Former Pfizer CEO To Become Commerce Secretary?
10 CommentsBy Ed Silverman // March 9th, 2011 // 6:56 pm
Earlier today, President Obama nominated US Commerce Secretary Gary Locke to be the next US ambassador to China and former Pfizer ceo Jeff Kindler is among the names being mentioned as a possible successor, according to Bloomberg News, citing unnamed sources.
The 55-year-old Kindler, you may recall, spent four years as the Pfizer ceo before unexpectedly resigning last December amid ongoing tension with some board members (see here and here). And there has long been speculation that he would next look to Washington, DC, whenever he left the drugmaker.
Last July, in fact, Kindler was named by Obama as a member of a presidential advisory board devoted to increasing US exports. And the portly one had already angled to become a Democratic mover and shaker. Three years ago, for instance, he participated in a healthcare roundtable discussion about healthcare at the Democratic National Convention in Denver (see this). And his contributions to the Democratic Party and its candidates were widely publicized (look here).
Of course, there is no assurance he will be chosen. As Bloomberg notes, another possibility is Google ceo Eric Schmidt, who is leaving the technology juggernaut next month, and US Trade Representative Ron Kirk, whose confirmation as Commerce Secretary might make for an easier win on Capitol Hill.
industry insider
Considering all of Pfizer’s convictions in federal court for off label marketing among other convictions, Kindler should know something about violating interstate commerce laws, so he would be the logical choice, IMHO.
PharmaSpy
Oh god. Can’t douchebags just go away and die.
doc
Spare us from this guy.
Ronald McD
And do we assume that all other politicians and nominees to office are squeaky clean, or do these comments just reflect that - gasp - this one came from pharma?
Jack Friday
Well he is a paid up democrat who supported Obama! LOL
A country gets the politicians it deserves!
Salient point
This is probably more about Ron Kirk, who has ruffled feathers in China & S Korea with a strong anti-censorship & -copyright infringement stance. Moving him into Commerce would probably be considered an olive branch to those countries, who own a lot of our debt.
Kirk has had some trouble with the IRS in the past, but it’s much easier to bash a Pfizer exec than to look up something like that.
Charles "the boss of bosses" Nemeroff
I feel bad about all the negative publicity for Kindler. He did a good job pushing drugs on the American people.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2010/03/19/AR2010031905578.html
Been There
Say what one will about Kindler, he was as ethical as he was allowed to be by those who systematically kept corrupt business practices from his attention. One of them was Read. Now that he is CEO and given his hands-on approach to illegal activity, expect more. His army of yes-men and yes-women aren’t bright enough to keep the lid on his disregard for company policy (not that the Board apparently knows or care) as well as domestic and international law.
Betsy
I like Charles’ comment the best: “I feel bad about all the negative publicity for Kindler. He did a good job pushing drugs on the American people.” I’m assuming sarcasm.
I’ve never had the feeling that Obama was in favor of cleaning up the Big Pharma community, and I cannot imagine nominating the former CEO of one of the most corrupt pharmaceuticals for Commerce. I find it very scary.
Insider
I agree it is more than obvious that Kindler was invovled in all the cover-ups. How does Obama figure that would be agood idea to put one of the most corrupt CEO’s in that position? It must be Obama’s lack of experience or maybe lack of character. ALso hard to believe that Kindler would be interested so fast as I thought he was stressed out. Have to wait and see on this one?
I agree with Betsy, very scary!!