Yesterday afternoon, CNBC’s Maria Bartiromo interviewed the Chairmen Emeritus of CItigroup (and former Citi CEO), Sandy Weill.
And, considering Bartiromo’s infamous history with Citi execs, some viewers questioned the network’s decision to grant Money Honey this particular interview.
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According to the NYP, When Maria Bartiromo’s not busy fending off rumors that she cheated on her high school boyfriend, she’s apparently raking in the dough by pulling double-duty…as a freelance writer.
CNBC’s Money Honey Maria Bartiromo has been under fire since her close friendship and globetrotting trip on the corporate jet with Citigroup’s now fired global asset management head Todd Thomson first came to light.
But she is still keeping her day job and her easy money side jobs as a magazine columnist for Business Week and Reader’s Digest – where she is estimated to be pulling in another six figures in pocket change.
An additional six figures? For writing?? And here we thought “dental plan” was just one of those antiquated phrases you only hear about in old movies…
• Money Honey cheated on her high school boyfriend with a whiny loser! Fortunately for her, the lucky “other man” is still bragging about rounding second base with her a mere twenty years later.
• Radar rounds up all of YouTube’s greatest accidental talents, and reminds us why they’re hilarious pitiable.
• Cartoon Network looks for new chief who will focus on multiplatform initiatives, not getting fined $2 million for “fake” terrorist attack.
• With a little help from Slate, even the Sports Illustrated Swimsuit issue can be boring!
• We all know Anna liked yogurt, SlimFast and Worcestershire sauce, but what’s in CNN’s fridge? Expired milk and a Victoria’s Secret bag.
• If The 1/2 Hour News Hour loses the laugh track, will anyone still be laughing? (Answer: No, no they will not).
• Money Honey made a habit of ‘cozying up’ to business execs; CNBC made a habit of ignoring it.
• WashingtonPost.com blogger, William M. Arkin, has received thousands of email critiques, death threats—or, one from each of President Bush’s remaining supporters.
• Scooter Libby believes NBC’s Andrea Mitchell will clear him in CIA leak case. Also, everyone hates Meet The Press.
• Viacom to fire 500 MTV staffers; Related: Vanessa Minnillo to try really, really hard not to drop another F-bomb.
• MySpace to keep pedophiles, perverts; get rid of copyrighted video material.
• More Time Inc. publications to move to Florida, crash your grandparents’ retirement condo.
• The Portland Press Herald apologizes for accidentally threatening to destroy the entire Jewish race.
• Jeff Zucker to spin around in his desk chair while his three new senior deputies deal with “that whole YouTube thing.”
• NYT has one more chance to talk about the Iraq-inspired “cartoonish violence” of this year’s Super Bowl ads.
• Atoosa Rubenstein is negligibly closer to unveiling homemade films about her cat on LSD.
• In the wake of Money Honeygate, AdAge reflects on the valuable lessons we’ve learned about travel demands and merchandising.
• A videographer and “alleged journalist” continues to stay behind bars for no apparent reason.
• David Letterman celebrates his 25th year of being almost as funny as Johnny Carson.
• The New York Times reports a $648 million loss in its fourth quarter earnings; An official spokesperson shrugged and said, “hey, mo’ money, mo’ problems.”
• According to Judith Miller, Scooter Libby told her Valerie Plame was a CIA. agent three times…then dared Miller to “repeat it in front of a mirror on Halloween and see what happened.”
• Maria Bartiromo inherits Anderson Cooper’s title as the “Paris Hilton of journalism.”
• Remember when Graydon Carter threw a temper tantrum over an inconveniently placed scaffolding? Well, how’s he going to react to news that nobody wants to buy his crappy $5 million movie?
• We really didn’t need a whole article in Slate to tell us why Top Chef is a huge disappointment.
• Time Inc. pledges to take more risks, fire “even more people” over speakphone.
Todd Thomson and his wife, Melissa, could use more than a second honeymoon right about now.
The recently axed Citigroup exec has been grabbing headlines for all the wrong reasons, with everyone from Page Six to the Wall Street Journal insinuating that his jetsetting relationship with “Money Honey” Maria Bartiromo was something more than platonic, and chiding him for his over-the-top extravagances, (i.e. his luxe former office, “derisively dubbed ‘The Todd Mahal.’”)
And now, it’s being reported that Thomson and his wife have disappeared on a possibly romantic, possibly horribly awkward and definitely ill-timed vacay up in the mountains.
So, with things spiraling out of control, we decided to write an open letter to Todd offering our unsolicited advice for his myriad of problems, and reprinted it for you below:
Dear Todd,
Not sure if disappearing with your wife to a remote cabin is really the proper course of action here. Most husbands/philanderers in your position would either flee in terror, or else stick to very, very public places lest their wives pull a Lorena Bobbitt and lash out at them for their indiscretions. (Haha, we’re only kidding! Probably).
And while we’re on the subject of discretion, maybe you ought to reconsider the whole chartering a private jet for your possibly adulteress companion modus operandi. As we already learned from Scott Storch’s failure to land Lindsay “Sure Thing” Lohan, grand overtures won’t necessarily get you the girl, but they will bring extremely public attention to your failure, and—in your case—clue your wife in to the fact that you’ve been hiding the sausage somewhere else.
Oh, and also? You might want to work on that whole humility thing. Because, as it turns out, people generally don’t feel sorry for jackasses who cheat on their wives by banging television news celebrities on the desk of “The Todd Mahal.”
Hope this helps!
Jossip
Let us know if we missed anything.
While David Carr ushers in the third New York Times (one, two, three) piece dedicated to the Maria Bartiromo/CNBC/Citibank scandal, today we also hear from Post walkabout Cindy Adams on the matter:
SPEAKING of lots more, there’s lots more on this long-going tete-a-tete 40,000 feet up twixt CNBC’s married Maria Bartiromo and her good friend, very good friend, like very very good friend Todd Thomson. They’ve been gossip for 18 months. Thomson was just bounced from his Citigroup top job for, among other things, lending her his company’s plane. On one flight from China where he told underlings to find their own way home, he told them to do it on the company’s dime so he could fly high in the sky with his American pie.
“Lots more,” like, oh, they were having an affair? Ya don’t say, Cinds. About the only folks not reporting that “news” is CNBC. But it’s nice to see your octogenarian audience clued in.
CNBC has positioned itself as an adjunct to business, the glowing friend in the corner with the sound off and a ticker at the bottom. In that respect, CNBC has roughly the same relationship to Wall Street that ???Entertainment Tonight??? has to Hollywood: boosterish, gossipy and more than a little starry-eyed…
If there???s a price to be paid, the bill will be sent to Ms. Bartiromo???s reputation. After all, what are all those day traders going to think the next time she opens her show with a look at Citigroup? It may be hard to keep their minds on their ???trade??? buttons.
–David Carr, on Maria Bartiromo/CNBC in “Citigroup and CNBC Cozy Up“
So, uh, maybe you heard that Maria Bartiromo is in the clear with CNBC brass after her Mile High Homewreckers Club rendezvous with Citibank’s Todd Thomson — and that CNBC totally lost its cred with the decision? Well guess what? Jon Friedman was already thinking that!
CNBC showed bad judgment this week by putting the interests of its biggest star, Maria Bartiromo, over those of its viewers.
Another exclusive commentary coup for the Jon-Jon, ladies and gents. Though to be fair, at least he didn’t wait a week to voice his feelings like he usually does. After everyone else has.
• CNBC anchor Maria Bartiromo free to ride with Citigroup any time she wants.
• NYT is “praised” for not being as boring, apathetic as usual.
• Former NBCU Treasurer could face up to 20 years in jail for his “pillaging.”
• The editor of an alternate weekly newspaper quits because he just can’t stand The Man.
• Meanwhile, John Ambrosia quit the Sun-Times Media Group because there was a shortage of “truthiness.”
By now you’re likely sick of the Citi-”Money Honey” story. You know, the one where CNBC host Maria Bartiromo and ousted Citibank exec Todd Thomson are accused of having an affair while he abused his bank’s resources (like its private jet) to shuttle Maria around the world. Unfortunately for your boredom, however, the story continues to flow.
Here’s what you likely know so far: Maria received approval from CNBC before taking her Beijing flight with Todd, paying around $4,000 for her ride. Todd, however, didn’t receive approval from his bosses, costing them about $50k — and costing him, as of Monday, a job. Meanwhile, this twosome is said to be carrying on a private romance, even though Todd has a wife and kids, situating Maria as the newest member of the Mile High Homewreckers Club. Also, Maria has disclosed, on-air, that she owns Citi stock.
Then, there’s what we’ve been hearing: Behind closed doors, CNBC brass has been meeting to discuss Maria’s future with the network. While one insider says “the whole situation will blow over, just give it a couple weeks,” we hear CNBC chairwoman Pamela Thomas-Graham and* president Mark Hoffman has been on calls with top execs at GE. They’re in “crisis management mode,” tattles one source, while another CNBC insider says, “Englewood has become a gossip scene … [usually] this sort of thing is what happens at 30 Rock … [but now] it’s all anyone here is talking about.” Another CNBC source, who has knowledge of Maria’s administrative affairs, says calls have arrived from Business Week, where she writes a column. (The nature of the calls sounded ominous, says our source, but surely they’re just talking about edits.)
We’re also told that Jim Cramer, of all people, has privately come to Maria’s defense. Not that he’s running his mouth to build her alibi, but we hear that when asked by a colleague about what he thinks, his response was along the lines of “Who cares? Why are we still talking about this? She’s a good girl.”
Meanwhile, as a TVNewser source points out, “This brings to light CNBC’s stock ownership policy for newsroom employees. It hasn’t been talked about much, maybe the network has dropped its guard, but everyone in the newsroom is talking about it again.”
And, certainly, you likely know more. So why not share it?
* As a reader pointed out, Pamela Thomas-Graham no longer works at the company. That was our mistake, not our source’s, whose report included information about “CNBC’s president/chief,” which our shoddy research labeled as Thomas-Graham.
• Oscar nominations announced. Dreamgirls shut out from Best Picture. Gays cry.
• Ahoy, The Politico, and welcome to the neighborhood … where we don’t watch each other’s backs or care much if the bullies on the corner kick your ass on the way home from school.
• Maria Bartiromo: CNBC anchor, homewrecker.
• NYT jumbles up its reporters and rebrands them Hollywood scribes.
• With a fourth hour, isn’t it time for the Today show to add the fifth through 24th hours?
• Scooter Libby’s trial begins.
• Twenty four writers have ditched the Observer for the Times. Twenty four writers are richer because of it.