Jon Stewart: NBC News Was Too Busy Explaining 'LOL' And 'Muffin Top' To Report On GE's Zero Tax Bill

As you know, the NYT reported Friday morning that GE paid no federal income taxes on $14 billion in profit in 2010.  Friday night, NBC News, owned by GE, chose not to cover the story, opting instead to give precious air time to new dictionary entries LOL and 'muffin top.' Stewart questions whether Obama tapped GE head Jeff Immelt to be his Chairperson of the Council on Jobs and Competitiveness as a corporate demonstration on how to layoff American workers and escape paying taxes.

• "I know the Supreme Court ruled that corporations are people.  But what they didn't realize is that those people are a**holes."

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Background...

• Bernie Sanders: The Top Ten U.S. Corporate Tax Avoiders

• G.E. Made $14 Billion In 2010 And Paid NO U.S. Tax

• 60 Minutes: New Corporate Tax Havens

Comments

[DailyBail]

Jon Stewart calls out GE-NBC relationship

http://www.politico.com/blogs/onmedia/0311/Jon_Stewart_calls_out_GENBC_relationship.html

different story...i might cover this later today...

[DailyBail]

Willie Nelson Prosecutor Loves Willie Nelson

http://www.deathandtaxesmag.com/68483/willie-nelson-prosecutor-loves-willie-nelson/

[DailyBail]

The FDA Comes to the Rescue of Big Pharma

http://www.activistpost.com/2011/03/fda-comes-to-rescue-of-big-pharma.html

[john]

Flashback:

ENRON'S COLLAPSE: THE HAVENS; Enron Avoided Income Taxes In 4 of 5 Years

http://www.nytimes.com/2002/01/17/business/enron-s-collapse-the-havens-enron-avoided-income-taxes-in-4-of-5-years.html

[DailyBail]

great link john...thanks...

[john]

Here is a little more on GE...

Clean Up GE

http://www.cleanupge.org/

[john]

Here is the section on GE Misdeeds...

http://www.cleanupge.org/gemisdeeds.html

[snip]

GE has a lengthy record of criminal, civil, political and ethical transgressions. Here are a few examples:

In 1995 -- with the establishment of a Presidential Advisory Commission -- the full extent of GE's human experiments with nuclear radiation were revealed. General Electric ran the Hanford Nuclear Reservation in Richland, Washington as part of America's weapons program; beginning in 1949, General Electric deliberately released radioactive material to see how far downwind the radioactive material would travel. One cloud drifted four hundred miles, all the way down to the California-Oregon border, carrying perhaps thousands of times more radiation than that emitted at Three Mile Island.

[omg_igiveup]

G.E. also designed Fukushima...so we have them to thank for this disaster.

[john]

This is a very important article... From Sept. 2002.

Corporate misdeeds expose Japan's structural faults
Linda Sieg in Tokyo, Reuters

http://www.timesofmalta.com/articles/view/20020904/business/corporate-misdeeds-expose-japans-structural-faults

[snip]

Who's watching the watchdogs? That, analysts and activists say, is the question that should be foremost in citizens' minds as they ponder the latest in a long list of scandals to hit the cream of corporate Japan.

The disturbing answer - "often, no one" - is one reason Japan finds it so hard to reform its economy despite more than a decade in the doldrums and policy-makers' promises of change.

The president of Tokyo Electric Power Co. (Tepco), Japan's largest power utility and a firm closely linked to the nation's policy elite, said on Monday that he and four other top executives would resign over a scandal involving the falsification of reports to cover up damage at nuclear reactors.

The scandal came to light last Friday, more than two years after an employee at the unit of US-based General Electric Co. which conducted the safety checks told authorities that there appeared to be problems with Tepco's reports.

Critics said the sluggish official response was symptomatic of a deeper problem - the cosy ties which for decades have linked top companies, their official overseers and politicians in a triangle of mutual interests.

[bo2]

The PEOPLE of America should use this as a case for not paying taxes, period.

[john]

SEC fines GE $59 Million for accounting misdeeds (2002)

http://westendgop.com/smf/index.php?topic=563.0

Enron and on....... I wonder how many wind turbines were sold this way and wonder about T.Boone Pickins acquisition of GE turbines before the Pickins plan was scrapped.

http://www.dallasnews.com/news/state/headlines/20100112-T-Boone-Pickens-cuts-order-915.ece

[john]

GE to buy UK oil pipe maker Wellstream for US$1.3 billion

http://www.chinapost.com.tw/business/company-focus/2010/12/14/283542/GE-to.htm

[snip]

LONDON -- General Electric Co. has agreed to buy British oil drilling pipe-maker Wellstream Holdings Plc. for 800 million pounds (US$1.3 billion), as GE continues its push into the offshore oil services industry.

[john]

Bill Clinton in Brazil for climate change (pushing GE's entry into offshore oil and gas?)

http://news.yahoo.com/s/afp/climatebrazilusenvironment

Comment: where there is smoke....... see my 8:20 post......

[john]

Obama’s Climate Exchange Is A Gift To GE (GE)

http://www.carbonoffsetsdaily.com/news-channels/usa/obamas-climate-exchange-is-a-gift-to-ge-ge-4971.htm

[snip]

GE needs all the help it can get right now, with its stock hurtling closer towards $0 on a daily basis. The company obviously stands to benefit from infrastructure buildout, and from capturing its share of green (energy) dollars. The more wind-turbines we erect, the better for GE.

[john]

GE: Bringing Creative Tax Strategies to Light

http://www.accountingtoday.com/news/GE-Bringing-Creative-Tax-Strategies-Light-57849-1.html

[snip]

The corporate behemoth’s creative use of tax deferral strategies, shifting much of its reported income to foreign subsidiaries, has shed new light on how multinational corporations oftentimes pay little to no taxes. GE not only paid no federal income taxes on its $14.2 billion in profits last year, but even claimed $3.2 billion in tax breaks. A New York Times article last week pointed out that GE employs a 975-employee tax department run by a former Treasury Department official, John Samuels. The department is sometimes known as the world’s best tax law firm, and also includes former officials from the IRS and congressional tax-writing committees.


General Electric (NYSE:GE) Buys French Power Player

http://www.emoneydaily.com/general-electric-nysege-buys-french-power-player/69811602

[snip]

The acquisition is intended to extend its portfolio of high-efficiency automation equipment for the oil and gas thermal-power and renewable energy markets.

[john]

Google’s Wind-Power Project Draws Opposition on Return Guarantee

http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2011-03-30/google-s-5-billion-wind-power-bid-draws-opposition-on-return-guarantee.html

[john]

More stuff regarding GE and others.

http://bjdurk.newsvine.com/_news/2011/02/21/6099211-enron-gave-birth-to-the-us-wind-energy-industry-?threadId=3059051&commentId=52809412

[BOB]

Stewart is like a lot of people who know things that just aren't so. The Supreme Court never ruled that corporations are persons. It is not in any ruling. A clerk responsible for publishing Supreme Court cases wrote that in some introductory remarks, and corporations and others who saw the value in the assumption took it and ran with it. Now it has become established lore, but that is all it is.

[john]

Companies With Permission to Bypass Sanctions

http://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2010/12/24/world/24-sanctions-list.html