News conference: Is the Chicago Tribune hiding corporate murder by Bruce Rauner?
Corruption fighter Andy Martin accuses the Chicago Tribune
and Illinois media of trying to
cover-up “corporate murder” by Illinois
gubernatorial candidate Bruce Rauner. Andy calls Rauner “The Wolf of LaSalle
Street,” and questions whether Rauner’s media spending is causing local media
to soft-pedal evidence of Rauner’s misdeeds.
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FOR
IMMEDIATE RELEASE:
Attention
Illinois daybook/assignment editors
Announcement
of Chicago telephone news conference Monday
Andy
Martin accuses the Chicago Tribune of trying to
“insulate” and “immunize” Bruce Rauner from Rauner’s history of corporate
murder
Andy
questions why Chicago media are trying to soft-pedal
corporate murder by gubernatorial candidate Bruce Rauner – Part One of an
Eight-part series
(Editor’s
note: Andy Martin now lives in New Hampshire where he is a U. S. Senate candidate. But Andy
continues his nationwide political and judicial corruption fighting; his Chicago crime-fighting efforts remain
active. If you have hard evidence of political or judicial corruption anywhere
in the United States, please let us know.)
(Chicago) (January 26, 2014) Andy Martin will hold a
telephone news conference Monday, January 27th to discuss whether
the Chicago Tribune is trying to soft-pedal corporate murder by Illinois
gubernatorial candidate Bruce Rauner.
“I believe the charge of ‘corporate murderer’ can legitimately
be made against Republican gubernatorial candidate Bruce Rauner,” Andy says. “I
have had a series of articles on Rauner in preparation for several months; but
a story which was issued by Republican News Watch (link below) caught my
attention. The Chicago Tribune’s soft-pedal response to the Republican News
Watch story confirmed my suspicions: Illinois
media are ignoring serious evidence of ‘corporate murder’ by Bruce Rauner and
his financial cronies (see Tribune story link below).
1. Corporate murder during the 2012 presidential campaign
“During the 2012 presidential campaign Barack Obama’s
mudslingers accused Mitt Romney of corporate murder. Obama’s minions alleged,
in a powerful TV ad and relentless cable TV appearances, that Romney's closure
of a plant had led to the death of a worker’s wife and that Romney was guilty
of her murder.
“The murder charge was totally bogus. The wife had died long
after the plant closed, and the wife had access to ongoing health insurance
through her own job. Nevertheless, Romney never really rebutted Obama’s
malignant accusations; the false impression that Mitt Romney's greed was
killing his employees lingered to Election Day.
“While the corporate murder charges against Romney were both
false and unfair, I believe that a fair-minded review of the evidence confirms
that accusations of corporate murder against Bruce Rauner have a legitimate
basis.
2. The basis for accusing Rauner of corporate murder
A. Why accusations of murder against Rauner’s murder are different
“In Mitt Romney’s case, the accusation of corporate murder
was based on indirect causation. Democrats charged that a plant closure had led
to cancellation of health insurance, and the loss of insurance had precipitated
a death many years later. The facts did not support the claims against Romney.
B. Rauner was personally responsible for the operation of
his business
“Public figures and politicians who take ‘personal
reasonability’ for their incompetence, from Hillary Clinton all the way down to
local jerks, have become a colossal bore. When they take ‘personal
responsibility’ they are usually trying to evade actual responsibility. Rauner’s
case of corporate murder represents a classic situation where the corporate
murderer tries to shift blame for his greed to third parties.
“In business, when you are an owner or execute of a business
you are legally responsible for all aspects of your business. As the Tribune
admits, ‘Rauner, however, was GTCR’s chairman when it moved into the nursing
home business…as well as when the health care firm put itself into receivership
11 years later…’ He was a chief executive and owner of the nursing home firm’s
parent company.
3. How Rauner ran his nursing home business
A. The day-to-day operations of Rauner’s nursing homes
“Any business needs workers and supplies to operate
properly. In the case of manufacturing businesses, lack of adequate safety
precautions on the plant floor that lead to employee deaths can support charges
of criminal negligence. If employees are deprived of the proper tools and
proper supplies to perform their duties, management is guilty.
“Rauner’s culpability is much more serious than that of an
ordinary business executive. Most businesses produce goods or services that a
customer can accept or reject. No one has to go into a dirty place of business
or purchase a defective product. But nursing home residents are often helpless
senior citizens who can’t care for their basic needs (which is why they are in
a nursing home); they are extremely vulnerable to abuse and neglect. Nursing
home patients can’t simply pick up and walk out. Increasingly today, many
patients are held in locked areas because of their progressive Alzheimer’s
deterioration.
“By demanding excessive profits and depriving his employees
of the essential resources – supplies and employees – to properly run his
business, Rauner created conditions where care was denied and where it was inevitable
that patients would eventually die from neglect and abuse. The consequences of
Rauner’s greed were completely foreseeable and predictable: patient deaths.
B. The massive financial corruption of Rauner’s business
“Rauner is part of a class of business people today that are
little more than ‘white collar’ criminals. Rauner & Co.
call themselves ‘private equity’ operators. In most instances ‘private equity’
does not amount to building and investing in a business. ‘Private equity’
involves stealing value from public stockholders and then cutting costs to the
point of running the business into the ground. That was Rauner’s method.
“Rauner not only stole from his nursing home patients he
also stole from employees and other suppliers by putting his businesses into
receivership and bankruptcy. Why would anyone, least of all a ‘conservative’ Republican,
vote for a corporate scam artist as a gubernatorial candidate?
“Rauner’s creation of corporate shell entities to insulate
his assets and personal wealth from his creditors represents a pattern of
fraudulent conveyances which are illegal under federal law and can lead to
criminal charges (we’ll be working to see Rauner is indicted). The Tribune
story slides right over the impact of Rauner’s Mafia-style mismanagement. The Tribune’s
reporters had no concept of fraudulent conveyances and did not consult a
newspaper lawyer wile preparing their story.
4. Rauner’s excuses as presented by the Chicago
Tribune
“Rauner’s mouthpiece Mike Schrimf makes two very predictable
defenses. First, Schrimf says Rauner ‘had nothing to do with the management of
the nursing home company…’ when Rauner was the chief executive of the corporate
parent. That’s nonsense. A privately-owned corporate parent is almost always liable
for the misdeeds of its subsidiaries, particularly in cases such as Rauner’s
where debt is used to create a pyramid scheme.
“Second, Schrimf rolls out the typical Republican response
that ‘trial lawyers’ are behind Rauner’s problems. No, Mr. Rauner, like Benghazi,
real people died in your nursing homes.
“Mr. Rauner, your corruption and mismanagement led to real deaths.
Senior citizens were slaughtered through the abuse and neglect of your
employees while you were the corporate chief. “Mr. Rauner used his business
enterprises to enrich himself; he brought about the deaths of helpless senior
citizens in the process.
“The Tribune tries to suggest that a Rauner opponent, State
Senator Kirk Dillard, ‘cribbed’ the nursing home story from an ‘anti-Rauner
blogger.’ The original blog story was based on facts, evidence, court records
and links to local news stories in the areas where the helpless patients of Mr.
Rauner had been butchered by Rauner’s employees. Senator Dillard did not ‘crib’
anything. Dillard merely commented on the facts and the evidence. The Tribune’s
attempt to use derisive language towards Dillard, and to minimize Rauner’s
corruption and greed, is a despicable media cover-up.
“Just as Hillary Clinton continues to be dogged by evidence
of corruption and mismanagement because of her State Department’s response to Benghazi,
Mr. Rauner cannot escape liability and responsibility for the blood on his
hands from the dead patients who were butchered under his corporate leadership
and management.
“Unlike Mitt Romney, Mr. Rauner is a genuine corporate
murderer,” Andy says. “Rauner did not stick a poison needle in his patients,
but he deprived them of medical care and allowed them to die horrible deaths
from neglect and abuse. Many prosecutors would agree that Rauner’s egregious level
of negligence and greed, and Rauner’s gross mismanagement of human beings under
his care, amount to criminal negligence. Rauner is criminally liable for the
deaths of his patients. Mr. Rauner used his corporate entities as instruments
of death,” Andy charges.
Stay tuned for Part Two: Who is Bruce Rauner and why won’t Chicago
media tell the truth about him?
----------------------
January 27th [TELEPHONE]
News Conference Details:
WHO:
Corruption fighter and New
Hampshire U. S. Senate candidate Andy Martin
WHAT:
Andy Martin asks whether the
Chicago Tribune is trying to cover-up corporate murder by candidate Bruce
Rauner
WHERE:
Telephone news conference:
Dial-in Number: 1-800-466-8543
Conference Code: 510518
WHEN:
Monday, January 27th – 11:00
A.M. CST (Noon EST)
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LINKS TO THIS STORY (cut and paste the entire link below and not
just the underlined portion):
http://republicannewswatch.com/wp/?p=13297
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Labels: Andy Martin, Bruce Rauner, Chicago Tribune, corruption fighter, GTCR, Illinois corruption, Illinois politics, media critic, New Hampshire U S Senate candidate