IT wasn’t just teenage pages Mark Foley cozied up to.
When he wasn’t sending explicit text messages to House pages, the now-disgraced congressman put his efforts into courting the entertainment industry.
As head of the House entertainment caucus, Foley was an influential advocate on a number of issues facing the movie and music industries. In 2004 he lobbied heavily to become head of the influential Motion Picture Association of America. The post eventually went to former Kansas congressman Dan Glickman, who replaced the legendary Jack Valenti.
“He was someone who was very supportive of copyrights and artists’ rights,” said one music industry executive.
Foley also had another agenda: “He was very eager to get to all the parties,” said this person.
Foley was a frequent guest at entertainment industry events.
Two years ago at a pre-Grammy gathering honoring Sting in Los Angeles, the congressman was seated next to this columnist at a table hosted by music giant EMI.
Over the course of the evening, Foley proceeded to get quite tipsy – and handed over his phone number along with an offer to fly me back to New York in a private jet. (For the record: The overture was rebuffed.)
Short-Ed
The last year cannot have been easy for short-selling hedge funds, reports The Post’s Roddy Boyd.
The four or so dedicated shortsellers remaining have each been sued by the likes of Biovail, Overstock and Fairfax Financial Holdings, all of which allege short-selling hedge funds are at the center of nefarious plots to drive their companies out of business.
So it came as some surprise to market watchers when the Op-Ed pages of The New York Times allowed some of its high-profile real estate to be taken over by one Richard Sauer, who argued passionately for the importance of short-sellers in the market.
Sauer, who worked at both the Securities and Exchange Commission and for high-profile law firm Vinson & Elkins, noted at the bottom his piece that he would soon be joining an unnamed “shortbias” hedge fund.
The Post has learned that he is joining Copper River Partners- the hedge fund formerly known as Rocker Partners-as an analyst.
Rocker/Copper River pulled off an impressive trifecta of sorts within the past year: It was the only short fund sued by Biovail, Overstock and Fairfax.
RUMORS BLOOM
Rumors bloom Rumors thatMayor Michael Bloomberg had sold a chunk of his giant financial news company to The Carlyle Group were swirling around news company’s office complex last week.
The rumors, untrue, were fueled by sightings of private-equity moguls chit-chatting with Bloomberg CEO Peter Grauer.
Several financiers, including billionaire investor Thomas H.
Lee, Carlyle founder David Rubenstein and executives from Goldman Sachs and other big Wall Street banks are all trying to get the inside track on buying what could be a $15 billion company, sources said.
However, Bloomberg won’t be ready to sell his company until the end of his term in 2009, sources close to the mayor said.