I often say that while it's important to know your friends, it's absolutely essential to know your enemies. A lot of us here know Jerry Brown quite well; some of us are even old enough to remember him as "Governor Moonbeam."
But how many of us here really know Meg Whitman? Yeah, sure - we know she's bad for CA and bad for the country simply by virtue of being a Republican - but we're not the ones that our GOTV efforts have to convince. And I get the distinct impression that GOTV efforts in this race are running up against two issues: 1) the "I don't know much about her, but she seems okay" problem; and 2) the likelihood that undecideds are less apt to vote for Jerry Brown than they are against Meg Whitman.
If that's the dynamic, then it's time to show the undecideds 1) that Meg Whitman is NOT okay; and 2) that there are more than enough reasons to vote against her.
Ultimately, the question is this: Do you want a public servant? Or someone who thinks you're HER servant?
And drop ten bucks in Jerry Brown's kitty via the ActBlue link below - you could be the proud winner of Sara R's fabulous quilt! Scroll to the end of the diary to use the ActBlue widget.
So herewith, Kossacks, is your "essential Meg Whitman."
MONEY. PILES OF IT.
The first thing you need to know about Meg Whitman (if you don't already) is that she is rich. Very rich. Filthy stinking rich. Her current net worth is estimated at $1.3 billion. Yes. Billion.
The thing about Meg is that she's always been well-off. Born on August 4, 1956, into a wealthy family - the kind of people, as one wag put it, who have three last names - Margaret Cushing Whitman grew up in the posh town of Cold Spring Harbor on Long Island's North Shore. Her father, Hendricks Hallett Whitman, owned his own firm, providing financial services advice to other wealthy people. Her mother, Margaret Goodhue Whitman, serve as an Army mechanic in New Guinea during World War II, but that appears to have been more out of adventurousness than necessity. Young Meg and her siblings appear never to have wanted for anything; during childhood summers, Dad stayed behind to run the business, but Mom packed up the kids every year and drove them cross-country to see America.
Meg would enter Princeton intending to be a doctor; instead, she earned a degree in mathematics, and went on to get an MBA at Harvard. From there, is was a constant, steady rise to the top: She began her business career with Procter & Gamble, moved on to work for Mitt Romney at his Bain & Co. (now Bain Capital), then Disney, Stride Rite, FTD, and Hasbro, before joining e-Bay in 1998. Along the way, she married a fellow WASP with three last names - and a number! - Griffith Rutherford Harsh, IV. They have two sons: the older, predictably, named Griffith Rutherford Harsh, V; the younger, perhaps equally predictably, William Whitman Harsh.
No one disputes that Meg Whitman has intelligence, ambition, and a drive to succeed; she appears always to have had all three in abundance. Before her death, Whitman's mother relayed a telling anecdote to an interviewer regarding her daughter's temperament as a child:
"Meg was a pretty good swimmer. But at meets, I had to be there, because if she wasn’t at least first or second, she’d be screaming with rage. There was no second best for her. She has always loved to win."
Still, her lack of preparedness on the campaign trail - particularly with regard to her failure to study the issues and declare her positions - bespeaks a certain sense of entitlement. She's always been good enough to do anything she's ever tried, and, in fact, she's always succeeded. Of course, that was due solely to her hard work, and not at all to her privileged background, wealth, and family connections - so why shouldn't she be entitled to the Governor's Mansion, too? In this respect, Meg Whitman is a perfect example of Jim Hightower's succinct description of George H.W. Bush (and later, his son): "Born on third base and thinks [s]he hit a triple."
"WALL STREET WHITMAN"
Wall Street was apparently delighted with Meg Whitman's appointment as CEO of e-Bay:
In 2000, the stock hit $127.50 a share (it now trades around $23).
It appears equally delighted with the prospect of Whitman in the California Governor's Mansion.
Throughout her career, Whitman has had unusually close ties to Goldman Sachs: From 2001 to 2002, she was a member of their board of directors for just over one year, earning $475,000 just for occupying that seat. As of late April of this year, she'd taken in more than $110K in campaign contributions from Goldman execs - two of whom are members of her campaign's finance committee. She also chose a Goldman subsidiary, NY-based Ayco - to manage the investments for the Griffith R. Harsh and Margaret C. Whitman Charitable Foundation.
Meg Whitman's Wall Street ties - and Wall Street behaviors - don't end there. In the early years of her tenure at e-Bay, she and other executives were caught engaging in "spinning," a practice that has always been unethical, and was subsequently made explicitly illegal - although Whitman to this day maintains that she did nothing wrong and that her much-vaunted integrity remains intact. So what is "spinning?" This:
As part of an investigation, a federal government committee revealed earlier this month that Goldman Sachs had allocated IPO shares to executives such as Whitman, Enron Chairman Kenneth Lay and WorldCom CEO John Sidgmore. Many of those IPO companies posted large first-day gains. Whitman and others have said their receipt of shares was related to private dealings with Goldman Sachs and other investment banks. But critics have charged that such allocations were part of a quid pro quo that involved giving executives shares in exchange for investment banking business. eBay has a longstanding relationship with Goldman Sachs. The investment bank led eBay's IPO and served as a financial adviser in its recent merger with PayPal. Whitman sits on the firm's board of directors.
When the practice came to light, several e-Bay shareholders filed lawsuits against Whitman and other company executives, alleging breach of fiduciary duty. Whitman's personal take from receiving and selling those IPO shares? A mere $1.78 million, a bagatelle in her world.
WHITMAN v. WORKERS
According to Level the Playing Field 2010, Whitman's overall compensation for 2007, her final year as CEO of e-Bay, broke down as follows:
* Salary: $995,016
* Bonus: $ 243,013
* Other Annual Compensation (Life Insurance Premium and 401K contributions): $4,500
* Corporate Jet Use: $ 787,936 total; $596,823 personal aircraft use, $191,113 tax reimbursements for aircraft use
* Stock Awards: $920,335
* Option Awards: $9,514,249
* Non-Equity Incentive Plan Compensation: $1,409,861
An independent ad run earlier this year accused Whitman of raking in $12 million in bonuses while she laid off e-Bay workers. Whitman, of course, denies that, saying:
"There were some individuals who didn't meet our standards and they had to be let go." . . . "There were no large scale layoffs."
Throughout her tenure as CEO, however, e-Bay did engage in multiple episodes of layoffs: some a result of bad business decisions, some a result of acquisitions, some a result of the bursting of the dot-com bubble.
More to the point, however, was her performance as a member of e-Bay's board of directors in 2008. Whitman was part of the decision-making process that led to the lay-offs of 1,500 employees - 10% of e-Bay's workforce - immediately after taking a $120 million payment herself. At the same time, the board approved lavish severance packages for its top executives:
It appears from SEC filings that some top execs will receive two years' target cash compensation, defined as annual base salary plus target annual incentive bonus. That "bonus" is usually 100% of salary, so it would be like getting 4 years' worth of pay if they are laid off. (President and CEO John Donahoe's target bonus is 125% of salary.)
But don't forget that Whitman has a business record that predates her tenure at e-Bay. And with regard to layoffs, it's not a particularly pleasant one. "Wall Street Whitman" reports:
* While Whitman served as an executive at Stride Rite from 1992-1995, the company closed two manufacturing plants in Massachusetts and fired 450 workers -- and Whitman collected $568,000 in compensation and stock options. The Wall Street Journal reported that during and prior to Whitman’s tenure, the company closed 15 US plants, moving manufacturing to "low-cost Asian countries." During Whitman’s time at Stride Rite, the company cut its unionized workforce by half.
* While Whitman served as president and CEO of Florist Transworld Delivery (FTD) from 1995-1997, the company eliminated 475 jobs and gutted retirement benefits for workers -- and Whitman collected $1.2 million in compensation and stock options.
* While Whitman served as an executive at Hasbro from 1997-1998, the company cut the workforce by 23%, laid off 500 U.S. workers and sent manufacturing jobs to Mexico.
* While Whitman served on the board of directors at Gap Inc from 2003-2006, the company closed down a distribution facility in Maryland, outsourced dozens of merchandising jobs and fired 100 tech workers in California.
The same source also reports that by 2007, almost 40% of e-Bay's jobs had been outsourced (this, a year prior to the mass layoffs of 10% of the entire company workforce)m and that Whitman and e-Bay lobbied persistently for an increase in H-1B visas for foreign employees (who are not afforded the protections of U.S. employees).
Oh, and that 10% figure? It's the same figure by which she has promised to cut the number of California state public employees. Only in this case, it would result in 40,000 lay-offs, not 1,500.
Meanwhile, on the stump, she's employing all the usual anti-labor, anti-worker dogwhistlea. She makes only minimal effort to disguise her disdain for state workers, who she considers "selfish and arrogant":
"Every year, we pay more to sustain an out-of-control state bureaucracy - a wasteful bureaucracy, out of touch with the needs of Californians. And a selfish and arrogant bureaucracy, unwilling to give an inch even in the toughest of economic times."
Never mind that most state employees are enduring three unpaid furlough days a month, a roughly 14% wage cut saving the state $2.2 billion this fiscal year. The workers don't like it, but they're not yet marching on picket lines.
BUYING THE GOVERNOR'S MANSION.
As of the last reporting period, Meg Whitman has spent a record $140 million of her own money on her campaign. Read that again: One hundred and forty million dollars. And even so, she's still running neck-and-neck with Jerry Brown, who's only spent about $10 million. Pretty pathetic: $140 mil just doesn't buy a Governor's Mansion the way it used to. Or not. But it does indicate that huge amounts of money aren't enough to overcome her massive deficiencies on the policy and leadership fronts.
CIVIC DUTY - OR NOT.
Yes, we've all heard about Meg Whitman's pathetic voting record. Or rather, her lack of a voting record. But do you know the details? Here they are:
Mwg Whitman is 54 years old. She first registered to vote at age 46. That's right: eight short years ago. That means she didn't vote in the 2000 presidential election, and it turns out that she didn't vote in the 2003 California recall that put der Gropenator in the Governor's Mansion. She didn't even register as a Republican until 2008 - presumably in the event that John McCain had a sudden attack of common sense and decided to reject the Wasilla teabagger. If that was her motivation, it was a monumental failure.
Oh, but Meg Whitman has a reason for her nearly life-long failure to perform her civic duty:
"I was focused on raising a family, on my husband's career and we moved many, many times."
"Raising a family," hmm? Well, let's just take a little look at her success on that front, shall we?
OVER-ENTITLED AND OVER-PRIVILEGED
Calling Meg Whitman's two sons "over-entitled, over-privileged brats" would be a masterpiece of understatement. Their conduct reflects poorly, to say the least, on their mother and their upbringing generally. Both boys have a lengthy history of expulsions from prep and other schools and violent outbursts with racial and class undertones.
The eldest, Griffith Rutherford Harsh, V, was arrested for assaulting a young woman during an altercation in a restaurant. A young Latina woman who apparently knew him had ridden past him (and a group of his friends) on her bike, grabbing his fraternity cap and saying, "Fuck you and fuck your fraternity" as she did so. He and his friends followed her, yelling. She got off her bike and walked into the restaurant; they followed her inside, where the dispute escalated. Young Griffith placed his hands on her chest and pushed her backward, hard enough to make her fall . . . and to break her ankle in the process. Griffith was arrested for assault.
The next morning, Meg Whitman, Griff's mother and then the CEO of eBay, posted Griff's $25,000 bail with a cashier's check and brought her son home. Nine court dates followed over the next year, but the charges were ultimately dismissed, although it's unclear why.
And although Griffith should have graduated with Princeton's class of 2008, he didn't do so until 2009 - apparently because the school placed him on probation for a year, having also banned him from living on campus, despite the fact that Meg gave Princeton $30 mil to build a dorm in her name.
Meg's younger son, William Whitman Harsh, has a similar reputation. When his elder brother was suspended, he'd already paid his dues as a member of Cottage, Princeton's schmancy "eating club." The club permitted younger brother Will to use the membership in his place - and was summarily banned from the club after what those present report as a racist outburst:
The story goes that Will yelled "what are all these n[*****]s doing here" one night when all the members of the Black Arts Company where there to celebrate a show they had performed. Cottage is know as one of the whiter clubs on campus so I assume that he was shocked to see so many black people there in a night. He was already on notice with Cottage officers because of an altercation he started with a bouncer early in the year.
Another person present alleges that he directed the racial epithet at a specific person.
And just this summer, Will was making news again for throwing a temper tantrum on a Princeton playing field and disrupting a softball game.
A few weeks ago, Princeton’s graduate student softball league was using the field for a game when, according to witnesses, Will Harsh "stormed the field mid-game" and demanded that only rugby players were allowed on that particular field, "his" field. He then proceeded to throw the softball team’s stuff over a fence and threatened to call the cops.
After Harsh confronted a professor and dared people to "tackle him," campus police arrived.
Campus police had to be called; eventually, apparently, the softball teams were able to resume their game.
But don't worry about the Whitman boys; they'll be fine. Will is on track to graduate this year (so far, anyway), and his older brother has landed a gig with family friend Mitt Romney's Bain Capital.
Perhaps Meg blames herself. She does have an anecdote that she includes in her stump speeches about one particularly painful episode she experienced as a mother. Others, of course, might find it more telling about how out of touch she is with the concerns of ordinary parents:
One story she tells on the stump took place 21 years ago, when her oldest son was three years old and another mother at his preschool called to organize a carpool. Whitman, who then worked fulltime at Bain, told the mother she would be happy to participate, assuring her that on days when the job interfered, her nanny would fill in. This elicited a response Whitman says she will never forget. "In an icy tone she said, 'I did not quit my job at McKinsey [the management consulting firm] to have someone else’s nanny drive my child.'" That night, Whitman says, her husband bucked her up. "He said, 'Meg, do not worry about it. You keep on doing what you’re doing'’ But I must tell you, it took me six months to recover from that moment."
Most parents I know have far graver concerns than whether another wealthy parent cops an attitude over whether a nanny drives on carpool day - oh, say, little things like how to put food on the table, how they'll pay the rent or the electric bill or the heat this month, or whether they can afford a doctor's visit when a child gets sick.
EMPLOYEES? NAH. SERVANTS
You're undoubtedly familiar by now with Meg's little "domestic help" problem: an undocumented Latina immigrant employed as her housekeeper/nanny for nine years. According to the housekeeper, Nicky Diaz Santillan, both Meg and her husband were always aware of her undocumented status, and only fired her once she became politically inconvenient. She also alleges that, while they paid her a superficially generous $23/hour wage, that only applied to the hours the let her claim as "on the clock" - in other words, they forced her to work large number of hours on a regular basis for which she was not paid at all. She is now suing for unpaid wages and mileage costs. According to Ms. Diaz, Whitman laughed at her when she asked for help in legalizing her immigration status, saying:
"[She] treated me like a piece of garbage. She treated me as if I were not a human being."
Former Whitman nanny Jill Armstrong has lent her support to Diaz, saying that Whitman and her family treat domestic employees as "disposable."
However, it appears that domestic employees were not the only ones Whitman considered "disposable." A former employee at e-Bay, Young Mi Kim, sued Whitman for physical assault. Ms. Kim, a member of e-Bay's communications team, was apparently tasked with readying Whitman for an interview. Whitman allegedly decided that Ms. Kim had done an inadequate job with the preparation - and so shoved her physically, shouting at her in a rage. Ms. Kim ultimately sued, and the case was settled out of court for what was reportedly around $200,000.
Okay, yes, I know this is not nice. [Where's it written that I gotta be nice all the time, anyway?] But it made me laugh, and I'm including it. Some of you have already heard this story, so just ignore it.
Ten days ago or so, we had TRMS on, and the backdrop included a montage of GOP candidates who refuse to take responsibility for their errors. I didn't realize that, up to that point, Mr. Aji had never seen a photo of Meg Whitman, because he asked me: "Who's Chucky's Mom there on the left?" Henceforth and forevermore, Meg Whitman is "Mom of Chucky" to me.
So, really: Who would you rather have as Governor of California?
The former Governor Moonbeam, a certified DFH with a decades-long history as a public servant of ordinary people?
Or Mom of Chucky, with a history of treating ordinary people as HER servants?
You know what to do.
And now, how to do it, courtesy, of Sara R:
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"All Buttoned Up" - photo by Bill Bachhuber
The community signed a quilt in Chicago at the 2007 Yearly Kos. It is, in a sense, a snapshot of who we were then. It could be yours!
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Sara R's diary :: :: </div>
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Every day in October brings an opportunity to enter a drawing to benefit Jerry Brown’s campaign for Governor of California. Every donation of $10 or more to the fundraiser’s Act Blue page will count for a chance – one chance per person per day. You don't need to spend money to enter, however. If you are not donating, you can enter and have an equal chance of winning by writing an essay of 50 words or less on "Why I want Jerry Brown to be California’s next Governor". Send your essay with a subject line, "Jerry Brown Essay", to communityquilts (at) yahoo (dot) com. If we find your essay topical, it will count for a chance. As with donations, one essay per person per day will count as a chance. Only one form of entry is allowed for a person on a given day.
The winning ticket of the "From Red to Blue" quilt
At the end of the fundraiser period, I will assign a ticket number to each chance and ask a neighborhood child to pull just one ticket. The drawing will be the first week in November.
Drawing for the star quilt
Quilt stats: It is 59" square, made of cotton fabric with a cotton batting. My sister and I pieced it. I hand quilted it. The blocks feature 1930s reproduction fabric (feedsack prints) on one side, and bright, jewel toned contemporary fabrics on the other. The quilt is sleeved for hanging and would look great on your wall!
Here are the signatures, by block number:
1-1A: Shanna
1-1B: Marilyn Rickert
1-2A: shakti
1-2B: Ben Wyskida
1-3A: LeAnne Clausen
1-3B: Peace to all
1-4A: sisterhavana
1-4B: snokat
1-5A: DailyKingfish
1-5B: Randi Scheurer
1-6A: Kainah
1-6B: Littlesky
1-7A: grndrush
1-7B: Tenn Wisc Jan
1-8A: Hope Despite All
1-8B: Xanthe
1-8C: WV Blue Guy
1-9A: Agnostic
1-9B: cocker mom
1-9C: Lauren Swihart & Nick Bailey
1-10A: herding old cats
1-10B: Mooncat
2-1A: LoisNClark
2-1B: Brian Reach
2-2A: Gilda Reed
2-2B: Ultrageek
2-3A: Courtney Sieloff
2-3B: rwreed17
2-4A: Ozzie
2-4B: flautist & Jared Lash
2-4C: JanetT in MD
2-5A: Rick Perlstein
2-5B: Anderson Republican
2-6A: Waterbug
2-6B: Cosmic Debris
2-7A: Kathy Kaufman
2-7B: ntorbett
2-8A: Optimusprime
2-8B: TheDon
2-9A: erinh
2-9B: Dania Audax & Timroff
2-9C: Christy Bowman
2-10: Matt Gibson, Jay Purdy, Jacob Wolf (The Extraordinaires)
3-1A: bendygirl
3-1B Malacandra
3-2A: Daniel Hartman
3-2B: Anne Marie Nicholls
3-3A: Irish Patti
3-3B: DavidNYC
3-3C: Hunter
3-4A: The Werewolf Prophet
3-4B: General Wes Clark
3-4C: Andy Ternay
3-5A: flaxter
3-5B: Michelle Martin
3-6A: spotbrian
3-6B: elfling
3-6C: Marian Nestle
3-7A: AAbshier
3-7B: megabn
3-8A: sharoney
3-8B: TheKK
3-9A: uberblonde
3-9B: Michelangelo Signorile
3-10A: Lane Hudson
3-10B: Jerome a Paris
4-1A: cskendrick
4-1B: Eric Massa
4-1C: Christina Siun O’Connel
4-2A: casperr
4-2B: Melissa McCullough
4-3A: quicksilver
4-3B: David Brock
4-4A: DemFromCT
4-4B: loggersbrat
4-5A: Mrs. P
4-5B: pastordan
4-6A: John W. Dean
4-6B: Ilona Meagher
4-7A: Kos
4-7B: Carla Axtman
4-8A: texasmom
4-8B: javelina
4-9A: janeta43
4-9B: Lilypew
4-10A: Juan Cole
4-10B: Jeffrey Feldman
5-1A: northwesterly
5-1B: everhopeful
5-2A: Kennedy
5-2B: kid Oakland
5-3A: Susan Thistlewaite
5-3B: schmendrick
5-4A: Navajo
5-4B: Melissa S.
5-4C: DBunn
5-5A: Tracy Joan
5-5B: fabooj
5-6A: thereisnospoon
5-6B: Ann Reed
5-6C: JZola
5-7A: Tullia Fidei-Bagwell
5-7B: memiller
5-8A: Silence is Complicity
5-8B: Jesselyn Radack
5-8C: Spiral
5-9A: One Pissed Off Liberal
5-9B: Bodhisattva
5-10A: Booman
5-10B: Cali Scribe
6-1A: Jill Richardson
6-1B: soyinkafan
6-2A: 42
6-2B: athenachrome
6-3A: silverleaf
6-3B: Susan McCue
6-3C: murphy
6-4A: highfive
6-4B: Edgewater Joe
6-5: MsSpentyouth
6-6A: ArgosRun
6-6B: Digby
6-6C: Sundayhighway
6-7A: Scott Kleeb
6-7B: Larry Grant
6-8A: noblindeye
6-8B: diceepur
6-9A: ProduceMan
6-9B: Oakroyd
6-10A: xysri
6-10B: fghPA
6-10C: George Lakoff
7-1A: ttobba
7-1B: Josh Sproat
7-1C: PlantingLiberally
7-2A: NinthElegy
7-2B: Susan S
7-3A: Common Sense Mainer
7-3B: Bill in Portland Maine
7-4A: SanDiegoDem
7-4B: Christy Hardin Smith, Taylor Marsh
7-4C: kaye
7-5A: Sean Robertson
7-5B: Vicki
7-6A: Bonddad
7-6B: Virginia Simmons
7-6C: worldpiece17
7-7A: rickeagle
7-7B: suz in seattle
7-8A: teacherken
7-8B: Rev. David Beckmann
7-8C: sra030
7-9A: Hlinmo
7-9B: Blog Active
7-10B: gloriana
7-10B: boofdah
8-1A: Ellicatt
8-1B: Dreaming of Better Days
8-2A: Frederick Clarkson
8-2B: DHinMI
8-3A: wanderindiana
8-3B: Frankenoid
8-4A: videogirl
8-4B: Delaware Dem
8-5A: Robert Losner
8-5B: Anathalie Sugiva
8-5C: BAC
8-6A: virgomusic
8-6B: raines
8-7A: Spencer Overton
8-7B: shermanesq
8-8A: Atrios
8-8B: Will Bunch
8-9A: Reality Bites Back
8-9B: Dante Atkins
8-9C: MBNYC
8-10A: sdorn
8-10B: Perseus
9-1A: Brian Keeler
9-1B: Irene Yacobson
9-2A: synesthete
9-2B: Carol Barnes
9-3A: Glenn Greenwald
9-3B: Rachel Griffiths
9-4A: Cenk Uygur
9-4B: Poemless
9-4C: Safir Ahmed
9-5A: Sam Seder
9-5B: Garance Franke-Ruta
9-5C: David Boyle
9-6A: China Parmalee
9-6B: Elizabeth Compa
9-6C: Kevin Huyge
9-7A: Sydney Blumenthal
9-7B: Steve Novick
9-8A: David Sirota
9-8B: Max Blumenthal
9-9A: Danish Brethern
9-9B: Sara Reed
9-10A: Espresso
9-10B: Kelly Gordon
10-1A: Charles Brown
10-1B: Gary Trauner
10-2A: Timroff and Dania Audax
10:2B: maxomai
10-3A: Bill Richardson
10-3B: Joan McCarter
10-4A: Pam Spaulding
10-4B: Linda Perlstein
10-5A: Madame de Farge
10-5B: VB Dietz
10-5C: Dan Seals
10-5D: Marianne Wood
10-6A: Delia
10-6B: Lanie
10-6C: JCHFleetguy
10-7A: Canyoubeangryandstilldream
10-7B: Major Danby
10-8A: Robert Geiger
10-8B: Anthony Romero
10-8C: Lithium Cola
10-9A: brillig
10-9B: mik
10-10A: Sara Robinson
10-10B: Darcy Burner