News and notes from around the interweb:
- A Kuwait Airways crew member was arrested smuggling gold into Bangladesh in the spring (Gold can apparently fly on Kuwait Airways even if Israelis cannot). A North Korean Diplomat tried smuggling gold into Bangladesh as well. Now another gold smuggling arrest in Mumbai which follows recent arrests in Delhi and Dubai. Seriously, learn a lesson and find some other store of value to smuggle…
- Former United lobbyist and current New Jersey Transportation Commissioner — who was at the infamous dinner with Jeff Smisek and David Samson where the ‘Chairman’s flight’ was requested — will resign this month.
The only reasonable defense at this point is but it’s New Jersey (as former President Gerald Ford wrote about powerful Democratic Congressman Dan Rostenkowski’s conviction for “paying salaries at taxpayer expense for no-show “jobs”); using Congressional funds to buy gifts such as chairs and ashtrays for friends; diverting taxpayer funds to pay for vehicles used for personal transportation; tampering with a grand jury witness; and trading-in officially purchased stamps for cash at the House post office”….
Danny’s problem was he played precisely under the rules of the city of Chicago. Now, those aren’t the same rules that any other place in the country lives by, but in Chicago they were totally legal, and Danny got a screwing
- Delta is cutting (some) management jobs.
- Under Amtrak’s new revenue-based program, points won’t expire for 3 years from any account activity (no more requirement for train or co-brand credit card travel to keep points alive). Since Chase transfers to Amtrak end December 8 I moved 1000 points over to Amtrak to extend the life of my points that would otherwise expire in early 2016. In theory I should have waited until early December to get even more of an extension, but I didn’t want to forget to do it. And Starwood points will still transfer, but you can’t transfer fewer than 5000 Starpoints (vs. 1000 with Chase) and I value Starpoints more highly than Chase points in any case.
- The Mayor of Stockton, California was detained at the US border and had his laptop confiscated because the government can do that, for any reason or not reason. (HT: Paul H.)
- Boeing 787-9 assembly timelapse: (HT: Hans M.)
Come on! Jamie Fox was appointed by Chris Christie. You know that Bridgegate Governor! While NJ has a sordid past with elected officials, this is all part and parcel with the way Chris Christie has run NJ!
Re: CBP detention of Stockton mayor – do you think the reason was to check whether his laptop was tampered with by the Chinese? More generally, to what extent does CBP enforce or check for evidence of espionage?
@Jason
If this mayor looked questionable in any way CBP can detain and search everything. No warrant needed, no reason needed. It was speculated that the mayor was possibly in the sights of CBP because the CBP was acting for other agencies. Possibly searching for evidence of corruption. It is very well known that the IRS uses CBP to intercept tax cheats. So the CBP can definitely be acting as “flypaper” for possible perpetrators/violators of US law.
There is no basis to conclude that delta is cutting any management jobs. The linked article states that the cuts will come from the “administrative salaried” workforce. In other words non-hourly employees, which does not necessarily mean executives, managers or supervisors.