*****Update: Media Matters shill doesn't like this post, and is responded to at end of article.
The financial scam involved in advancing climate alarmism got even more obvious Monday - to folks outside of the media, that is! - when Nobel Laureate Al Gore joined "Silicon Valley's most prestigious venture capital firm to guide investments that help combat global warming."
As reported by the Associated Press (emphasis added, h/t NBer Wildcatter 1980): "Gore, who won the Nobel Peace Prize last month for his work on climate change, joins Kleiner Perkins Caufield & Byers as it and dozens of other venture firms expand into so-called ‘clean-tech' investments worldwide."
Media that have continually ignored the financial aspects of this con will certainly not see the exquisitely delicious irony in the following announcement from the same article:
Also Monday, Kleiner Perkins partner John Doerr announced he's joining the advisory board of Generation Investment Management, the $1 billion investment firm that Gore founded with David Blood, who previously managed $325 billion in assets out of Goldman Sachs' London office. Doerr is one of Silicon Valley's most outspoken clean-tech advocates.
Anybody getting a whiff of rodentia yet, or do you need another clue media will surely ignore?
Well, here goes.
On October 3, NewsBusters highlighted a spectacular Human Events exposé by Deborah Corey Barnes concerning Gore's financial connections to so-called global warming solutions including carbon credits (emphasis added throughout):
[Gore's] GIM appears to have considerable influence over the major carbon-credit trading firms that currently exist: the Chicago Climate Exchange (CCX) in the U.S. and the Carbon Neutral Company (CNC) in Great Britain. CCX is the only firm in the U.S. that claims to trade carbon credits.
[...]Clearly, GIM is poised to cash in on carbon trading. The membership of CCX is currently voluntary. But if the day ever comes when federal government regulations require greenhouse-gas emitters -- and that's almost everyone -- to participate in cap-and-trade, then those who have created a market for the exchange of carbon credits are in a position to control the outcomes. And that moves Al Gore front and center.
Please recall before going further that Gore's partner at GIM used to be a fund manager at Goldman Sachs:
We do know that Goldman Sachs has commissioned the World Resources Institute (affiliated with CCX), Resources for the Future, and the Woods Hole Research Center to research policy options for U.S. regulation of greenhouse gases. In 2006, Goldman Sachs provided research grants in this area totaling $2.3 million. The firm also has committed $1 billion to carbon-assets projects, a fancy term for projects that generate energy from sources other than oil and gas.
So, add this all up, and Al Gore's investment group is not only connected with one of the world's leading brokerage firms that just so happens to be the preeminent player in carbon trading, but he is also now working for the top venture capital company in Silicon Valley whose partner has reciprocally been placed on the board of Gore's organization.
As such, soon-to-be-billionaire Al Gore has brilliantly structured himself as a virtual financial hub of international investments associated with so-called global warming solutions whereby he'll benefit financially from any hysterical climate claim uttered by a media member, Hollywood sycophant, United Nations climate panelist, or, deliciously, himself.
Yet, virtually no journalist is willing to either see it or report it.
Honestly, I'm not sure whether to applaud his ingenuity or weep for the media's stupidity.
*****Update: I don’t normally respond to every blogger that links to my articles. However, when someone connected to such a high-profile Clinton campaign front as Media Matters does, it certainly warrants comment.
As such, Oliver Willis is described at MMA’s website thusly:
Web developer and information architect on several media-related Web projects. He also boasts extensive experience in political blogging and authors his own site, which has been profiled in The Boston Globe and Baseline magazine, and on PBS. Willis attended Florida Atlantic University and is a member of the Technology and Online Community Department at Media Matters for America.
With that in mind, Willis didn’t like this article concerning Gore being employed by a VC, and perfectly demonstrated why it’s so easy for the former Vice President to pull the wool over so many Americans’ eyes (emphasis added for your entertainment pleasure):
Except, the facts don't line up again.
As part of the arrangement, Mr. Gore will donate his salary as a Kleiner Perkins partner to the Alliance for Climate Protection, a nonprofit advocacy group he founded. Mr. Doerr will in turn join the board of Generation Investment Management, a $1 billion investment firm Mr. Gore founded with David Blood, a former Goldman Sachs partner.
Like the obvious Media Matters shill he is, Willis suggested that since Gore is donating his salary to ACP, the former Vice President has no financial gain working for this VC group.
However, what Willis ignored -- or just simply doesn't understand, and, therefore, should refrain from commenting -- is that ACP is Al Gore’s organization. Therefore, by donating his salary to ACP, Gore pays no taxes on said salary, but still gets to control how it’s used.
I guess this eluded Willis.
Of course, what also seemed beyond this Media Matters operative was that the salary to Gore is totally irrelevant. His connection to the largest venture capital firm in Silicon Valley affords him financial and investment benefits far beyond the salary he’s being paid.
One such benefit is ownership in privately-held companies that explode in value once they go public. This indeed is why folks want to work for a venture capital group as capital gains from such events dwarf the salaries paid to employees and principals.
Just imagine how much the folks at this VC group Gore now works for made after companies in their portfolio such as Netscape, Google, and Amazon went public.
Yet, Willis mysteriously seemed to understand the relative unimportance of salary as it pertained to other companies Gore is tied to:
Al Gore is on the board of Apple (YTD: about 100% increase) and Google (YTD: about $300 increase) , as well as the chairman of Current. Somehow I don't think the big bucks are in donating his salary from looking for green tech.
Amazing hypocrisy, wouldn't you agree?
When it's convenient for this shill, salary is the issue. Yet, he seems to understand -- possibly by accident! -- that in the case of Apple and Google, equity is more important.
Honestly, folks, if this is representative of the financial acumen and the intellectual honesty of the operatives under the employ of the Clinton campaign, Republicans around the country should sleep much better tonight.
I know I will.
