Speaking Personally

Forbes article on how to be a good billionaire gives insight into a segment of society that gave us Carnegie libraries.  One of the Sunday Morning news-maker interview shows mentioned a Federal grand jury investigation of New Mexico state contracts.  Its an important story because Bill Richardson appointed many of the people who gave the contracts and he is now probable US Secretary of Commerce.  The explanation quoted below is plausible. The press thankfully is not giving Richardson the Rod Blagojevich treatment but it should keep a careful eye on the grand jury proceedings. 

Three 

Important Stories

How To Be a Good BillionaireGrand Jury Probes
 
Richardson Donor’s New Mexico Financing Fee
 

Yearly growth rate ticks above record low: ECRI

 

Quotes and Pointers

'So if you're Nike, for example, and you just think, "I'm going to make money in whatever way I can cheaply in the third world," and you don't think, "Hang on, I've got a consumer brand with lots of people in the rich world who are predominately using our brand for leisure." You don't want to have their leisure experience tainted by the thought that some little kid in Africa is being exploited. Then you're not very good at understanding or managing the risks of your brands. You should actually say, "Well look, this is a leisure product bought by wealthy people in the Western world. We should really make sure that we look after our workers properly in the developing world." That penny has dropped with Nike very clearly.

And if you're Wal-Mart and you started to think about climate change, again how do you see it in terms of costs of renewable energy and your ability to use your supply chain to drive down costs? And [how do you see it in terms of] your customers want to have products they feel better about? Then you can actually use your purchasing power to make a huge difference that no charity is ever going to be able to match on the environment.

You can really make the argument that the penny dropping at Wal-Mart has probably done more for improving the environmental performance of all the firms working in China than anything any nonprofit has done or anything any foreign government has done in China. So those are not things that would have happened automatically. I don't believe that capitalism is so efficient that people simply always do the thing that is always in their rational self-interest.'

Matthew Bishop

'CDR was hired after responding to a Dec. 30, 2003, request for proposals from the New Mexico Finance Authority for investment advisory services.

Splitting the Mandate

Six companies answered the request, which contained two questions out of 39 items related to experience with interest-rate swaps and guaranteed investment contracts. A joint venture from Smith Barney and New York-based Ryan Labs Inc. received the top score of 99 percent. CDR had the second-highest score of 97 percent, authority records show.

Rather than select the Smith Barney/Ryan Labs team as both investment and swap adviser, the authority’s then- Chief Financial Officer, Keith Mellor, recommended splitting the mandate. The agency gave the swap adviser job to CDR, which received the same score as the Smith Barney/Ryan Labs team on the swap section of the proposals, authority records show.'

Martin Z. Braun and William Selway

"With WLI growth barely above its all-time low seen two weeks ago, the U.S. recession will persist in the months ahead."

Melinda Hubman

Out and About on the Net.

 

"Auld Lang Syne"

 

Out of Place: A HyperHistory of the Elusive Acoustics of Concert Hall Venues

 

Evo Morales  -- Mr. 50% to the people

 

et alli is cross posted at The Intelligence Forum 

A.Word.A.Day from Wordsmith.org:  seriatim