The Curious Mr. Barry Diller: Chisrael's Many Shapes...
Why does someone enter the casino business in his 80s anyway?
“THE Chinese people seem to be way ahead of Americans in living a digital life,” said Barry Diller, an American media mogul, last week in a speech to students in Beijing. Mr Diller recently broke up his media company, IAC; he was in Beijing to announce he was stepping up investments in Chinese internet projects. To justify this move, he published a survey comparing how Chinese and Americans aged 16-25 use the internet. It revealed that in this arena as in so much else, China is surging ahead. (The Economist, December 4, 2007).
“What I do is to rub the idea as toughly as one can, to have as much conflict as I can. I like to have passionate opinion in every matter until the issue is resolved. It improves the end decision.” — Barry Diller
Our recent report on Steve Wynn and foreign agents and billionaires got us thinking about who else might be doing Beijing’s bidding here at home. One billionaire said he would leave the country if Trump got elected. The more obvious question is whether he was ever a part of it in the first place.
There are, after all, three foreign casinos which operate in Macau — the Wynn, Sands, and MGM. We’ve hitherto explored the close ties of Steve Wynn and the GOP and also of the late Sheldon Adelson, whose widow sold off Sands’ assets to Apollo, the firm started by Leon Black, he of Jeffrey Epstein association.
I call this phenomenon “Chisrael” — where the money flows from Macau through Wynn and Adelson and into right-wing Israeli and American politics. You’d be forgiven if you thought that this process was exclusively right-wing. After all Wynn and Adelson cut quite the figure.
But Chisraeli has agents on the left, too. Elsewhere though we’ve explored Chisrael when we’ve looked at Sheryl Sandberg of Facebook fame (and her family ties to Mossad) but we haven’t really looked too closely at MGM. This is surprising for two reasons. We had one of the largest mass shootings in American history at MGM properties in Las Vegas and we still aren’t sure at all what really happened there and because MGM’s largest shareholder is Barry Diller’s IAC. Now Barry Diller’s IAC, became the largest shareholder of MGM stock right after this shooting. The timing is, shall we say, curious.
For what it’s worth, I’ve long thought that there was some sort of message being delivered with that shooting. But from whom and to whom is the unanswered question.
We like old stuff over here at Thoughts and Adventures, and that includes old people. You’ll find not a whiff of ageism here. No sir. We like our elderly though at times one might be forgiven for thinking we live in a gerontocracy. Everyone must know his place and when it’s time to exit stage left. As with oldsters, so, too, with billionaires and politicians.
Most octogenarians are keen to spend time with their grand kids — maybe watch a little TV news, play a little golf or tennis or bridge, do a crossword puzzle, volunteer, and then shuffle off their mortal coil — but not Barry Diller. No, Barry Diller is an odd old man, especially for a billionaire (if it is indeed all his money.) And no, I’m not talking about the gay rumors that have longed dogged him (though these days seemingly everyone is gay). I’m talking about the intelligence and organized crime ties he most certainly has — about that Microsoft insider trade probe that has visited upon him just as he provisionally gets a license from the very Macao-connected MGM.
Never you worry the DOJ is on the case, forcing Steve Wynn, who was obviously working for the Chinese, to register.
What will be the ramifications be?
“Should they successfully sue Steve Wynn, this will definitely raise red flags for the three US-based operators in Macau. MGM, with their partnership with Pansy Ho, will not be immune from potential consequences either,” Eric Coskun, director of casino projects at IGamix Management & Consulting, a Macau-based consultancy, told Asia Sentinel. “MGM would be most worried as they have a significant presence in Vegas and the Eastern Coast.”
MGM China Holdings, a Hong Kong-listed joint venture between US casino operator MGM Resorts and Ho, a daughter of the late Macau gaming tycoon Stanley Ho, operates two casinos in Macau. Sands China, a Hong Kong-listed subsidiary of Las Vegas Sands, which is listed on the New York Stock Exchange, operates a handful of casinos in the semi-autonomous Chinese territory. (Toh Han Shih, “US Gaming Executives in Sino-US Crossfire,” Asia Sentinel, May 20.)
I’m wondering, of course, about the millions Diller spent on a park in Manhattan and whether or not that was a pay off to some unionized construction workers. And, of course, I’m wondering that if I write about what I know to be true about Barry Diller whether he might come at me in ways hidden and dangerous. You don’t want to get gay grandpa angry. He might sicc the Daily Beast on you. Careful now, Barry. You wouldn’t want me to do the Daily Beast like we did Gawker, would you? Johnson v. Huffington Post is sitting before the Supreme Court, isn’t it?
Who couldn’t love a man who was described thusly in 2002, at the height of his power:
The key to Diller’s success: vision, viciousness, and other people’s money. His pitch alternates, from new media to old media and back again, but his blistering management style remains. Diller has a hair-trigger temper that alternates between fire and ice. He once threw a video at an underling with such force it put a hotel in the wall. A secretary who neglected to note a returned phone call received a 20-minute tirade from Diller that drove her to tears.
Critics — such as the analyst who recently accused Diller’s company of overstating its returns — are hammered with self-righteous indignation and legal threats.
No wonder criticism of Diller — from ex-employees or outsiders — is rare. “There’s almost a visceral fear of what Barry might do to them,” said George Mair, author of 11 celebrity bios including The Barry Diller Story: The Life and Ties of America’s Greatest Entertainment Mogul. “He’s vicious as hell to anyone who crosses him. And he uses his power for personal vendettas. If he sees you in his gunsights, he’ll pull the trigger.” (Tampa Bay Times, September 22, 2002)
I don’t want the trigger pulled on me but I’m not a stranger to the good fight. Diller’s ties to Israel are well known and have been the subject of breathless articles which portray his payoffs as philanthropy. What’s less obvious are his ties to organized crime and to the art of kompromat which he mastered as a teen at William Morris talent agency.
One man’s talent agency is another man’s private intelligence network and Diller got to it.
“There he learned the entertainment business by reading every document in sight. It reportedly took him a week and a half to get through Elvis Presley’s 6-foot file. Within two years he was an agent who knew secrets about everybody in town.”
His protégé would be none other than Michael Eisner who would go on to run Disney, one of the most China-compromised companies in the United States.
How did Diller run his empire? Through fear and intimidation and espionage, of course.
The intercom became an instrument of terror for employees who would be paralyzed with fear when Diller’s name appeared on its digital readout. In meetings, his bullet-bald head would flush red with anger. His piercing blue stare would go icy and curses would fly. At wild parties and in the workplace, Diller cultivated spies who would keep him up on the latest gossip and be protected in return.
Mair, the biographer, interviewed a secretary of Diller’s at Paramount, who said her boss would go into an uncontrollable rage if the papers on his desk weren’t precisely arranged, his tea perfectly brewed and the cups of cigarettes around the office not adequately replenished.
As you can imagine I was less than enthused about doing a deal with such a man when he called inquiring about facial recognition.
Clearview.AI — the company I cofounded — got a lot of attention from Barry Diller who called Richard Schwartz wanting to deal with Clearview. Of course, knowing what Barry Diller is, I advised not doing the deal at the time but apparently Hoan Ton-That put that Clearview was in talks with Tinder — a Diller property — in a recent deck published in The Washington Post.
Is that Ton-That claim true? Well, consider the following:
Justine Sacco, a spokeswoman with Tinder and OkCupid parent company Match Group, said that the companies have “never worked with Clearview AI and are not in any discussions with them.”
Yes, that Justine Sacco. So it’s probably not true. Hoan has what might generously be called a passing familiarity with the truth as my lawsuit against him (and the Chisraeli plot to steal Clearview) will soon reveal. Stay tuned there.
Speaking of lawsuits, Diller is no stranger to them, having settled a massive one when he undervalued Tinder and cheated its founders out of a deal. (He recently settled for $441 million.)
The Wall Street Journal reports that after many years Barry Diller is entering the casino business. He began buying up stock in MGM since August 2020 right around the time that a paltry $800 million awarded to the 4400 victims of the shooting.
Diller has been given a provisional license to operate the MGM casinos given that he’s under SEC investigation for insider trading. From Hollywood insider to insider trading, apparently.
Like Jeffrey Epstein, he, too, has a relationship that dates many years back with Bill Gates. He wants us to believe that his decision to load up on stock ahead of a Microsoft-Activision deal was simply “luck.” He wants to increase online gambling because, you know, that’s healthy. He says there’s a $450 billion market in online gaming.
Is any of this good for Americans? Of course not. Even China has cracked down. (Where, oh where, is Tom Friedman and his “to be China for a day” now?)
But Americans gaming and stupid is great for Chisrael.
Before there was Chisrael there was Israel and a gay old time.
Cherchez la femme! Or the Velvet Mafia, who reigned with a lavender scented fist until Netflix and Amazon Video came in and crushed the money laundering film business.
We mentioned that Barry Diller is probably gay but we didn’t mention that he’s married — long story — and that his stepson, party boy, Alex von Furstenberg, is also being investigated for that same insider trading deal.
David Geffen, who gave us all Obama after breaking early from the Clintons, is also a part of the cabal, too. Geffen prefers to stay out of the closet. He’s got too many skeletons in there already.
When Diane von Furstenberg married Barry Diller late in life it was a merger, not a marriage. Naturally Furstenberg is on the board of the Anti-Defamation League, which has long served as front for Israeli intelligence.
Diller owns the Daily Beast, a tabloid publication which targets all those who stand opposed to Chisraeli politics. The Beast keeps coming after Congressman Matt Gaetz, especially after he refused to vote their way on Iran sanctions. Try as they might The Beast kept sending Roger Sollenberger after Gaetz.
Sollenberger worked for Ronn Torossian at Paste Magazine. Torossian is a supposedly toxic PR guy (who was really a lot weirder than that and probably a spy). How do I know he was toxic? Why, I read about it in the Daily Beast.
What I didn’t read about is Torossian’s ties to naughty Turkish intelligence and manipulating the world.
As Torossian notes in his book, famed American journalist Michael Wolff [CCJ’s note: Wolff is not a journalist], writing in Vanity Fair once said, "Publicity geniuses are different from you and me. They have the stomach for it. This temperamental combination of imperviousness and egomania that allows them, compels them, to dominate the media . . . means, too, that they dominate reality, that's their world and we just . . . well you know."
Sounds very Diller-esque!
The Daily Beast has also targeted me right around the time I was cofounding Clearview.AI, the world’s leading facial recognition company.
Of course that I made it clear to another Jewish-American billionaire that I would not sell Clearview to the ADL until its leadership apologized for smearing me as a Holocaust denier.
Then my own company moved to minimize and then eliminate the role I played forming the company, hiring key executives, and raising money for it.
But courts are funny things. You shall know the truth and it shall set you free. That’s New Testament, though, isn’t it?
Hahaha! Speaking of Barry Diller and Gawker:https://www.gawker.com/5701857/barry-dillers-sexy-all-boy-thanksgiving