Yesterday New York Attorney General Andrew Cuomo, a.k.a. the Bonus Buster, got former Merrill Lynch president Gregory Fleming into his torture chamber. He had been waiting a long time for this. The hot wax and the marbles and the feathers were ready. But he didn’t get a chance to use them. Fleming immediately sang. Bank of America, he gulped, had threatened to sue him for talking about the bonuses Merrill Lynch gave to its highest-paid employees. This pissed the Bonus Buster right off. He handed the long, spindly feather he had planned on using to his deputy and stormed out, grabbing on the way a thesaurus from the library bookshelf, and retreated to his study in order to write a long missive to a New York Supreme Court judge, asking for his intervention. Several hours later, the sky had grown dark, and Cuomo emerged from his chamber feeling satisfied. He was particularly pleased with the last sentence: “We respectfully request that the court reject Bank of America’s continued efforts to stymie the attorney general’s investigation.” Stymie, he felt, was literally the perfect word.
Cuomo and BofA Fight Over Bonus Data Testimony [Dealbook/NYT]
