"Serve Us" PEUs & TechGods

The Guardian reported:

For the past 100 years, US consumers have powered the US economy, their $21tn in annual spending supported by the business ethos that the “customer is king.” Today, that idea is as outdated as a Norman Rockwell painting, say consumer activists, historians, analysts, executives and customers themselves. 

Instead, consumers are bearing the brunt of sweeping developments in the business landscape. Decades of mergers have limited consumer options. Companies are so big they can push industry-friendly regulation and charge what they want, safe in the knowledge that disgruntled customers have nowhere to go. 

With customers stuck and competitors gone, companies can raise prices without improving customer satisfaction.

Ding, ding, ding...  does anyone know why?  

Private equity underwriters (PEU) rolled up companies in industry after industry.  PEUs make profits from flipping those companies after mining them for cash via fees and special dividends/distributions.  

TechGods brought our country abysmal customer service and plan take what little human element remained and outsource it to AI.  

Both PEUs and TechGods utilized their political power to achieve those "industry friendly regulations." Alongside the rise in private equity came the term "policy making billionaire."  It's a  position powerful enough to repeatedly keep private equity's highly unpopular preferred "carried interest" taxation.  

Just as Founding Father Thomas Jefferson used his slaves for collateral for a loan, the greed and leverage boys use their accrued carried interest for the same purpose.

So what is being pushed by the powerful today?  

Legislation is under consideration that would provide legal protection for software developers (rapidly moving to AI).  Does AI care about human trafficking?  Catholic Priests do, as should any decent human being.

Just as elected officials do not care what the public thinks, corporate executives and their investment sponsors care not about the customer, internal or external  I saw it first hand at several healthcare companies. 

Politicians Red & Blue love PEU and their new TechGod brethren.  Increasingly, more are one and for that so many suffer.  

IMF Nominee is PEU

Trump II nominated Rebekah Jurata for U.S. Executive Director of the International Monetary Fund (IMF).  Jurata is currently General Counsel for the American Investment Council, the private equity underwriter (PEU) lobbying organization (formerly named the Private Equity Growth Capital Council).

Turn over a rock in Washington, D.C. and one is liable to find a tax hating PEU.

 Trump II also nominated a tax attorney who represents investment firms for a key IRS position.

President Trump has chosen James Gadwood, a tax attorney who has represented energy companies, hospitality companies and investment firms, to be the top lawyer at the Internal Revenue Service and Assistant General Counsel in the Department of the Treasury.

Things just keep getting sweeter for the greed and leverage boys as their kind are likely further embedded in the IMF and IRS!

Politicians Red and Blue love PEU and their new TechGod brethren.  Increasingly, more are one. 

Fishback to Pay Greenlight's Attorney Fees

A judge ruled that James Fishback, current candidate for Florida Governor and former temporary Fed governor candidate, must pay his former employer's attorney fees/costs, roughly $1.3 million.  

Greenlight Capital sued Fishback for violations of their employment contract and had been awarded $229,000 in damages as a result of confidentiality breaches.  The firm had U.S. Marshals seize James' assets to fulfill that obligation. 

Fishback gave up his Azoria stock and trustees for two of Azoria's funds voted to liquidate as a result of James' behavior.  

James Fishback, a former DOGE advisor, is part of the nest of vipers that slither through Trump II's White House and the confines of Mar-a-Lago.  Fortunately, Trump's pardon power does not apply to civil judgements.

That said, MAGA can throw big money at connected insiders.  The question is this.  Has James Fishback dropped to Rudy Guiliani levels within the political Red Team?

Watch Fishback's next moves.  They will be instructive.  

The Hollowing: Part Trois

Private equity underwriters (PEU) have long leveraged political connections to make big money off Uncle Sam's wallet.  TechGods noticed and abandoned their Libertarian leanings to support Trump II's orgy of greed.  Put all that together and we have the new U.S. state sponsored enterprise.

The people of Albania recognize a crap sandwich when placed before them.  They do not want their natural resources apportioned for the super rich, the aforementioned PEUs and TechGods.  Thus, they want a new government.  A Guardian story described the revolt as:

a spasm of disgust over the perceived excesses of "a rotten oligarchic class"

Not so, here at home where politicians Red & Blue love PEU and their new TechGod brethren.  The Undersecretary of War founded Cerberus Capital.  The Secretary of Army ran Flex Capital.  

Trump's older boys scattered their equity seeds across the defense industry landscape and Pete Hegseth's Department of War is personally doing the watering with his alcohol tainted urine.  

The Trump's contempt for basic ethical norms, practices and requirements could not be more clear.  Jared Kushner's financial disclosure is months past the deadline.  His last filing was in early 2021.  Jared's father has been able to submit three since his ambassador appointment under Trump II.

The federal government has gone from writing tax/other laws preferential to PEU's and spending money on products/services provided by PEU affiliates to providing capital for equity stakes in specific enterprises.  

Elected officials have funded this boondoggle via debt for decades and Trump II is spending like there is no tomorrow.  I expect the insatiable PEU boys and their disfigured TechGod twins to win again here in the U.S.  

That said, I can cheer loudly for the Albanians in their fight against Affinity Partners and Atlantic Incubation Partners.  Three cheers for the Pink Flamingo revolution.  Yay, yay, yay!!!

The Hollowing: Part Deux

Yesterday I posted a piece on "societal permission" for TechGods to create an economy without working people.  Those pesky employees actually give feedback when their workplace turns into a sci-fi nightmare.

As part of Zuckerberg’s all-in AI push, Meta announced it would fire ten percent of its workforce, or nearly 8,000 employees, leaving many uncertain about their future. The company is also demanding that employees produce more than ever by using AI agents and coding tools as much as possible, with AI usage now a factor in performance reviews.

People can only take so much and the lopsided deal has gone on for far too long. 

Insatiable TechGods copied the private equity underwriter (PEU) playbook which pushes incapable technology as a replacement for headcount reduction.  PEUs have a long history of crapifying workplaces and decreasing product/service quality. 

Disabled people can wait to get their motorized wheelchairs fixed and water for AI should be prioritized over "baseline human comfort."

Of course Bezos is talking his own book.  If its water you want Jeff, there are oceans all around.  I'm sure you have a great view of it from your Miami penthouse.  

In West Texas you can have all the frac water you want.  Technology exists for desalination and detoxifying produced water from oil wells.  Apply that intelligence to Prometheus' cooling resources needs.

Better yet, Jeff, use that intelligence to stop Amazon related scams.  

Here's a sci-fi nightmare.  

A driverless car stalks a 76 year old woman as she is funding her granddaughter's child harm lawsuit against Meta, facebook's owner. 

The car's onboard computer posts a scam AI video to the woman's facebook account.  It's an AI fake of Bill Gates pushing a dementia curing supplement based on honey from Turkey/Nepal.  The woman buys the product as she has experienced more confusion of late.  

The product arrives within its one hour promised delivery time.  No signature is required so the driver rings the doorbell and leaves the package on the front doormat.  The driverless car monitors the woman's Ring camera as it waits for the woman to come to the door.  It revs the engine, drops into gear and floors the gas.  After bending over to pick up the package the woman sees the approaching vehicle and turns to run into her home.  

Her storm door is heavy and she struggles to get it open.  In a panic she tosses the package at the driverless car.  A chip with the tiny gyroscope inside the package voids the woman's product warranty as this major movement occurred post delivery.

The driverless vehicle shifts into "off-road" mode which elevates the undercarriage giving it greater ground clearance.  It climbs her two level brick stairs and slams into the back of her legs.  Bricks shatter, the door frame collapses and the woman is pinned under the vehicle, which shifts out of "off-road" mode, increasing the weight on her chest.  Unable to breathe, she is dead within minutes.  The driverless car sends a message to the entity that gave it the assignment.   

Meta's defense attorneys jack up the motions driving up the cost of the granddaughter's lawsuit.  Their aim is make it so expensive for the plaintiff that they cannot afford to proceed with the 76 year old woman's money tied up in the estate.  In the meantime, Meta executives are working on a law that would exempt social media providers from child harm lawsuits.

That's one less person needing cooling resources for baseline human comfort, the new TechGod name for potable water.  

And these are the people elected officials cater to?  Sickening.

Politicians Red & Blue love PEU and their new TechGod brethren.  Increasingly, more are one.  

The Hollowing: TechGod's AI Warning

Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella stated:   

"There is no societal permission for an AI future that hollows out entire industries."

This is fifteen years after a former major business reporter wrote:

There are very few people out there who will talk and write honestly about private equity. I know from personal experience that the financial press is so eager to break news on "deals" that reporters (who are increasingly compensated on the number of "market moving stories" they write) can't afford to be critical of Carlyle, KKR and Blackstone, and risk losing access to people at those firms.

I have seen so many people -- particularly those in their 50s - 70s -- taken apart by what has happened in their industry as greed has hollowed out the economy. These are people took pride in their jobs and held themselves to this invisible standard that we all just took for granted, but is being wiped out.

Private equity underwriters (PEU) were later joined by TechGods in leveraging political influence and tapping Uncle Sam's wallet.  

Together they are behind the data center boom that is impacting many of the very areas private equity previously hollowed out.  Below is one example:

The United States Army has conditionally selected Carlyle Group and CyrusOne to enter exclusive negotiations to develop and operate hyperscale data centers on Army installations, marking a significant step in expanding artificial intelligence and digital infrastructure capabilities. 

The projects will be located at Fort Bliss and Dugway Proving Ground, spanning approximately 1,384 acres and 1,201 acres, respectively. Under the arrangement, the selected firms will finance, build, operate, maintain, and eventually decommission the facilities on underutilized Army land, with no upfront cost to taxpayers.

Army Secretary Dan Driscoll is a former PEU with Flex Capital. 

The Carlyle Group is returning to a heavy focus on defense contractors calling the space "unlimited."  Carlyle cut its teeth flipping defense contractors and is ecstatic about the new global phenomenon of war making.

The Army poisoned thousands of sheep in Utah from a nerve gas test gone wrong at Dugway Proving Ground in 1968.  A nozzle failure was cited at the cause.  

Should nearby residents be concerned about error filled AI coming to Dugway?  How about Fort Bliss which not long ago closed the airspace over El Paso due to invading drones?  

No one gave permission for the PEU hollowing out of the U.S. economy, yet it happened anyway.  Part II is being facilitated by a hand's off Congress and an enabling Chief Executive.  Trump II recently said:

"The one that they're crazy about is AI. So if you want to say one thing, AI, and just hope that it works. You better hope!"

"Hope that it works,"  I believe we have Trump II's campaign slogan for 2028. 

Update:  "They beat their plowshares into swords and garbage AI turned their brains into mush, all so billionaires could become trillionaires."

Here endeth the lesson.

Update 6-22-26:  

Futurism reported on a Harvard Business Review study:

Companies that went all-in on using generative AI tools are developing a major “workslop” problem. 

...over-relying on AI can prove disastrous for organizational knowledge, the critical business insights companies need to make strategic decisions. The phenomenon, dubbed “knowledge decay,” describes the deterioration of information over time, marked by workers forgetting skills and organizations relying on outdated processes. 

In the context of AI, it can be a dangerous downward spiral that starts with workers using AI to produce low-quality work, which wastes colleagues’ time, erodes trust, and gradually sloppifies organizational knowledge into worthless soup. 

Multiply that by entire departments, and a business’s outputs start to crumble as well.

I expect TechGods to blame their abject product failures on workers and a society that would not give them permission.  

Accountability disappears under AI, the tinker toy of TechGods, PEUs and political insiders.  

AI Defends Corporate Ownership Error

It's common for AI to put out inaccurate information and it did so once again regarding Humana's percentage ownership of Gentiva Hospice, which it is finally ditching.  

I asked Gemini why their AI  published the wrong percentage and it told me I was confusing Humana's 40% equity stake with Gentiva's operating in 35 states.  Who knew Gemini wrote comedy?  I did have a hearty laugh, albeit at Gemini's expense.

For over two years Humana's 10-K has clearly stated the company owned approximately 35% of Gentiva Hospice.  40% is a historical figure from their deal with TPG and Welsh, Carson, Anderson & Stowe (WCAS).  It also was the original percentage when Humana sold 60% of Gentiva to Clayton, Dubilier & Rice (CDR) in August 2022. 

A Humana 10-K filing stated "at December 31, 2023 we owned approximately 35%."  That 35% has remained constant for fiscal years ended December 2024 and 2025.

Gemini wrote that Humana's recent press release stated this 40% figure.  Google could not find that in the actual press release, which only state "minority interest."

AI cited Hospice News as its source.  Therein lies the problem.  That publication has been a longtime disappointment for hospice workers wanting some help in challenging greedy management.  

Private equity underwriters (PEU) found hospice long ago and have been playing an accumulation/spinoff/IPO game   I lived it at Gentiva after Humana et al bought Kindred at Home in June 2018.  It was highly distasteful, even cruel.  

Politicians Red & Blue love PEU and their TechGod brethren, who together bring us garbage AI, hyperscale data centers and an inattention to actual feedback.  The little people are supposed to take what they give us.  

Therefore, I must apologize to Gemini for mixing up the 40% ownership number from 2022 with the number of states Gentiva operates within.  I promise to forget the more up to date information in Humana's SEC filings.  Now, doesn't everyone feel better in our new irreality?    

This situation is not a runaway Waymo vehicle or targeting a girl's school on day 1 of Trump II's disastrous war with Iran, but it does not lead me to use AI again.  And for that I am truly grateful.