Proving that “disgrace” is not in the Democratic dictionary.
A former MF Global employee accused former president William J. Clinton of collecting $50,000 per month through his Teneo advisory firm in the months before the brokerage careened towards its Halloween filing for Chapter 11 bankruptcy.
Teneo was hired by MF Global’s former CEO Jon S. Corzine to improve his image and to enhance his connections with Clinton’s political family, said the employee, who asked that his name be withheld because he feared retribution.
“They were supposed to be helping Corzine improve his image as a CEO—I guess you can tell how that went,” he said. Corzine resigned as CEO and chairman November 4.
Let’s savor that for a moment. Jon Corzine, who is quite wealthy, apparently used $50,000 per month of MF Global’s money, to pay the once impeached Bill Clinton, who is also quite wealthy, to improve Corzine’s public image. Corzine couldn’t find his personal checkbook to pay for this little perk?
You know what would have done the most good for Corzine’s image? Not engineering yet another massive financial train wreck.
The Teneo contract with MF Global lasted at least five months, he said. “The board cancelled it after Corzine resigned.”
The source, who is no longer associated with MF Global, said Teneo is a dual-track company with one side devoted to merchant and investment banking and the other side set up to provide image and strategy consulting services.
Clinton is the chairman of the company’s advisory board. His duties and compensation have not been released. The other member of the board is former British prime minister Tony Blair.
Two of the three founding partners are very close to the former president and his wife, Secretary of State Hillary R. Clinton. They are Douglas J. Band, who is the former president’s counselor and has served on his personal staff since 1995 and Declan Kelly, who earned the “Hillraiser” status in the secretary’s 2008 run for president for bundling more than $100,000 for the campaign.
These people, Tony Blair and the rest of ’em, all undoubtedly made sure they got paid. MF Global’s stockholders, not so much.
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