Curmudgeon's Corner

An Old Sore Re-Opened

Posted by Al Campbell on Sept. 21, 2011

People Making A Difference, Political

I received a Business Journal e-mail update yesterday that made me scratch the scab off an old sore.

The article made mention of Dick Strong’s 70^th birthday and a coming gathering at the Frontier Airlines Center for all his old friends and former employees.  I hope he sees hundreds and hundreds of those folks and has a great birthday celebration.  I have frankly never met anyone who had a bad thing to say about this man; to the contrary, most have only superlatives when they describe their memories.

My wife and I used to be in a tennis league that included Dick and his wife.  They were, and I’m sure still are, the consummate ‘nice people’ who went out of their ways to help others.

The article also, of course, had to deal with Dick’s unfortunate run-in with a person who reminds me of a rodent, Eliott [sic] Spitzer, then an Attorney General who felt he had to go after Dick for some trading irregularities involving timing that likely had not affected any of the Strong customers.  Of course, Spitzer took his customary bulldog approach since he was aiming for a glorious elected future.

So, Strong was squarely in the crosshairs and took the hit.  His company was fined $60 million; Strong was fined $80 million and the company was later sold for $500 million when it might’ve fetched a good deal more had it not fallen low.  Don’t get me wrong, I know that Strong continues to enjoy a great lifestyle, but I simply believe this was “justice” run amok.

Beyond Dick Strong, this action harmed a lot of people who lost their jobs and had to find employment elsewhere.

We know how well Spitzer has done since he ‘nuked’ Strong.