Miami's Art Basel's Role in the UBS (Tax Cheat) Scandal

Of course Florida and South Florida in particular is a character in the emerging tax scandal involving Swiss banking giant UBS and billions of undeclared greenback$.
Why should this story be any different from so many dozens of crazy stories before it over the past thirty years?

(See: Sen. Levin: Shut Down Giant Swiss Bank UBS,
Investigation Reveals Secrecy Tricks Allegedly Used by Swiss Bankers
By BRIAN ROSS, AVNI PATEL, and RHONDA SCHWARTZ, July 17, 2008
http://abcnews.go.com/Blotter/story?id=5394214&page=1 )

It's really great that the Art Basel Art Fair could help facilitate the meet-and-greet card exchanges that led directly to illicit behavior and financial transactions among the monied class.
Friendly, competent help like that down here is VERY hard to find, as we all know from experience.
No wonder UBS kept coming back year-after-year!

As of this morning, the UBS logo still appears in the bottom left of the Art Basel web page
http://www.artbasel.com/
FYI: Art 40 Basel takes place June 10-14, 2009.

In a few years, when they eventually make a feature film out of Tom Wolfe's upcoming novel on the Miami area, I hope they at least do some on-site shooting down here so that some good can come from all the (temporary?) ill-gotten gains.
(Who knows, maybe MIA's construction will even be finished by then!)

Regardless of how old the cool as a cucumber Swiss banker Bradley Birkenfeld really is, I hereby nominate Jeremy Irons to play him. http://www.imdb.com/name/nm0000460/

I can already see him in the role, stepping out of a long dark Town Car at night, impeccably dressed with a tan and saying bon mots to folks who love nothing in the world so much as cultured and erudite people tossing bon mots their way.

A little bit of Reversal of Evidence http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0100486/ and a little bit of Damage http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0104237/ and pretty soon you're talking Swiss banker
with dollar signs in his eyes as he hands out UBS cards with the three keys on it.
Ironically, I'm doing this post while simultaneously watching Clark Gable and Lana Turner on Turner Classic Movies in 1941's Honky Tonk, http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0033726/ in which Gable plays -yes- a lovable but tough con man in the Old West.

Naturally, now that I say all these things about characters and actors, I see thru this http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/22474914/ and this, http://nymag.com/daily/entertainment/2008/01/inside_tom_wolfes.html
that Wolfe's novel Back to the Blood already has identifiable characters, and, none of 'em are Swiss bankers with the savoir-faire to help those with the dough avoid the tax man.
Maybe I'll have to be the one write that screenplay after all!

Herewith, the Swiss variation of a con, except here, rich folks are the easy marks, eager to escape paying Uncle Sam their fair share of the tax load while indulging their haute culture in South Florida.

And remember, as the Herald keeps insisting we must, they're not all snobs, they're just
connoisseurs and possible condo-owners to be.
Meanwhile, back in The Miami Art District...
(Numbers in blue identify footnote numbers)

from page 3/114:
On June 30, 2008, the United States took another step. It filed a petition in the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of Florida requesting leave to file an IRS administrative summons with UBS asking the bank to disclose the names of all of its U.S. clients who have opened accounts in Switzerland, but for which the bank has not filed forms with the IRS disclosing the Swiss accounts.10 The court approved service of the summons on UBS on July 1,
2008.11 The summons has apparently been served, but according to Swiss authorities the Swiss
and American governments are negotiating over its execution.12 This John Doe summons
represents the first time that the United States has attempted to pierce Swiss bank secrecy by
compelling a Swiss bank to name its U.S. clients.

from page 6-7/114
In May 2008, a second international tax scandal broke when the United States arrested a
private banker formerly employed by UBS AG, one of the largest banks in the world, on charges
of having conspired with a U.S. citizen and a business associate to defraud the IRS of $7.2
million in taxes owed on $200 million of assets hidden in offshore accounts in Switzerland and
Liechtenstein. The United States had earlier detained as a material witness in that prosecution a
senior UBS private banking official from Switzerland traveling on business in Florida, allegedly
seizing his computer and other evidence. In June 2008, the former UBS private banker, Bradley Birkenfeld, pleaded guilty to conspiracy to defraud the IRS.8 His alleged co-conspirator, Mario
Staggl, part owner of a trust company, remains at large in Liechtenstein. The current UBS senior private banking official, Martin Liechti, remains under travel restrictions. This enforcement
action appears to represent the first time that the United States has criminally prosecuted a Swiss banker for helping a U.S. taxpayer evade payment of U.S. taxes.9

On June 30, 2008, the United States took another step. It filed a petition in the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of Florida requesting leave to file an IRS administrative
summons with UBS asking the bank to disclose the names of all of its U.S. clients who have
opened accounts in Switzerland, but for which the bank has not filed forms with the IRS disclosing the Swiss accounts.10 The court approved service of the summons on UBS on July 1,
2008.11 The summons has apparently been served, but according to Swiss authorities the Swiss
and American governments are negotiating over its execution.12 This John Doe summons
represents the first time that the United States has attempted to pierce Swiss bank secrecy by
compelling a Swiss bank to name its U.S. clients.

from page 9/114
Marsh Accounts: Hiding $49 Million Over Twenty Years. James Albright Marsh, a U.S. citizen from Florida in the construction business, formed four Liechtenstein foundations, two in 1985, one in 1998, and one in 2004, and transferred substantial sums to them. LGT assisted him in establishing the two 1985 foundations, using documents that gave Mr. Marsh and his sons substantial control over the foundations and strong secrecy protections. By 2007, the assets in his four foundations had a combined value of more than $49 million. Although LGT became a participant in the QI Program in 2001, which requires foreign banks to report information on accounts with U.S. securities, LGT did not report the Marsh accounts. Instead it advised Mr. Marsh to divest his LGT foundations of U.S. securities, and treated the accounts as owned by non-U.S. persons, the Liechtenstein foundations that LGT had formed. After Mr. Marsh’s death in 2006, the IRS apparently discovered the Liechtenstein foundations through the documents released by the former LGT employee. Mr. Marsh’s family is now in negotiation with the IRS over back taxes, interest and penalties owed on the $49 million in undeclared assets.

from page 16/114:
Mr. Birkenfeld testified that UBS also provided its Swiss bankers with tickets and funds to go to events attended by wealthy U.S. individuals, so that they could solicit new business for the bank in Switzerland. He said that UBS sponsored U.S. events likely to attract wealthy clients, such as the Art Basel Air Fair in Miami; performances in major U.S. cities by the UBS Vervier Orchestra featuring talented young musicians; and U.S. yachting events attended by the elite Swiss yachting team, Alinghi, which was also sponsored by UBS. A UBS document laying out marketing strategies to attract U.S. clients confirms that the bank “organized VIP events” and engaged in the “Sponsorship of Major Events” such as “Golf, Tennis Tournaments, Art, Special Events.” This document even identified the 25 most affluent housing areas in the United States to provide “targeted locations where to organize events.”

page 19/114
Olenicoff Accounts. These concerns are further illustrated by the recent criminal prosecution involving UBS accounts opened in Switzerland by Mr. Birkenfeld for Igor Olenicoff. Mr. Olenicoff is a billionaire real estate developer, U.S. citizen, and resident of Florida and California. From 2001 until 2005, Mr. Birkenfeld and Mario Staggl, a trust officer from Liechtenstein helped Mr. Olenicoff open multiple bank accounts in the names of offshore companies he controlled at UBS in Switzerland and Neue Bank in Liechtenstein. For a time, Mr. Olenicoff was Mr. Birkenfeld’s largest private banking client. To service these accounts, Mr. Birkenfeld met with Mr. Olenicoff in the United States and elsewhere, communicated with him by telephone, fax, and email in the United States, and advised him on how to avoid disclosure of his accounts and assets to the IRS. In 2007, Mr. Olenicoff pled guilty to one criminal count of filing a false income tax return by failing to disclose the foreign bank accounts he controlled. He was sentenced to two years probation and 120 hours of community service, and paid six years of back taxes, interest, and penalties totaling $52 million. In 2008, Mr. Birkenfeld pled guilty to conspiring with Mr. Olenicoff to defraud the IRS and avoid payment of taxes owed on $200 million in assets hidden in accounts in Switzerland and Liechtenstein. Their alleged coconspirator, Mr. Staggl, remains at large in Liechtenstein.

page 42/114 one of the most fascinating parts of the story!
(1) Marsh Accounts: Hiding $49 Million Over Twenty Years
James Albright Marsh, Jr. (“Mr. Marsh”) is a construction contractor who lived in Florida with his wife and six children, until he died in 2006.117 He, his wife, and his children have always been U.S. citizens. In 1985, Mr. Marsh traveled to Liechtenstein, and LGT helped him establish two Liechtenstein foundations, the Chateau Foundation and Lincol Foundation, which then opened accounts at LGT Bank. Also during the 1980s, Mr. Marsh formed two more
Liechtenstein foundations, called Topanga Foundation118 and Largella Foundation,119 apparently using two other financial institutions in Liechtenstein.120 Over the years, these four
Liechtenstein foundations opened accounts at five Liechtenstein banks.121 By 2007, the
Liechtenstein accounts had assets with a combined value in excess of $49 million.122

This section on Mr. Marsh continues for five pages with all sorts of secretive legal corporate tactics they employed to keep below the radar.

from page 79-81/114
Using Transfer Corporations to “Cover Up the Tracks” of Client Funds. As indicated in some of the case histories described earlier, LGT documents obtained by the Subcommittee show that it was not uncommon for LGT to set up intermediary, pass-through corporations that were used by the bank, in the words of an LGT employee, “to cover up the tracks” of funds moving into LGT client accounts. When asked about these corporations, the head of compliance Officer for LGT Group confirmed their existence, explaining that these “auxiliary services corporations” served several functions, including the transmission of funds “confidentially.”338

The documents show that LGT used BTS Management Ltd., formed in the British Virgin Islands (BVI), to establish a number of the transfer corporations. The documents indicate that LGT typically asked BTS Management to form a BVI corporation which then opened an account at LGT or another bank, such as Bank du Gothard in Luxembourg. The transfer corporation then
received funds or securities from an LGT client and immediately transferred those funds or
securities to LGT, if its account was at an outside bank. In some instances the transfer corporation was then dissolved; in other instances, it continued in existence. Once the funds or
securities were delivered to LGT bank, they were moved internally within the bank, using a
mechanism called “journaling” to transfer them from one LGT account to another, here from the transfer corporation’s LGT account to the client’s LGT account. This internal transfer mechanism makes it much more difficult to trace the movement of funds and securities, since it
leaves no record outside of the bank showing that the assets were transferred to the ultimate
recipient, the LGT client.

The Subcommittee investigation uncovered several examples of LGT engaging in this practice. For example, Sera Financial Corporation is a BVI corporation that appears to have functioned as an LGT transfer corporation. An internal LGT document describes Sera Financial as a “[s]pecial purpose company (indirect subsidiary of LTV) for portfolio transfers for assets which are to be brought into an LTV structure.”339 The document shows, by account number, that Sera Financial held one account at Banque du Gothard and eleven separate accounts at LGT Bank in Liechtenstein.340 The document explains this unusual account structure as follows:

For each customer, a sub-account or deposit facility is opened under a reference at BdG
[Banque du Gothard] and at LGT …. Funds transfers as well as securities deliveries to BdG are in favor of SERA …. BdG is instructed to forward cash values and securities without delay to LGT BIL [Bank in Liechtenstein] in favor of Sera Financial Corp. with specification of the reference. ... As soon as the assets are credited at BIL, they are transferred to the destination account ….341

One example of how Sera Financial was used involves a new trust set up for a U.S. client in 2000. A LGT memorandum to the file discussing the transfer of assets to the new trust states:
“The trust shall open an account in the LGT Bank in Liechtenstein. The transfer of assets should
take place using this account. To cover up the tracks from UBS Zurich to the trust in Liechtenstein, I recommend an intermediary Single Purpose Company.”342 LGT decided to use
Sera Financial as the transfer corporation. A wire transfer instruction from Gotthard Bank shows how the transfer operation worked.343 It shows that on October 31, 2000, after $1.2 million had been credited to the Sera Financial account at Banque du Gothard: “BTS Management Limited, Tortola, as Managing Director of the company Sera Financial Corporation, Tortola, B.V.I. [h]ereby declares: … that the following beneficiary(ies) is/are entitled to the above-referenced transaction,” naming the U.S. citizen from Florida, known to the Subcommittee as a U.S. client of LGT at that time. The $1.2 million was then transferred to his account.

pages 96-97/114
Mr. Birkenfeld testified that UBS not only authorized and paid for the business trips to the United States, but also provided the Swiss bankers with tickets and funds to go to events
attended by wealthy U.S. individuals, so that they could solicit new business for the bank in
Switzerland. He said that UBS sponsored U.S. events likely to attract wealthy clients, such as
the Art Basel Air Fair in Miami; performances in major U.S. cities by the UBS Vervier Orchestra
featuring talented young musicians; and U.S. yachting events attended by the elite Swiss
yachting team, Alinghi, which was also sponsored by UBS. An internal UBS document laying
out marketing strategies to attract U.S. and Canadian clients confirms that the bank “organized
VIP events” and engaged in the “Sponsorship of Major Events” such as “Golf, Tennis
Tournaments, Art, Special Events.”405 This document even identified the 25 most affluent
housing areas in the United States to provide “targeted locations where to organize events.”406

Mr. Birkenfeld described to the Subcommittee how Swiss private bankers used these events and other means to find new U.S. clients during their trips to the United States: You might go to sporting events. You might go to car shows, wine tastings. You might deal with real estate agents. You might deal with attorneys. … It’s really where do the rich people hang out, go and talk to them. … [I]t wasn’t difficult to walk into a party with a … business card, and then someone ask[s] you, ‘What do you do?’ and you say, ‘Well, I work for a bank in Switzerland, and we manage money there and open accounts.’
And people immediately would recognize, oh, this is someone who could open new
business by opening accounts.407

page 98/114
For example, the Subcommittee found that at least five UBS client advisors travelled to the United States for trips coinciding with the Art Basel Art Fair, an annual UBS-sponsored event held in early December in Miami Beach since 2002. The data shows that, over the years,
several UBS Swiss client advisors were in Miami during the art show, including three in 2007.
On the customs forms completed over the years by UBS travelers prior to landing at Miami
International airport, only one client advisor stated that the purpose of the trip was for business, while five described the visit as for pleasure. These client advisors’ trips, however, coincided
closely with the dates of the Art Basel event, including an invitation-only private showing.
Moreover, the Subcommittee’s analysis of the customs and travel records obtained from the
Department of Homeland Security show that a Swiss-based UBS client advisor traveled to New
England from June 20-25, 2004, a trip coinciding with the UBS Regatta Cup, held in Newport,
RI from June 19-26, 2004.

pages 105-106/114
(5) Violating Restrictions on U.S. Activities
The UBS practices just described, related to Swiss banker activities undertaken in the United States to recruit and service U.S. clients, may have violated U.S. law as well as UBS policy. As explained earlier, U.S. securities and banking laws prohibit non-U.S. persons from advertising securities services or products, executing securities transactions, or performing banking services within the United States, without an appropriate license. Moreover, U.S. tax laws may require a foreign financial institution to report to the IRS on 1099 Forms sales of non-U.S. securities effected in the United States, such as by executing a transaction by a broker physically in the United States or ordering the completion of a transaction through telephone calls or emails originating from the United States.

It was to avoid violating U.S. law, exceeding its licensed activities, or triggering 1099 reporting requirements, that caused UBS to issue policy statements restricting the activities that its non-U.S. bankers could undertake while in the United States. Its 2002 and 2004 policy statements, for example, prohibited UBS Swiss bankers, while in the United States, from advertising securities products to their clients, informing clients of how their security portfolios were performing, providing copies of account statements, or using U.S. mails, faxes, telephone calls or email to discuss a client’s securities portfolio.443 UBS also prohibited its Swiss bankers from prospecting for new clients while in the United States, soliciting new accounts, or obtaining
signatures on account opening documentation.

Despite these prohibitions, it appears that UBS Swiss bankers in the United States servicing U.S. clients routinely undertook actions that contravened the UBS restrictions. Mr. Birkenfeld described, for example, an art festival sponsored by UBS in Miami each year, which he attended with other Swiss bankers for the express purpose of soliciting new accounts. “We went to these events. We went to dinners, we went to art exhibitions, we went to private homes as private bankers, knowingly by management that they were paying for our hotel, paying for our airfare, paying us our salary, and getting us tickets to the UBS VIP tent to drink champagne with
clients.”444 He testified that he witnessed Swiss bankers soliciting new accounts and completing
account opening documentation while in the United States. He testified that in some cases,
“instead of saying, ‘I signed it in New York,’ they brought the forms back to Geneva and they
put in ‘Geneva.’”445 When asked whether he had promoted securities products during his trips to the United States, he responded, “We were promoting anything.”446

Mr. Birkenfeld also told the Subcommittee that UBS Swiss bankers routinely communicated with their U.S. clients about the status of their accounts, including their securities portfolios. He said that some Swiss private bankers communicated with their U.S. clients by telephone or fax, or by sending occasional documents to them in the United States by overnight mail.447 He said the bankers sometimes used code names during the telephone calls, so that the U.S. client would not have to identify themselves by name, in case anyone was listening.448 He said that U.S. clients generally did not like sending or receiving emails via computer, “because they didn’t want that link, for obvious reasons.”449 Nevertheless, some clients did use email, as shown in the case involving Mr. Birkenfeld and Mr. Olenicoff, examined further below. Mr. Birkenfeld also described how Swiss bankers brought into the United States information about clients’ accounts and securities portfolios. He told the Subcommittee that his day-to-day interactions with clients were in direct contradiction to the restrictions set out in UBS’ policy statements. He indicated those policies simply were not enforced while he was at the bank.450

from page 108/114
Contrary to this representation by UBS, however, a Subcommittee review of the relevant
travel data for the Swiss bankers determined that, from January to April 2008, UBS client
advisors made twelve trips to the United States, travelling from Switzerland to New York,
Miami, San Francisco, and Las Vegas. The Customs I-94 Forms indicate that, on half of these
trips, the Swiss bankers indicated they were travelling for business purposes, while on the other
half, the Swiss bankers indicated they were travelling to the United States for non-business
purposes. With respect to Mr. Liechti, head of the UBS Wealth Management Americas division,
the I-94 Form shows that he arrived in the United States on April 20, 2008, on business. There is no record of his departure to date.

The clear contrast between the UBS policy restrictions dating back to at least 2002, and the activities undertaken by UBS Swiss bankers while traveling in the United States, as described
by Mr. Birkenfeld in his deposition, in connection with his recent indictment, and in internal UBS documents, suggests that until recently, the UBS restrictions were not being enforced. This lack of enforcement, in turn, raises concerns that UBS Swiss bankers with U.S. clients may have been routinely violating not only the bank’s internal policies, but also U.S. law. UBS is currently under investigation by the SEC, IRS, and Department of Justice regarding the activities of its Swiss bankers in the United States.

And in the end...

D. Analysis
Unlike LGT, UBS did not generally refrain from conducting banking operations within the
United States. UBS Swiss bankers targeted U.S. clients, traveled across the country in search of
wealthy individuals, and aggressively marketed their services to U.S. taxpayers who might
otherwise never have opened Swiss accounts. UBS practices resulted in its U.S. clients
maintaining undeclared Swiss accounts that collectively held billions of dollars in assets that
were not disclosed to the IRS. UBS serviced these accounts, in part, by offering banking and
securities products and services within the United States that UBS Swiss bankers were not
licensed to provide. Swiss bank secrecy laws hid not only the misconduct of U.S. taxpayers
hiding assets at UBS in Switzerland, but also the actions taken by UBS bankers to assist those
U.S. clients.
UBS has now stopped all travel by its Swiss bankers to the United States, issued more
restrictive policies, and is conducting an internal review to gauge the nature and extent of the
problem. UBS also cooperated with this Subcommittee in its efforts to gain a full understanding
of the facts and issues.
____________________________________________________
from the
U.S. SENATE PERMANENT SUBCOMMITTEE ON INVESTIGATIONS, STAFF REPORT ON TAX HAVEN BANKS AND U.S. TAX COMPLIANCE, July 17, 2008
at:
http://abcnews.go.com/images/Blotter/REPORT-Tax%20Haven%20Banks%20(July%2017%2008).pdf

Speaking of Marlins stadium cost over-run provisions...

Meant to post this Monday
-------------------------------------
Just wanted to share a couple of odds and ends with you that I caught late Sunday over at DCRTV, http://dcrtv.com/ , a go-to media website and connect them to some local issues of interest to me.

DCRTV's a website that I've been going to for years since I lived in the DC area, and eventually got fed-up with the whitewash and company line I saw too often in the Washington Post's coverage of news about DC-area TV and radio stations and their personalities.
They still cover that in a way that's long been missing at both the Herald and the Sun-Sentinel, though I'm old enough to remember when the Herald did a pretty decent job of that, back when it seemed like every other week something crazy was happening at WNWS, with Neil Rogers, Al Rantel, Stan Majors, et al, when there was local radio talk that was a worth listening to.
But then South Beach Hoosier still recalls how great Neil Rogers was doing play-by-play for U-M baseball games, so...

Owing largely to DC's much-larger media universe, it necessarily is better plugged- in to the industry and has more influence up there than locally-based http://www.sfltv.com/ down here, though I still go to the latter a few times a week, and have listed them on my blogroll from Day One.
In fact, it's there that I first learned that IU alum and then-Local10 meteorologist Megan Glaros was heading up to Nueva York.
It's also where I first learned yesterday morning about Post-Newsweek buying local NBC-6 -WTVJ, to create yet another duopoly in this media market.
I'll have a post on that story tomorrow as I really thought that the Tribune Company was a more likely buyer for the NBC affiliate. http://www.miamiherald.com/news/breaking_news/story/605477.html

Please read the first link below from the Washington Post, as it presages exactly the sort of embarrassing future Marlin headlines I think it's quite likely we'll see in the Herald, if this disastrous Megaplan goes through, as the Washington Nationals' owner is currently not paying the team's rent in DC due to problems with the stadium.
Not surprisingly, the City of Washington is not amused!

And did you catch this delicious nugget in Barry Jackson's Sunday Herald column? http://www.miamiherald.com/592/story/602626.html
Apparently the Marlins were trying to change the terms of their $38.5 million loan from MLB, but the suits up at Park Avenue weren't buying Jeffrey Loria's lame excuses.
They want their money back.

Well, to paraphrase what Popeye's popular side-kick Wimpy (J. Wellington Wimpy) often said, Jeffrey Loria & Co."would gladly pay you Tuesday for a hamburger today."
The difference is that Loria wants to use our wallets to do it!

See this great illustration of Wimpy and the whole gang at a very interesting flower blog called the Human Flower Project: Sweet Pea - ‘Adoptid infink’
Sweet Pea on Popeye’s lap, with Wimpy and Olive Oyl Image: Myron Waldman, King Features
_______________________
from http://www.dcrtv.com/

More: Baseball A Bust In DC - 7/11 - Now, on top of news that the team's delivering lower-than-low TV ratings, we learn that the Washington Nationals' owners - the family of Bethesda-based developer Theodore Lerner - have failed to pay $3.5 million in rent for the District's new ballpark, contending that the state-of-the-art stadium is still incomplete. DC paid more than $611 million in public money to build the stadium complex along the Anacostia River. More in the DC Post.....

Nats' Fans May Boycott Post - 7/11 - Some Nationals fans are not happy with the Washington Post's coverage of the team. And are floating the idea of boycotting the Post's Nats coverage in favor of the Washington Times' Nats coverage. Dan Steinberg has more at washingtonpost.com.....

(It's all at http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2008/07/10/AR2008071002731.html?hpid=topnews )
Nationals Withhold Rent on Ballpark, Hundreds of Items Are Incomplete,Team Owners Say
By Daniel LeDuc and David Nakamura. Washington Post Staff Writers, July 11, 2008)

Williams: Bad Baseball Cause Of Nats' TV Slump - 7/14 -In the Examiner, Jim Williams looks at the ultra-low TV ratings for the Nationals: "The team isn't playing well and there just not seem to enough compelling storylines. Add to that the area is not yet used to following the Nationals... I think that it is unfair to blame MASN for the low numbers. I have heard the absurd argument that because the Nationals and the Orioles alternate between MASN and MASN2 fans can't always find the games. If you can find NBA basketball on CSN, TNT, ESPN, ABC, and even NBA-TV then you should be able to find the Nationals games".....

On a Clear Day, You Can See Forever...

le 14 de juillet 2008
Happy Bastille Day!

"On a clear day, you can see forever..."

True enough from atop La Tour Eiffel en Paris, http://www.tour-eiffel.fr/teiffel/uk/ and especially in one of my all-time favorite films, 1956's Funny Face, strarring Audrey Hepburn, Fred Astaire and Kay Thompson (See http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0050419/ for info and http://www.imdb.com/media/rm3499137024/tt0050419 for great photo!)

But as this delicious and interesting post Thursday by the South Florida Sun-Sentinel's Anthony Man on their Broward Politics blog makes clear below, it's also true from atop Broward County Govt.'s HQ at 115 S. Andrews Avenue, Fort Lauderdale.
From interim County Administrator Bertha Henry's office, it's apparently nothing but blue skies -and green lights!

This attitude certainly explains a lot around here!
With friends like this...

Most of today I'll be down at the Circuit Courthouse on Flagler Street at the trial of Norman Braman v. Miami-Dade County, Ciudad de Miami y Los Marlins.

I'd planned on being there Friday, taking some notes and photos for les blogs, but something came up. Given what happened with the delay, I lucked out.

Happy Bastille Day!
Apropos of the French holiday today, over the weekend on FOX Movie Channel, I finally saw the non-musical 1952 film version of Les Misérables, starring Michael Rennie as Jean Valjean and Robert Newton as Inspector Javert. http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0044907/

Por aujourd'hui, I'm going under my nom de guerre, Laurent.

"On a clear day, you can see forever..."
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3rSA0Va-xTQ Barbra Streisand at her best!
http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0066181/
La Babs est magnifique!!!
_________________________
South Florida Sun-Sentinel
Broward Politics blog
July 10, 2008

Something to think about when you're stuck at a traffic light in Broward County: the government believes the signals are timed
Posted by Anthony Man at 10:15 AM

Broward County has a $3.5 billion annual budget. But it hasn't come up with the dough to synchronize the traffic lights, so taxpayers can save time, gasoline, and wear and tear on their cars.

The reason, perhaps, is that at the top of Broward government, it isn't seen as an issue.

The view from county government headquarters is that the lights are synchronized.

It just doesn't seem that way to drivers who travel at the speed limit along many major streets and get stuck at light after light even when there is hardly any other traffic around.

To see the rest of the post, see: http://weblogs.sun-sentinel.com/news/politics/broward/blog/2008/07/something_to_think_about_when.html#more

Purdue RB recruit: Choosing Purdue over IU was a 'no-brainer"

I grew-up in South Florida as a huge sports fan in the 1970's, played three sports competitively -baseball, football and soccer- and was the Team Manager for two North Miami Beach Senior High School teams that won the Florida State championship.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/North_Miami_Beach_Senior_High_School
(I wrote about 80% of the above Wiki definition.)


To see Street Scene of NMBHS: http://maps.google.com/maps?q=North+Miami+Beach+Senior+High+School&ie=UTF8&ll=25.934659,-80.174553&spn=0.008684,0.010343&t=h&z=16&layer=tc&cbll=25.929149,-80.175365&panoid=iSypIXGVnW7S2RAEg6qT5A&cbp=1,0.6870095273476409,,0,5


The first State Championship was Boys Soccer in 1975 under head coach Vic Cappillo, and then Girls Gymnastics in 1979 under Pete Saponaro, two wonderfully talented and enthusiastic men whom I admired and respected enormously.
For all those reasons, by the time I graduated from NMB in 1979, I had many talented friends around the greater Miami area who were fortunate enough to be offered -and accept- D-1 college athletic scholarships in myriad sports.


Because of those factors, more than most people, I was very familiar with the enormous football talent pool around here, and foresaw the inevitable rise of the Hurricanes, Seminole and Gators' football programs to where we became accustomed down here to the idea of the three of them being ranked in the Top Ten at the beginning and end of every college football season.
To me, it was completely predictable.

So with that in mind, while I was at IU from 1979-83, I was continually frustrated at the number of very talented kids from South Florida -and Central Florida, too- who'd wind up going to smaller schools like the Central, Western or Eastern Michigan, or the like.

Kids who'd be just the sort who'd give IU some much-needed depth so they wouldn't have the sort of second-half collapses against good teams as has long been the norm in Bloomington.
And I wasn't alone in my frustration.

Not to name drop, per se, but Jim Thomas of FT. Lauderdale the-then IU basketball team was a good friend of mine at the time, despite Jim's living over at Teter Quad while I was at Briscoe Quad., near the IU Fieldhouse and Assembly Hall.
(Jim and I were friends despite his single-handily knocking off my school, North Miami Beach, in the state playoffs, at his school's gym, the one year we were arguably THE best team in the state of Florida and favored to win the state championship.)

As both students and sports fans who loved IU, we'd continually bemoan IU's chronic inability to get South Florida kids up to Bloomington, who, while perhaps not stars, were exactly the sorts of very solid, well-rounded kids that make the difference between a solid 7-4 or 8-3 team, and a floundering 5-6 team that raises more questions than they answer.
(Like are they really a 4-7 team that simply got lucky?)

All this frustrating talk of ours was conducted in an era when Michigan had a bona fide South Florida superstar like wideout Anthony Carter and Michigan State had RB Lorenzo White, each of whom were winning games of national importance.
I understand implicitly why someone of their unique caliber were, necessarily, out-of-reach for IU in the Lee Corso years, but must everyone down here with any talent remain un-touchable?

Having finally gotten Direct TV before last Fall, and the Big Ten Network, it's very discouraging as a Hoosier fan to see so many South Florida kids performing for not only Big Ten schools, of course, but, also seeing them play Michigan and Michigan State as the pride of Ypsilanti or Mt. Pleasant, MI, too.
Kids who could've been making a difference in Bloomington, but weren't.


Logically, why in the world should Eastern Michigan continually have better luck at recruiting kids in South and Central Florida than IU? Or Western Michigan for that matter?
And yet... http://www.miamiherald.com/620/story/561110.html

There were opportunities aplenty for IU and Coach Lynch a few months ago, when former NMB QB/DB Doug Wiggins, the Dolphins' 2006 Miami-Dade Player of the Year, was looking to transfer from the U-M. http://hurricanesports.cstv.com/sports/m-footbl/mtt/wiggins_doug00.html
So, what happened with Wiggins?


From my perspective, someone who attended his first Canes game at the Orange Bowl in 1971, last year was littered with lots of broken promises and self-evident poor coaching moves, as Randy Shannon constantly showed his multiple weaknesses as a head college football coach, showing himself as a Coordinator who's now out of his depth.

Against a middling North Carolina State team at the Orange Bowl, U-M completed exactly one pass in the entire game, even putting a WR behind center three times to try to get some offensive momentum generated.
In fact, by the middle of the third quarter, if not earlier, the Wolfpack defense was actually daring the Canes to pass -and they couldn't!
So naturally, after the season, whom did Shannon fire?
Yes, that's right, the Defensive Coordinator whom he'd personally promoted from DBs coach, even though the defense has been sliding steadily for four years due to lousy LB play while Shannon was the D-Coordinator.


Hmmm...
http://ncaabbs.com/archive/index.php/thread-273456.html
Miami Herald quote:
" U-M's Randy Shannon has a good relationship with most local coaches, but North Miami Beach's Jeff Bertani said, "It would be difficult for me to send a kid to UM now. The trust is broken.''Bertani said former NMB standout Doug Wiggins -- who transferred to Western Michigan -- ''was told he had a torn hamstring, which he did not have, because they needed a reason to redshirt him after he played [the first two games].'' Shannon's response? "I don't know anything about that.''

Honestly, a school in IU's iffy position in the football world should've been ready to pounce on him in a second when he decided to transfer out, since he wasn't likely to play a lot at the U-M as a freshman, anyway, despite having been rated the nation's No. 4 cornerback and the No. 33 overall prospect by Rivals.com two years ago.
Instead, now Wiggins will be at Western Michigan and in two years will likely be MUCH BETTER than any defensive player IU has.

I'd be willing to bet that there are probably kids at Immokalee HS right now, up near Lake Okeechobee, that could play or start at IU, and yet based on experience, there seems very little chance that IU will even take a chance on them.
Why?


What's this great strategy at Assembly Hall to become a better and more competitive football team without getting a lot more talented players from Florida?
Sounds like the sports equivalent of Obama somehow imagining he'll win the Electoral College without the state of Florida?
Well, all empirical evidence suggests that both approaches, if continued, are destined to failure.

At a certain point, you don't have to be an IU-trained optometrist to know that something is short-sighted with their current approach, which as always, has them with few dependable playmakers.

I'd be very interested in knowing if any of you are familiar with anything that's been written within the past ten years that details how IU has continually missed the boat on Florida kids who could've added something positive to the campus and to the football program.
If so, please drop me a line with the appropriate URL, so that I'm no longer in the dark.


If not, I may just have to chronicle that sad story myself.


Just in case I didn't make my point strongly enough above, consider the following.
The second day I was ever in the state of Indiana, having flown up by myself from Miami on a late August Thursday afternoon in 1979, days before moving into Briscoe Quad and while checked into the Holiday Inn on S.R 37, I spent most of that afternoon watching the IU football team practice from up in the stands at Memorial Stadium, surrounded by a handful of devoted and curious Hoosier fans, male and female, in various shades of Cream and Crimson.
Yep, that's me.


Sadly, the Miami Herald article below speaks for itself, and is more of the same ol' bad news for Hoosier fans.
______________________________________________
http://www.miamiherald.com/sports/story/596825.html
Columbus wideout Bush commits to Purdue
Posted on Mon, Jul. 07, 2008
BY DAVID QUINONES



LARRY BLUSTEIN'S COMMENTS
Gary Bush, Columbus
Known for his tremendous speed, here is a player who certainly came into his own over the past year. While his quickness and ability to break receptions for long scores has been a lure for colleges, his knowledge of the game is also something that has played in his recruitment as well.



In this Hoosier-state recruiting battle, score one for the Boilermakers.


Columbus' Gary Bush, a 6-1, 180-pound wide receiver, orally committed to attend Purdue University on Sunday night. His decision came after campus visits to Indiana and Purdue two weeks ago.


For Bush, West Lafayette was the clear winner between the two.


''It was really a no-brainer,'' Bush said. "Me and the coach [Joe Tiller] just bonded. It felt like the right place for me to be. Indiana was nice, it was a lot like Purdue, but in the end I chose Purdue.''



He added that he and his parents talked about the long-distance move, but that he has family in nearby Indianapolis and that his folks "supported my decision.''


The explosive Explorer also received attention from Ole Miss, Boston College, Alabama-Birmingham, Troy State and Vanderbilt before ending his recruitment experience early.



The rising senior is a three sport-star who transferred to Columbus from Southridge after his sophomore year. In the 2007-2008 season, Bush was among the Explorers' leaders in receptions -- usually of the breakaway-variety -- while also earning a Miami Herald All-Dade honorable mention for basketball and a second-team slot on the All-Dade Track and Field team.


In a midseason game against Miami Beach, Bush put the game out of reach with a 38-yard touchdown catch against the smaller Hi-Tides secondary. He recorded a 33-yard TD a month later against South Miami. Columbus' deep-threat paced the team with 21.3-yards per catch on the season.



Bush runs a 4.5-40 yard dash and his leaping ability (23-10 long-jump) at 6-1 makes for a huge downfield target. His second place long-jump finish helped Columbus secure the District 15-4A championships in April.


Strength might be an issue, as Columbus coach Chris Merritt says ''there is no offseason'' for the multi-sport Bush to devote lots of time to the weight room.



''For a guy like him, it's more about just maintaining. It's hard with his schedule,'' said Merritt, who describes Bush as an "all-around Division I athlete.''


But Bush says he has a plan for that dilemma.



''We don't start camp for a little while, so right now I'm just in the weight room, doing the work,'' he said.


Bush insisted the answer is not to give up on his other athletic pursuits. He is quick to note that while he and the staff at Purdue talked about the possibility of playing hoops, "Track is a definite. I'll definitely be jumping.''

Reader comments are at:
http://pod01.prospero.com/n/pfx/forum.aspx?msg=49813&nav=messages&webtag=kr-miamitm

Happy 4th of July!

American flag in front of Hallandale Beach Water Tower on S. Surf Road,
Hallandale Beach, FL; Overcast at 5:15 p.m.
July 3, 2008 photo by South Beach Hoosier
http://www.waymarking.com/waymarks/WM2EKR

Jessica Simpson, GQ, July 2005

http://men.style.com/gq/features/landing?id=content_2525

Cover photo by Peggy Sirota, smile by Jessica!

Additional photos at: http://www.mtv.com/photos/?fid=1505186&pid=1756289

------------------

USA Today

Simpson enlists in the pinup wall of fame
By César G. Soriano, June 30, 2005

http://www.usatoday.com/life/people/2005-06-30-jessica-simpson_x.htm?POE=LIFISVA

Where's the Disney World gun story in the Miami Herald?

Thursday, July 3, 2008

Below, an email I sent earlier this afternoon to Miami-area resident and longtime South Beach Hoosier favorite Matt Drudge, with the hopes that he'd turn his immensely powerful combination telescope and microscope of The Drudge Report in the general direction of Orlando and Miami.

This illuminating Orlando Sentinel story by Scott Powers and Jason Garcia is perhaps as good an example as any I'm familiar with that properly illuminates both the 'fixer' mentality and backroom-dealing culture of Tallahasseee, and the Miami Herald's own clueless-ness in the year 2008: a large organization that is neither deft enough nor quick enough on the draw to properly use the myriad resources it possesses, to the detriment of its remaining number of readers.

As to my own original thoughts below about the future of the Herald Building itself, consider yourself warned. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Image:IMG_1642.jpg

And yes, I'll admit, I completely forgot about the Terra Group's purchase of the building, but the general point still holds true.

Winner of the 2005 Best Architectural Eyesore: The Miami Herald Building, 1 Herald Plaza,
Miami, FL 33132-1609
http://www.miaminewtimes.com/bestof/2005/award/best-architectural-eyesore-42698

See also: http://www.miamisunpost.com/archives/2006/07-27-06/eightstoryfrontpage.htm

Sometime soon, I'll share some thoughts on what it was like to be in that huge building in the late 1970's, and look out towards the bay from the desks of the Sports Dept. of the late and much-missed Miami News.
___________________________
Thursday July 3rd, 2008
12:30 p.m.

Dear Matt:

I'm somewhat dumbfounded that you haven't yet linked to the infuriating story about Disney once again playing its Bigfoot card behind the scenes to carve out some special treatment for itself.

The story in today's Orlando Sentinel by Scott Powers and Jason Garcia is as clear and to the point as you could ask for.

Now, personally, me being me, I'd like for the article to have asked State Rep. Stan Mayfield, who helped craft the legislation, to publicly identify these lawyers" (i.e. lobbyists), who were able to $weet talk him and his committee into inserting such a patently deceitful exemption 'exception' on behalf of Disney & Co.
Yeah, I'd really like to know who they are.

The fact that the reputed largest newspaper in the state, the Miami Herald doesn't mention this story anywhere in the paper today, a front page story to be sure, and on its antiquated and third-rate website, rather than have their own reporters ferret out the true facts, runs two AP dispatches, the most recent of which contradicts/clarifies the first, is another larger question worthy of discussion.

Clarification: Parking Lot Guns-Disney story
http://www.miamiherald.com/775/story/591998.html

Disney says it's exempt from new gun law
http://www.miamiherald.com/news/breaking_news/story/592379.html

That's a question that might more reasonably be brought up in the not-too-distant future, when, aping the recent moves of The Tribune Company, McClatchy will likely raise the idea of selling the property where the Herald HQ is located, right on Biscayne Bay, where it's long been the largest eyesore on the Bay.

You can place this example of the Herald once again ignoring the troubles of a large state employer on the agenda/autopsy page, right after that delicious item I told you about the day it happened last September.

That was where the Herald ran a story in their third-rate Sunday opinion section, Issues & Ideas, shortly before a Dem presidential debate at the U-M, where one of their Latin America experts wrote that Gov. Bill Richardson of New Mexico was actually born in Mexico, which would surely come as shocking news to his mother, who was in Santa Monica, CA when Bill was born.

You'll recall that I stated to you at the time how this merely confirmed my own doubts about the tenuous grasp of the U.S. Constitution by most reporters, other than the Second Amendment, and in this case, not only the individual reporter at the Herald who wrote this, but his editors as well. A two-fer.

That this simple "fact" could've been discovered and refuted by a nine-year old in all of about 30 seconds via Richardson's own presidential or gubernatorial website, or that the newspaper never ran a correction, is just one of the many reasons why the Miami Herald has been in economic and editorial free fall for years.

Matt, I can hardly wait 'till the geniuses at The McClatchy Company try to re-assure their stockholders that they won't have any trouble getting the City of Miami or Miami-Dade County to change their zoning laws to accommodate McClatchy's desire to sell the property, and turn it into bayside luxury condos. (What else!)

That's when I think you'll see South Florida residents (inc. bloggers) decide that "what's good for the goose is good for the gander," and decide it's time for that area to become the beautiful bayside park it should've always been.
(The one the city and county completely botched with Bicentennial Park years and years ago, and are now trying to fix with their current equally flawed project.)

Then we'll see how dedicated to the concept of transparency and accountability the Miami Herald's Editorial Board is, when South Florida civic activists make it their business to give the proposed deal the highest possible degree of scrutiny.
You know, just for ol' times sake.

'Chinese wall' and all that.

Hmm... as of Noon, there were only 346 Orlando Sentinel reader comments on their website. That's like, what, the total of all comments to the Herald in a good week?
Exactly, hence my email to you now.

Please consider adding it before the 4th of July.

Adios!

Dave

Orlando Sentinel
Walt Disney World fires back on guns at work
Scott Powers and Jason Garcia, Sentinel Staff Writers
July 3, 2008

Walt Disney World employees won't be packing any heat in the company parking lots anytime soon.

The giant resort has declared that much of its sprawling property is exempt from a new state law that allows Floridians with concealed-weapons permits to keep firearms locked in their cars at work.

Disney, which has 60,000 employees and a long-standing policy against allowing guns on its land, cites an arcane -- and late-added -- loophole in the new law, which took effect Tuesday.

To see the rest of the story:
http://www.orlandosentinel.com/business/custom/tourism/orl-disneyguns0308jul03,0,4282076.story
________________________________________
Reader comments at:
http://www.topix.net/forum/source/orlando-sentinel/T7AB2CU04R1EK4NK0