Never Hear Disclosures Because They're Never Stated

Former Congressman Ron Paul spoke to the insidious nature of what I call the Government-Corporate Monstrosity, Dwight Eisenhower's MIlitary-Industrial Complex engorged by trillions in federal steroids.  Dr. Paul targeted the media: 

"Some of these major (television) stations, their consultants about the military or foreign policy..you know they've been in the Pentagon but now are with some manufacturing firm.  You never hear the disclosures there." Ron Paul, MD.

In addition to manufacturing firms, there are their owners, many private equity underwriters (PEU's).

Take Frances Townsend. a Homeland Security Advisor to CNN.   She proved her incompetence from a public accountability standpoint with her hapless White House Lessons Learned Report on Hurricane Katrina.  Who leaves out the hospital with the highest death toll, 35 deaths in Tenet's Memorial Medical Center?  Townsend did in February 2006.  Roughly one year later Jeb Bush was added to the Tenet's Board of Directors.  Twenty five of those deaths belonged to LifeCare Hospitals, owned by The Carlyle Group.

As for what's never disclosed, Fran sits on the board or advises SIGA Technologies, Scientific Games, DRS Technologies, SAP NS2, MacAndrews  Forbes, and Monument Capital. Monument Capital specializes in buying and selling homeland security oriented companies.

NPR hosted Former Ambassador Tom Pickering, recently seen defending Hillary Clinton on Benghazi.  NPR wanted Pickering's perspective on Egypt's implosion into chaos.  Pickering is co-chairman of the International Crisis Group, a nonprofit group established in 1995 to inform on global conflicts.

"Any commercial or economic crisis creates business opportunity." - Frances Townsend on CNN

As Fran noted, with crisis comes opportunity.  Pickering is a Strategic Advisor at NGP Energy Capital Management.  The Carlyle Group invested in NGP in December 2012.

In early 2010, NGP Energy Capital Management initiated the formation of NGP Global Adaptation Partners, which focuses on evaluating investments in two sectors linked to the need for the world to Adapt to a changing planet: Water Resources & Services and the Food & Agriculture industries.

Dr. Paul is correct.  Red and Blue love PEU and neither see a reason to disclose. 

CGI "Confesses" Past Transgressions to Create More in Future

The NYT ran a piece on "conflicts of interest" at the Clinton Global Initiative.  Let's be clear, the Clinton's, like the Bush's before them, live in a perpetual conflict of interest stew.  Bill Clinton's wealth potential is now magnified by Hillary's outsized speaking fees to the KKR's and Teneo's of the world.  Bill and Hillary give corporate and private capital chieftains access to Blue team officials, while Jeb and company cover the Reds. 

The NYT story is a fake "come clean, we'll start running Bill's baby professionally" story.  It sets the Clinton's up to reload CGI to ride Hillary's already ethically challenged wave and build Chelsea's credibility as a power broker for corporations.  Somehow the NYT couldn't find Chelsea's board seat at IAC.

Update 11-29-14:  Hillary's $300,000 speech at UCLA benefits the family foundation and reveals the disturbing aspects of America's Goverment-Corporate Monstrostity (GCM)

Update 9-6-15:  As the Clinton's move forward it can be instructive to look back. 

Update 11-5-16:  As far back as 2008 CGI leaders knew of ethical conflicts and failed to address them.

Carlyle Group Wants to Earn Fees on Everyone's Money

Carlyle Group co-founder David Rubenstein stated in his PEU's 2nd Quarter earnings call:

"We will slow down fundraising only when every single person on the face of the earth is already a Carlyle investor. Until that, we're not going to slow down."

It's another good line for Carlyle's biggest salesman and apologist.  Post-financial crisis Rubenstein compared easy credit to being "like sex," where seasoned financial experts couldn't say no.   How many on the "face of the earth" will recall this before plucking a portion of their hard earned retirement money into Carlyle PEU?  It would help Carlyle's billionaire founding troika grow their already sizable mountains of cash in retirement.

For some reason the Washington Business Journal writer heard "face of Europe."  Anyway, the pressure's on for Blackstone's Stephen Schwarzman to out joke his peer and competitor.  It's a PEU world, one with a darkly comedic side.  

Carlyle's Arabian Image Polish

Arabian Business had its choice of Reuters stories to publish on The Carlyle Group's second quarter:

1.  Abu Dhabi-backed Carlyle Group returns to profit in Q2 

2.  Carlyle profit misses estimates; prospects for U.S. deals poor

Guess which one it ran on behalf of One Carlyle, now up to $180.4 billion in management.  If you chose #1 you have some understanding of how the PEU game is played.  The journalist who wrote #2 diminished his chances of getting an interview with a Carlyle co-founder or a hot PEU lead from their image obsessed PR people.

PEU's Looking to Moms and Pops

Barron's gave Carlyle Group co-founder David Rubenstein a stage to sell PEU investments to the little people.  Rubenstein is likely grateful to Barron's Chad Dowling for the free ad.  :

What's the logic behind widening the investor base to nonaccredited investors?

Today, if you are to be an accredited investor, you need to have roughly $1 million of net worth or about $250,000 of annual income. The theory is if you have that much money, you are reasonably sophisticated. But that is a little unfair. Let's suppose you inherited $10 million, but that you aren't attuned to financial markets. You can put your money into a private-equity fund because you are an accredited investor. Now let's say you are a public-school teacher, you don't earn much, and you are not an accredited investor. But you know markets, which you studied in college. It is unfair that this person, who is very smart and sophisticated but doesn't have a high net worth, can't get the benefit of a higher rate of return. And that person probably needs the higher rate of return more than the wealthier person does. There is going to be political pressure on the government, including the Securities and Exchange Commission, to modify the types of people who can go into these products. 

The political pressure will come from the PEUniverse, not the small investor.  The Rubenstein's of the world want to cash in their PEU stakes and may need little people to again enrich them handsomely (BankUnited, Boston Private, Booz Allen Hamilton are but a few Carlyle affiliates benefiting from Uncle Sam's largess). 

WaPo Paper to Bezos, Graham to Pick New PEU Name

Amazon founder Jeff Bezos will buy The Washington Post newspaper and associated digital content.  The company trading as WPO will pick a new name.  Bezos promised not to change the newspaper's values.  That means not writing about Bilderberg while in attendance at the event, even when the meeting is in WaPo's backyard and Donal Graham is in attendance.

I don't want Donald Graham throwing up his hands, struggling to rename his PEU empire.  So I'll offer a few ideas:

The Cracker Group LLC
Monument Capital (already taken by a virtual Carlyle Group affiliate)
Whitberg, Bilderbread and Forneycation Capital Advisors
PEU-PO Asset Management

I'm sure Graham will hire a firm to create a name from scratch, like Carlyestone, Blackhole Group or RiverFoam Investments.  Personally, I'm sitting on the edge of my chair in anticipation of a new name slowly pouring from WaPo's ink smeared pages.  That's it!  Heinz-CatchUp-Hunt Brothers.

Update 10-25-23:  A Bono, Bezos, Gates company intended to revolutionize trucking may be going under.  Convoy will "shut down core business operations immediately while some staff would be retained to wind down operations and for potential future strategic options."

Revolving Door: U.S. Government to Albright Stonebridge

Crain's Detroit Business reported:

Veteran Detroit lawyer Nicole Lamb-Hale has joined Madeleine Albright's Washington, D.C., advisory firm.

Lamb-Hale joined Albright Stonebridge Group in May after stepping down from her position as assistant secretary of commerce for manufacturing and services at the U.S. Department of Commerce, International Trade Administration. She previously served as deputy general counsel for the department.

In her new role, she'll serve as a liaison between U.S. regulators and clients looking to make foreign investments. 

Madeleine Albright has a private equity underwriter within her corporate umbrella, Albright Capital Management.  Will Mrs. Lamb-Hale aid Madeleine's PEU in this role?   Can Lamb-Hale say African power?

Oddly, a Carlyle Group executive was the lead story on Crain's page.  Albright headlined Carlyle's annual investor meeting several years ago.  It's a small PEU world.