfo.com/dsvrn.8sh.d.htm
----> THE NEBRASKA CONNECTION - AN EXPLOSIVE IMBROGLIO SHARED BY DICK CHENEY AND THE BUSH FAMILY
by Linda Minor
... According to John DeCamp, FirsTier
Bank "was the bank Larry King's
pilfered $40 million passed through, without anybody batting an eye."
In 1987-88, at the time of the Franklin Credit Union scandal was
revealed, there were two men serving on the board of FirsTier
Financial, Inc. who were also directors of a company called Valmont
Industries--Robert H. Daugherty and William F. Welsh II.Note below that Thomas F. Madison is also on the board of US West Communications - a board on which Cheney sits. Also interesting is the fact that Lloyd P. Johnson serves on the board of Cargill and Norwest. Charles M. Harper is on the ConAgra board, as is Walter Scott, Jr., who also serves on the board of Berkshire Hathaway and Burlington Resources. A recent makeup of Valmont's board is shown below.
Burlington Resources is a company affiliated with the Burlington Railroad, formerly the Atchison, Topeka and Santa Fe in St. Louis. The Bush and Walker families have been closely connected to this company. Walter Scott, Jr. was on the FirsTier board in 1987 and has been on Valmont since 198, as well as on Burlington Resources and other boards. [Click. Note 2] He currently is on the board of Mid American Energy, sitting alongside a man with a fascinating resume, named Sir Neville G. Trotter, JP., DL., FCA, FRAeS, 67. [Click. Note 3]
Another thing that stands out is the obvious connection between the FirsTier Financial and Peter Kiewit Sons, Inc. The latter company controls the Kiewit Royalty Trust, which was created under a Trust Indenture dated May 17, 1982 by Peter Kiewit Sons', Inc., a Delaware corporation to provide "an efficient, orderly and practical means for the administration of income received from certain royalty and overriding royalty interests in certain coal leases." The Trust has no active plan of business operation and was set up to distribute income to holders of Units. (The trustee of the Trust is First Bank, National Association ("Trustee"), Omaha, Nebraska, which is a wholly owned subsidiary of First Bank System, Inc., a registered bank holding company. First Bank, National Association is a successor to FirsTier Bank N.A. Omaha, as a result of the merger of FirsTier Financial Inc., the parent holding company of the former trustee, with and into First Bank System, Inc.
FirsTier was also closely tied to California Energy and Magma Power Co. (a Nevada corporation). In a 1995 proxy statement for MAGMA POWER COMPANY, 4365 Executive Drive, Suite 900, San Diego, California 92121 a meeting to be held in Omaha, Nebraska, was announced by chairman David Sokol at which Magma stockholders would consider and vote upon a proposal to approve the Agreement and Plan of Merger, dated as of December 5, among Magma, California Energy Company, Inc. ("CECI") and CE Acquisition Company, Inc., a wholly owned subsidiary of CECI ("CE Sub"), pursuant to which CE Sub will be merged with and into Magma (the "Merger"). The statement also contained the following information: Kiewit Energy Company ("Kiewit Energy"), a wholly owned subsidiary of Peter Kiewit Sons', Inc. ("PKS"), is an approximate 43% stockholder (on a fully diluted basis) in CECI.
PKS, a Delaware corporation, is a large employee-owned company which had approximately $2.2 billion in revenues in 1993 from its interests in construction, mining, energy and telecommunications. PKS is one of the largest construction companies in North America and has been in the construction business since 1884. PKS is a joint venture participant in a number of CECI's international private power projects.
The principal executive offices of CECI and CE Sub are located at 10831 Old Mill Road, Omaha, Nebraska 68154 and their telephone number is (402)330-8900. CE Sub is a wholly owned subsidiary of CECI and has not conducted any business except in connection with the Offer. CECI and CE Sub were incorporated in 1971 and 1994, respectively, under the laws of the State of Delaware. The principal executive offices of PKS are located at 1000 Kiewit Plaza, Omaha, Nebraska 68131, and its telephone number is (402) 342-2052. PKS was incorporated in 1941 under the laws of the State of Delaware. The board of directors of Magma are as follows ... Director Walter Scott, Jr. 62 Director Barton W. Shackelford 73 Director DAVID E. WIT 32 Director. ...
http://www.newsmakingnews.com/lmnebraskaconnection.htm
----> Related - FirsTier and the Iran contra scandal, see: CIA AND ORGANIZED CRIME FRONTS DURING THE IRAN-CONTRA ERA AND CONTINUING (D. Wit mention)
http://www.mail-archive.com/ctrl@listserv.aol.com/msg49545.html
TO BE CONTINUED
