Citigroup is a pathetic loser of a corporation having needed three bailouts in as many decades. "Another large exposure for uncertain benefits," the corporate apologists at the Wall Street Journal editorial page declared of the latest Citi rescue. But the global banking giant is one of the largest tenants of Mort Zuckerman, the owner of Citigroup's world headquarters and of the nearby 59-story Citigroup Center, which Citi partly occupies. Why is NBC News allowing Zuckerman to pimp a rescue for Citi?
It's no surprise to see Zuckerman's Daily News editorializing that the Bush administration is "yesterday's news... with the crucial exception of having to prevent major banking houses like Citigroup from collapsing." What is surprising, though, is that MSNBC would allow Zuckerman to do the same on Morning Joe and 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue the other day without so much as noting the conflict. [I]Village Voice[/I] has a fuller rundown. A clip of Zuckerman's flackery is above.
