Word: alston
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...there is a comparable secular figure, it is Oprah Winfrey. It's no surprise, then, that the Reader's Digest executive who oversees Purpose Driven Connection launched O magazine for America's favorite talk-show host during a previous tenure at Hearst. Alyce Alston knows that the greatest asset a celebrity like Oprah or Warren brings to a publication is the power of their brand. And so just as O is all about Oprah, from the cover shot to the features inside, there's a lot of Warren in Purpose Driven Connection. (See pictures of a drive-in church...
...pastor's partners at Reader's Digest aren't worried about readers being turned off by a Rick Warren overload. On the contrary, they're counting on his global appeal. "He's a powerhouse," says Alston in explaining the publisher's decision to take on the new title. "Nearly 50 million people read The Purpose Driven Life - that's nearly 20% of America!" The math added up for Reader's Digest, even as the company is preparing to either undergo financial restructuring or file for Chapter 11 bankruptcy. "If we touched just 1% of Evangelicals in America," Alston continues, "that...
Daschle, for instance, was a high-paid "policy adviser" at Alston & Bird, a lobbying firm with dozens of brand-name pharmaceutical and health-services clients. "Senator Daschle focuses his services on advising the firm's clients on issues related to all aspects of public policy," boasts the firm's website. One of Alston's clients, EduCap, a nonprofit student-loan company that spent six figures lobbying to change federal loan laws, took Daschle on two cushy overseas trips, one to the Bahamas for a board meeting and another to the Middle East to meet with foreign leaders...
...During his time at Alston, a wide range of for-profit enterprises with interests in influencing government health policy - including giants like UnitedHealth, GE Healthcare and the Health Industry Distributors Association - paid Daschle five-figure sums for speeches. UnitedHealth was also a "client" of Daschle's at Alston, as was the Great Plains Indian Gaming Association, a trade group representing tribes with casinos in the upper Midwest. And then there is Leo Hindery Jr., the former chairman of the cable-television industry's lobbying group, who hired Daschle as an adviser on a new investment firm and gifted him more...
...While working at Alston, Daschle never technically lobbied anyone, even though he worked for a lobbying firm, made money from lobbying clients and become business partners of those investing in heavily regulated industries. He was able to skate through by exploiting an undefined middle ground in the way influence is brokered in Washington. Under the law, there is a distinction between "lobbying contacts," which only lobbyists can do, and "lobbying activities," which can be done by both lobbyists and non-lobbyists...