Two firms that received $343.3 million to handle advertising for Barack Obama’s
White House run last year have profited from his top priority as president by
taking on his push for health-care overhaul.
One is AKPD Message and Media,
the Chicago-based firm headed by David Axelrod until he left last Dec. 31 to
serve as a senior adviser to the president. Axelrod was Obama’s top campaign
strategist and is now helping sell the health-care plan. The other firm is
Washington-based GMMB Campaign Group, where partner Jim Margolis was also an
Obama strategist.
This year, AKPD and GMMB received $12 million in
advertising business from Healthy Economy Now, a coalition that includes the
Washington-based Pharmaceutical Research & Manufacturers of America, known
as PhRMA, that is seeking to build support for a health-care overhaul, said the
coalition’s spokesman, Jeremy Van Ess. …
Axelrod was president and sole
shareholder of AKPD from 1985 until he sold his interest after Obama’s victory,
government records show. The firm owes Axelrod $2 million, which it’s due to pay
in installments beginning Dec. 31. Axelrod’s son, Michael, still works there. He
didn’t return a phone call. The firm’s Web site continues to feature David
Axelrod’s work on the Obama campaign.
Big whoop right? David left the company after being brought onto Team Obama. One word, Halliburton.
Dick Cheney not only left Halliburton before entering the White House, but the contracts signed were also competing bids with other companies, and the funds gained were placed in a separate escrow.
The contracts with AKPD Message and Media were neither placed in a separate escrow, nor were they even competed against.
No comments:
Post a Comment