NEWS It’s Official: Chelsea Clinton Ties the Knot! Chelsea Clinton marries banker Marc Mezvinsky in star-studded ceremony in New York Sunday, August 1, 2010
•••Chelsea Clinton has married her longtime boyfriend at an exclusive estate along New York’s Hudson River.
Bill and Hillary Clinton announced in a statement that their daughter wed investment banker Marc Mezvinsky on Saturday night after weeks of secrecy and buildup that had celebrity watchers flocking to the small village of Rhinebeck for the evening nuptials.
‘Today, we watched with great pride and overwhelming emotion as Chelsea and Marc wed in a beautiful ceremony at Astor Courts, surrounded by family and their close friends,’ the Clintons said. ‘We could not have asked for a more perfect day to celebrate the beginning of their life together, and we are so happy to welcome Marc into our family. On behalf of the newlyweds, we want to give special thanks to the people of Rhinebeck for welcoming us and to everyone for their well-wishes on this special day.’
More than 400 guests were expected at the historic estate. Details of the wedding were kept fanatically close to the vest, with shopkeepers, innkeepers, vendors and restaurateurs sworn to secrecy.
Officials restricted airspace over the estate, and the area will remain a no-fly zone until 03:30 am local time on Sunday. Roads were also blocked off, and inconvenienced neighbors were soothed with a complimentary bottle of wine.
Some of the celebrities spotted in Rhinebeck for the event included actors Ted Danson and Mary Steenburgen, fashion designer Vera Wang and Madeleine Albright, who was secretary of state during Bill Clinton’s second term as president.
The wedding took place at Astor Courts, a secluded estate along the Hudson River built as a Beaux Arts style playground for John Jacob Astor IV more than a century ago. The estate features the sort of commanding view that once inspired Hudson River School painters, as well as 20 hectares of buffer space to shield the party from prying eyes.
Chelsea Clinton and Mezvinsky were friends as teenagers in Washington, and both attended Stanford University.
They now live in New York, where Mezvinsky works at G3 Capital, a Manhattan hedge fund. Mezvinsky worked previously at Goldman Sachs as an investment banker.
Clinton completed her master’s degree in public health earlier this year at the Mailman School of Public Health at Columbia University.
Mezvinsky is a son of former U.S. Reps Marjorie Margolies-Mezvinsky of Pennsylvania and Ed Mezvinsky of Iowa, longtime friends of the Clintons.
NEWS Clinton wedding extravaganza special! Thursday, July 29, 2010
•••Wedding bells aren’t ringing yet, but the cash tills are, as the countdown begins in tiny Rhinebeck to Chelsea Clinton’s celebrity wedding on Saturday.
‘It’s like having the Olympics in your town,’ exclaimed Alex Batkin, manager of the up-market Wing and Clover arts-and-craft boutique.
Like the rest of the world, locals can only guess at details of the secrecy-shrouded marriage between Chelsea, daughter of former president Bill Clinton and Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, and her investment banker beau Marc Mezvinsky.
The guest list remains under wraps, with names as varied as Steven Spielberg and Oprah Winfrey thrown around on gossip websites, but President Barack Obama apparently is not showing.
The location is assumed to be the posh Astor Courts estate just outside Rhinebeck, almost a three hours drive from New York City, though even this has never been confirmed.
In any case, Rhinebeck, population less than 8000, is laying out the welcome mat.
‘Congratulations to Marc and Chelsea!’ a poster in the window of Pete’s Famous Restaurant, an old style diner, says.
‘Mazel tov,’ reads a sign in Samuel’s sweets shop, using the Hebrew for ‘good luck’ in a nod to the Jewish Mezvinsky. Mixed with goodwill is hunger for good business in a sleepy town shifting from rural roots to the glitzier role of retreat for New York’s wealthy.
Echoing the Clinton family news blackout, no one here will openly discuss their share in the bonanza brought by the expected 400 guests at a no-expenses-spared party. But, clearly, no one wants to be left out.
One of the big winners is believed to be the picturesque Beekman Arms inn, which claims to be the oldest continuously operating hotel in the United States.
Workers were adding a lick of white paint under the roof on Tuesday as staff lugged in suitcases to fully booked rooms.
Asked who was staying, the normally polite front desk clerks became stony faced.
‘No comment,’ one told a reporter. Another conveyed the same message by raising her hands to make an X with two fingers.
Batkin’s store revealed at least one success: a painting bought as a gift for the betrothed.
The picture is emblazoned ‘Chelsea and Marc’ over a naive-style depiction of a wedding cake surrounded by trees, squirrels and a fish-filled river. Of course, Batkin wouldn’t say how much the painting went for – or to whom.
‘I just can’t,’ he said apologetically.
Across the road at Liquors and Wines, Mike Haley said the supplier for white wine at the party would be Clinton Vineyards from the happily named nearby town of Clinton.
‘It’s light and dry. It goes good with fish or chicken,’ he said.
Haley looked wistfully at his huge selection of bottles. ‘I’d love to supply. I haven’t had a call from them yet, though,’ he said.
Hoping to get at least a few financial crumbs from the wedding table, he did put some bottles of Clinton Vineyards Tribute 2009 in his storefront window.’
Another entrepreneur seeking wedding joy is Rhinebeck Deli, where the menu features the Hillary Clinton-themed ‘Secretary of Steak’.’
Even the Hudson Valley Renegades, a minor league baseball team, wants to get in on the act.’ Their mascot, a man dressed as a raccoon, stood at Rhinebeck’s main crossroads on Tuesday with a sign reading: ‘Chelsea Will U Marry Me?’ Locals and bemused tourists grinned at the sight.’
‘We’re trying to get a little buzz going for the team, so people come down to the park and check us out,’ explained teammate A.J. Tomeny.’
All the excitement would implode spectacularly if it turned out Rhinebeck was not the real wedding location, but an elaborate diversion in the Clinton information war – as a few conspiracy minded locals suspect.’
The Hudson Valley News, a local weekly that has become a must-read for the growing international press corps in the town, says not to worry.’
Without citing sources, the latest edition reports that the wedding will indeed take place at Astor Courts, starting at 6 pm on Saturday and that police will shut down roads in the vicinity.’
‘Congratulations Chelsea and Marc’ the slightly premature front page banner headline reads.’
Drinking coffee in Pete’s Famous Restaurant, 79-year-old Ed Hammond called the hoopla ‘insane’.’
‘I think they’ve lost track of the two people at the centre, the ones actually getting married,’ he said.’
NEWS Will Bloomberg Run for President? Monday, April 12, 2010
•••Mayor Bloomberg had a public lunch last week with a bunch of fellow billionaires – the kind of people who will pay more taxes under President Obama’s health reforms and are wary of Democrats writing new Wall Street regulations.
He was introduced by hedge funder Donald Marron, who joked they may need Bloomberg as President by 2013.
“I’m not running,” Bloomberg said later. “Don’t worry about that.”
Except that his closest advisers never stopped thinking about it.
The mayor is mired in his usual work of balancing the budget and dealing with Albany. He keeps himself busy by expanding his foundation and watching his growing business.
None of that is the sort of Next Big Thing that captures Bloomberg’s imagination.
Running for President? That’s different. He had a taste of it in 2008. He liked the flavor.
“That’s the impression everyone has,” said someone plugged into Bloomberg’s thinking. “Otherwise [former Deputy Mayor Kevin] Sheekey wouldn’t have gone to Bloomberg L.P.”
A third-party campaign by a divorced New York Jew was a long shot in 2008, and it would be an even longer shot in 2012. But still, Sheekey has left City Hall for the mayor’s company, where the bosses would be lenient if he needed some time to play politics.
Sheekey was replaced by Howard Wolfson, a veteran of Hillary Clinton’s presidential campaign. The mayor’s campaign manager, Bradley Tusk, is now a political consultant for hire.
They are watching and waiting, doing their day jobs but paying attention to the prevailing winds.
“There’s no way in April 2010 to know what the climate is going to be in November 2012,” said a Bloomberg veteran.
Bloomberg’s last presidential flirtation was predicated on the hope that Democrats and Republicans would nominate hard-edged ideologues who would rub the broad middle of America the wrong way. Hillary Clinton on the left and Rudy Giuliani on the right, his team figured, would leave an opening for a pragmatic independent like Bloomberg who could finance his own campaign without worrying about party infrastructure.
It didn’t work out that way. Obama ran as a reasonable moderate who could end partisanship and bring the country together – taking up the space Bloomberg needed.
Now look forward. If Obama can recover his honeymoon image as a responsible centrist – and if the economy starts humming again – it’s tough to imagine Bloomberg taking on a strong incumbent. If not? If Obama is seen as a doctrinaire Democrat and Tea Partyers take over the GOP?
Bloomberg would love to be President. His confidants would love to help him. Consultants would love to jump on his payroll.
In the meantime, Bloomberg offers measured praise for Obama. “I think he’s doing a good job,” Bloomberg said last week. “You want the President to succeed. If you disagree with him, in the last year, that’s the time to campaign against him. Throw him out and put somebody else in.”
Perhaps Bloomberg was being hypothetical. Perhaps not.
NEWS President Obama Announces the New START Treaty Friday, March 26, 2010
•••Climaxing months of hard negotiations, President Barack Obama and Russian President Dmitry Medvedev agreed today to sharp cuts in the nuclear arsenals of both nations in the most comprehensive arms control treaty in two decades. “We have turned words into action,” Obama declared.
The completion of this agreement gives Obama his biggest foreign policy achievement just days after his biggest domestic accomplishment: winning approval of his health care overhaul.
Obama said the pact, to be signed on April 8 in Prague, was part of his effort to reset relations with Russia and a step toward “the peace and security of a world without nuclear weapons.”
The agreement would require both sides to reduce their arsenals of long-range nuclear weapons by about a third, from 2,200 now to 1,550 each. The pact, replacing and expanding the Strategic Arms Reduction Treaty of 1991, which expired in December, was a significant gesture toward improved US-Russian relations that have been badly frayed.
The reductions would still leave both sides with immense arsenals – and the ability to easily annihilate each other.
“In many ways, nuclear weapons represent both the darkest days of the Cold War, and the most troubling threats of our time,” Obama said at the White House. “Today, we have taken another step forward in leaving behind the legacy of the 20th century while building a more secure future for our children.”
In Russia, Medvedev’s spokeswoman Natalya Timakova told the Interfax news agency, “This treaty reflects the balance of interests of both nations.”
A Kremlin statement said, “The new treaty stipulates that strategic arms will be based exclusively on the territories of each of the nations.”
Both sides would have seven years after the treaty’s ratification to carry out the approximately 30 per cent reduction in long-range nuclear warheads. The agreement also calls for cutting by about half the missiles and bombers that carry the weapons to their targets.
“We have turned words into action. We have made progress that is clear and concrete. And we have demonstrated the importance of American leadership – and American partnership – on behalf of our own security, and the world’s,” Obama said. Though the agreement must still be ratified by the Senate and both houses of the Russian Parliament before it takes effect, Obama and Medvedev plan to sign it next month in Prague, the city where last April, Obama delivered his signature speech on arms control.
For his administration, a major value of the treaty is in setting the stage for potential further successes.
Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, standing with Defence Secretary Robert Gates alongside Obama, noted next month’s international meeting of leaders on nuclear proliferation being hosted by the president in Washington, focused on preventing the spread of nuclear weapons to terrorists and rogue states.
“We come with more credibility, Russia comes with more credibility, having negotiated this treaty,” she said.
Ratification in the Senate will require 67 votes, two thirds of the Senate, meaning Obama will need support from Republicans. Some Republican senators had previously expressed concerns about concessions being made by U.S. negotiators.
Clinton, asked whether approval could be achieved given the recent fierce partisan battles and close votes over health care, said it could.
“National security has always produced large bipartisan majorities, and I see no reason why this should be any different,” she said. “I believe that a vast majority of the Senate, at the end of the day, will see that this is in America’s interest. And it goes way beyond politics.”
In Russia, the treaty goes first to the State Duma, the lower house, and then to the Federation Council.
Speaking in the White House briefing room, Obama said the treaty by the globe’s two largest nuclear powers would “send a clear signal that we intend to lead” the rest of the world in reducing the nuclear threat.
Clinton noted that the U.S. and Russia still possess more than 90 per cent of the world’s nuclear weapons. “We do not need such large arsenals to protect our nation,” she said.
She emphasized the verification mechanism in the treaty, a key demand of the US that was resisted by Russia and was one of the sticking points that delayed completion of the deal. It will “reduce the chance for misunderstandings and miscalculations,” she told reporters.
Adm. Mike Mullen, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, said that by helping to build trust “this treaty enhances our ability to do that which we have been charged to do – protect and defend the citizens of the United States.”
He said U.S. commanders around the world “stand solidly behind the treaty.”
Gates cautioned the treaty – and an accompanying review of nuclear posture – will require more spending to modernize America’s nuclear arsenal. At the same time, the defense secretary called it an “important milestone” in consigning Cold War nightmares to the past. British Foreign Secretary David Miliband welcomed the “historic” agreement.
He said the U.K. was committed to a world free from nuclear weapons and “stands ready” to take part in a future multilateral disarmament process.
He said: “As the Prime Minister told President (Barack) Obama when they spoke yesterday, the U.K. welcomes this agreement which is an important further step towards a world free from nuclear weapons.
“The international community must now seize the opportunity this creates for the 2010 NPT (Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty) Review Conference and beyond.
“That means continued efforts by all states possessing nuclear weapons to work towards their total elimination.
“It means concerted action from the international community to tackle countries like North Korea and Iran which seek to develop nuclear weapons in breach of their treaty commitments.
“And it means the safe expansion of nuclear power.”
The new treaty will also set out new verification procedures that are considered less cumbersome and expensive than those in Start.
‘We could not have asked for a more perfect day to celebrate the beginning of their life together, and we are so happy to welcome Marc into our family. On behalf of the newlyweds, we want to give special thanks to the people of Rhinebeck for welcoming us and to everyone for their well-wishes on this special day.’
Details of the wedding were kept fanatically close to the vest, with shopkeepers, innkeepers, vendors and restaurateurs sworn to secrecy.
Roads were also blocked off, and inconvenienced neighbors were soothed with a complimentary bottle of wine.
The estate features the sort of commanding view that once inspired Hudson River School painters, as well as 20 hectares of buffer space to shield the party from prying eyes.
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