As the Memphis Flyer noted first, as long ago as
January 15 (“Ford’s Future”), Harold Ford Jr. may be in line to become Commerce
Secretary in the Obama administration. The admirable Chuck Todd of NBC and MSNBC is the
latest to report such a possibility (“Is Commerce Department Built Ford Tough,”
msnbc.com), and, as Todd notes, the former Memphis congressman and U.S. Senate
candidate and current multi-tasking national celebrity has many points to recommend
him. Notes Todd:
On paper, Ford checks a lot of boxes for
a an easy-to-confirm nominee for this post: He’s a pro-business Democrat
(remember, this is Commerce Secretary so the job is to be a promoter of
business); he’s a former member of the Congressional Black Caucus (you’ll recall
this whole kerfuffle over control of the census under a Judd Gregg-led Commerce
Dept. was started by complaints from the CBC); and he’s a practiced spokesperson
on TV (the Geithner rollout this week is a reminder that the administration
doesn’t have enough solid media savvy members of his team who can sell the
administration’s policies.)
Todd also posits a potential caveat,
however:
There is one, potential, gigantic
problem: Ford’s current place of employment — Merrill Lynch. Given the current
views of Wall Street, Ford’s nomination could come under immediate fire and he’d
have to disclose exactly what his job was with ML etc. and whether he was one of
the
700 million dollar bonus recipients before Merrill completed its sale to
Bank of America in late 2008.
Attentive Flyer readers will observe that
we took note of that very concern in this space yesterday, Friday, February 13
(“Is Harold Ford Jr. a Merrill Lynch Bonus Baby”), some hours before Todd’s own
post on the MSNBC site. Though several readers – some friendly, some not –
interpreted our post as an “attack” on Ford, it was nothing of the kind. Our
article merely raised the same necessary conjecture as would Todd subsequently
on the site of one of Ford’s current employers, MSNBC.
I might add, parenthetically, that I
personally do not find it particularly amiss that the talented Mr. Ford might
have benefited from a year-end bonus tendered by yet another employer, Merrill
Lynch. Nor did any of the persons friendly to him whom I consulted for my most
recent article, all of whom assumed that Ford, as one of the brokerage’s prize
spokespersons, would have been so rewarded, along with the nearly 700 other
bonus recipients.
Yet I fully understand that many would feel
otherwise: that Ford — should he have accepted such a bonus — would, in
effect, have allowed himself to profit from an excessive corporate payout that,
as New York Attorney General Andrew Cuomo suggests, might indirectly have been
funded by the taxpayers themselves via last fall’s controversial federal
bailout.
So far Ford himself had not spoken on the
matter, though at least two commenters locally profess to know, sans
presenting any evidence, that Ford was not in fact a bonus recipient. And Todd,
too, evidently heard from such persons, presumably better placed than those responding
locally. As Todd said in an add-on Saturday morning:
***UPDATE: Ford’s folks tell me that he never
received a bonus in his time at Merrill Lynch nor was he involved in developing
or selling anything having to do with mortgage securities. Ford’s job was simply
business development and advising clients on domestic or int’l issues. Bottom
line: no one close to Ford believes he has a Merrill problem.
That may or may
not be “the bottom line,” but the Merrill Lynch bonus issue is certainly a line
Ford will have to cross at some point in his vetting for a cabinet post or
whatever other political or governmental position lies before him. For myself, I
wish him well.
