Afternoon Must-Read: Peter Hart: NYT Columnist Andrew Ross Sorkin’s Faulty Attack on Elizabeth Warren’s ‘Rage’
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NYT Columnist Andrew Ross Sorkin’s Faulty Attack on Elizabeth Warren’s ‘Rage’:
“Not so fast, says Sorkin…
…this is no normal inversion:
While the merger is technically an inversion, it isn’t comparable to so many of the cynically constructed deals that were done this year simply to reduce taxes.
That’s what Burger King says–though Stephen Shay… says,
I would be surprised if in five years’ time, their tax rate does not come down reasonably dramatically….
This is the crux of Sorkin’s argument that Warren ‘is, to put it politely, mistaken.’ She calls this a tax inversion, and it’s not–or actually it is, since it’s ‘technically an inversion.’ Is that clear enough for you?… Sorkin admits that Warren could have had a better argument if she wasn’t so blinded by her rage:
It is true that Mr. Weiss doesn’t have a lot of experience in the regulatory arena… will be the beneficiary of a policy at Lazard that vests his unvested shares… by taking a government job…. Ms. Warren might be more persuasive if she focused on those issues.
Good point: Warren should have focused on his lack of regulatory experience. Oh wait….
That raises the first issue. Weiss has spent most of his career working on international transactions–from 2001 to 2009 he lived and worked in Paris–and now he’s being asked to run domestic finance… oversee consumer protection and domestic regulatory functions at the Treasury.
Free tip for Andrew Ross Sorkin: Don’t say someone should have emphasized a point they in fact raised as ‘the first issue.’ It makes it seem like you didn’t read the article you’re critiquing.