{"id":5349,"date":"2005-09-26T09:45:56","date_gmt":"2005-09-26T13:45:56","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.thecarpetbaggerreport.com\/?p=5349"},"modified":"2005-09-26T09:45:56","modified_gmt":"2005-09-26T13:45:56","slug":"its-about-more-than-alleged-insider-trading","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/its-about-more-than-alleged-insider-trading\/","title":{"rendered":"It’s about more than alleged insider trading"},"content":{"rendered":"

Senate Majority Leader Bill Frist (R-Tenn.) clearly has a major problem on his hands, as evidenced by SEC and Justice Department investigations into his suspicious “investment strategy”<\/a> a few months ago.<\/p>\n

And while there’s been ample speculation about possible insider trading, there’s an equally important side to this controversy that could be even more damaging: whether Frist lied about it. Based on recent reports, it certainly sounds like he was playing fast and loose<\/a> with the truth.<\/p>\n

Frist, asked in a television interview in January 2003 whether he should sell his HCA stock, responded: “Well, I think really for our viewers it should be understood that I put this into a blind trust. So as far as I know, I own no HCA stock.” <\/p>\n

Frist, referring to his trust and those of his family, also said in the interview, “I have no control. It is illegal right now for me to know what the composition of those trusts are. So I have no idea.” <\/p>\n

Documents filed with the Senate showed that just two weeks before those comments, the trustee of the senator’s trust, M. Kirk Scobey Jr., wrote to Frist that HCA stock was contributed to the trust. It was valued at $15,000 and $50,000.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

It seems hard to believe Frist would be so reckless as to lie, on television, about something that would be so easy to check. I know Republican arrogance and a perception of a “permanent” GOP majority has affected so many people’s judgment in DC, but the blatancy here is almost over the top.<\/p>\n

The trustee of Frist’s not-quite-blind trust repeatedly told Frist about all of the HCA stock. And then, shortly thereafter, Frist essentially says, “What stock?”<\/p>\n

Indeed, on an even more basic level, Frist’s argument raises questions about basic logic. In 2003, Frist said, “So as far as I know, I own no HCA stock.” He added that he had “no control” over his trust. Then, last week, Frist’s office said<\/a> the senator “directed the trustees to sell the HCA stock.”<\/p>\n

I realize that the legal standards for insider trading are high and the evidence, at this point, is relatively circumstantial. But that doesn’t change the fact that Frist has an honesty problem, whether he has a securities problem or not.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Senate Majority Leader Bill Frist (R-Tenn.) clearly has a major problem on his hands, as evidenced by SEC and Justice Department investigations into his suspicious “investment strategy” a few months ago. And while there’s been ample speculation about possible insider trading, there’s an equally important side to this controversy that could be even more damaging: […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[617],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-5349","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-general"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5349","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=5349"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5349\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=5349"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=5349"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=5349"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}