Obamagate - The tangled web of Obama, GE, Immelt, Cap & Trade, GE Healthcare and Daschle part I

This is one of the most convoluted political webs that I have ever seen.  In order to break it down I am writing this in several parts – As I researched and started writing I realized that this is not a simple story.  There is so much information regarding GE available that as I researched one area I discovered another that is part of the tangled web.   This will be an ongoing project and as new and more twisted information evolves I will research and publish.  I still do not understand how any of this is legal.  It is obviously not ethical but since when are politicians and greedy, desperate CEO’s ethical.  You can decide for yourself.

In 2000, Jack Welch, the successful CEO of General Electric (GE), retired and it was announced that Jeffrey Immelt would take over as CEO.  He officially took over in September 2001.  Previous to this position Immelt was the head of GE Healthcare, a  division of GE that “provides transformational medical technologies and services that are shaping a new age of patient care.”  GE has since gone a step further and developed what they call Healthymagination where they believe that “it’s time for a better, simpler system where innovation helps lower the cost of care and improve the quality of outcomes for more people.”  It almost sounds like something right out of Obama’s playbook regarding healthcare. 

Obama named Immelt to his Economic Advisory Board, which is ironic since GE has done worse since Immelt took over as CEO.  Wouldn’t it make more sense to have successful business people on an economic advisory board?   This is the very same Immelt whose company continued to provide products to Iran through offshore subsidiaries despite American sanctions against rogue nations.  In fact, it is against United States law for American companies to provide products or services to nations that the U.S. deems as ‘rogue’, in this case Iran.    In a story reported by Leslie Stahl of 60 minutes back in 2004 GE stated that “they are breaking no laws, and like Halliburton, make no apologies for their business dealings with states that sponsor terrorism.”  Everyone on the left was up in arms about Halliburton due to the Cheney connection – where is the outrage now regarding the fact that Immelt holds a position in the current administration yet clearly violated U.S. sanctions via a loophole?  GE did not stop doing business with Iran until 2005.

In 2007, Immelt earned a total salary of over $14,000,000 dollars between bonuses, base salary and stock options.  Isn’t this the exact type of compensation that Obama is trying to cap on executives working for any companies that received TARP funds?  Since GE did not do well and has not since Immelt became the CEO, how do they justify his bonus?  Did Obama ask him about his bonus or is it perfectly okay for some CEOs to receive unwarranted bonuses but not for others such as those in the banking industry?  Now personally I believe executive pay is completely up to the company and its board but Obama has informed the country that he would like to put restrictions on ALL executive pay, not just TARP companies.

But wait, GE is also part of the banking industry.  GE Capital became FDIC insured back in November of 2008 so they would be able to receive $139 million dollars in the FDIC’s Temporary Liquidity Guarantee Program aka T.A.R.P.  GE also maintains a credit card line for consumers.  With the recent outrage by Obama regarding the credit card industries practices, it is simply amazing that GE’s credit line is doing the exact things that Obama is pushing to have stopped.  There are thousands of complaints about GE raising interest rates on good paying consumers to 30% as well as cutting credit lines and outright ending credit lines of on-time good-paying customers.  This practice hurts the very consumers that Obama claims he is trying to protect, yet one of the CEO’s whose company is performing these practices sits on his Economic Advisory Board.

GE also happens to own NBC, MSNBC and CNBC.  I believe at this point we all know how each of those stations feels about Obama.  MSNBC touts itself as a 24 hour cable ‘news’ network, yet when anchor Chris Matthews stated that he had a ‘thrill up his leg’ about Obama during the election, it was quite apparent that any unbiased, balanced news reporting flew out the door.   It is one thing when he is commenting on his program, another when he is supposed to be reporting the news.  All you need to do is watch any of these stations for a week and you will see that there is no negative news reported about Obama or his administration.  Even Wikipedia makes note that critics have charged MSNBC with becoming liberal.  How convenient that the CEO of the parent company of MSNBC sits on one of Obama’s boards.

The above touches on some of the background of Immelt, GE and Obama.  There is so very much more to this story.  Nothing of course that will ever be told on the networks I mentioned.  That would be reporting the actual NEWS.   I haven’t even touched on GE’s lobbying efforts for Cap & Trade.  I am going to end Part I here otherwise you may be calling your doctor for new blood pressure medication.  To be continued….  

Photo by National Geographic 

See my previous story regarding Pelosinocchio here:  http://www.examiner.com/x-9100-Boston-Conservative-Independent-Examiner~y2009m5d15-Pelosinocchio-keeps-digging-herself-deeper--where-is-Obamapetto-to-save-her