BETTER TASTE IN ENEMIES

Following up on the last post, which concerned a New York Post writer's redundant rehash of creaky right-wing attacks on the usual left-leaning celebrities, I see that someone at Murdoch's tabloid understands who really infuriates in Americans (right-wing and otherwise) in 2009:



Story:

Just weeks after Citigroup averted total collapse with a $45 billion shot in the arm of taxpayer cash, the bank jetted its former CEO and his family on one of its corporate jets to a posh Mexican resort for New Year's, The Post has learned.

Sandy Weill, 75, hopped aboard the tanking bank's Bombardier BD 700 Global Express on Dec. 26 with his wife, Joan, daughter Jessica, her husband and their children. They flew from Westchester County Airport to the Los Cabos shore region in sunny Baja, according to aviation records and sources familiar with the trip.

The holiday jaunt came the same week that Citigroup -- which lost $28.2 billion over the last five quarters and cut 75,000 jobs globally in 2008 -- agreed to curtail runaway corporate expenses as part of a deal to get the massive influx of federal money.

The new belt-tightening policy went into effect on Dec. 31, while the jet was parked at the Los Cabos airport.

The family stayed through Jan. 3 at the ultra-expensive One & Only Palmilla in San José del Cabo -- where a four-bedroom suite costs $12,000 a night. It's the same beachfront resort favored by high-wattage stars like Jennifer Aniston and John Travolta and is where Eli Manning got married in April....

Total cost of the trip: possibly up to $90,000.

More on the One & Only Palmilla, from Luxury-Insider.com:

...Each newly renovated casita has its own private infinity pool, a pool terrace adorned with day beds and stunning ocean views. There are also whirlpool and al fresco dining facilities for the 1,300 sq ft One-Bedroom Suites, whilst the 1,780 sq ft Master Suite has lavished bathing facilities including indoor and outdoor rain showers, a sculpted bath and an elegant marble bathroom.

For ultimate privacy, One&Only Palmilla has also opened a new standalone Villa Cortez. Perched on the cliffs along the Sea of Cortez, the incredibly spacious 10,500 sq ft four-bedroom villa offers 24-hour Estate Butler Service, private spa facilities, a 12-seat cinema, leather paneled office, indoor and outdoor kitchen, infinity-edged pool, full kinesis gym and a media studio....

I'd be delighted if Murdoch & Co. decided that the way to keep the punters reading the Post is to train the paper's stilettos not on the usual played-out list of liberal villains, but on arrogant corporate scum. Unfortunately, I don't think we're going to get much more than a brief wave of this sort of class anger from the Post, and soon it'll be back to the usual bashing of Sean Penn and Rosie and Babs and Hanoi Jane, the stories indistinguishable from the ones written from 1993 on, with "Obama" substituted for Clinton. (And Murdoch's Wall Street Journal, of course, will defend the Weills of the world as victims who'll suffer even greater privation without additional tax cuts.) For now, though, I like where the Post is going.

(And yes, I suppose it's easy to go after Weill because he gives a lot of money to Democrats, notably Hillary Clinton, although George W. Bush, Mitch McConnell, Steve Forbes, and Al D'Amato have also received his checks. That's fine with me. I wouldn't mind if close association with these guys began to be seen as increasingly toxic for all pols.)