From The Street, “No Free Lunch at White House for CEOs“:
CEOs from Wal-Mart Stores, Starbucks, Verizon and Nucor were asked to fork over their credit cards so the White House could charge them for a lunch they had with President Barack Obama on Friday, according to reports.
Obama is being careful not to create a conflict of interest as he meets with these CEOs to figure out how to get the private sector back on solid footing.
Last month the CEOs from Xerox, Coca-Cola, AT&T and Honeywell were also asked to pay for their own lunches at the Big House, Politico originally reported.
These lunches use to be paid out of the taxpayer-funded entertainment budget.
From The Washington Post, “The Prez, The Press, The Pressure“:
In the days before President Obama’s last news conference, as the networks weighed whether to give up a chunk of their precious prime time, Rahm Emanuel went straight to the top.
Rather than calling ABC, the White House chief of staff phoned Bob Iger, chief executive of parent company Disney. Instead of contacting NBC, Emanuel went to Jeffrey Immelt, the chief executive of General Electric. He also spoke with Les Moonves, the chief executive of CBS, the company spun off from Viacom.
Whether this amounted to undue pressure or plain old Chicago arm-twisting, Emanuel got results: the fourth hour of lucrative network time for his boss in six months.