There is a small chance that many of the top executives of the Hartford Business Journal are going to jail.
No, no, it has nothing to do with the $4.5 million in overtime that they owe Cohen the Columnist, who they treat as some sort of “contractor” or something, whatever that is.
No, the theoretical infraction goes something like this: You subscribe to the Hartford Business Journal because you trust the paper to tell you accurate, important stuff. And, similarly, the Business Journal trusts Cohen the Columnist to give you accurate, important insights, with, of course, no overtime.
Now, as it happens, you’re in need of a new member for your corporate board of directors, because you called U.S. Sen. Christopher Dodd’s wife to ask her if she wants the job, but she’s very, very busy, because she already sits on 300 boards, because she’s the best woman for the job.
Since you trust the Business Journal, you call the paper, looking for a qualified candidate and, they recommend, of course, Cohen the Columnist. You can use him, at a discount, in return for your corporation taking out 15 full-page ads in the next year. It’s a convenient arrangement; everybody comes out ahead — except, of course, for Cohen, who still won’t get any overtime.
The problem is Connecticut’s Attorney General, Richard Blumenthal. He wants to arrest the publisher and a few other folks, or at least tie them up in civil litigation and regulatory hell, because your shareholders should be able to pick anybody they want as a board member — with no little side deals corrupting the process, even if the process gets them someone as wonderful as Cohen, at a discount. With no overtime.
Blumenthal has been practicing for this case by torturing the property-casualty insurance companies, which insist that their policyholders use one of their recommended body shops for car repairs.
Sound familiar? Just as you trust the Business Journal, so you trust the Hartford-State Farm-Nationwide-Sort of Casualty-Mutual Insurance Co., which suggests that everyone comes out a bit ahead when you use a particular body shop.
Just as some of the other columnists at the Business Journal are insanely jealous over the Cohen arrangement, some of the other body shops are unhappy about not being included in the big hug from the insurers.
The insurers suggest that their policyholders appreciate that the insurers have done the work for them. The left-out auto body guys say that the insurers are as stingy as a Business Journal publisher — and that the favored body shops often attach new equipment with used chewing gum.
While Blumenthal erupted a few weeks ago about the dent-and-scratch thing, this has been a campaign of his since the Crimean War. The body shops have been dragging insurers into court on this thing for years — and the poor state legislators are occasionally required to dive under their desks when the various insurance industry and body shop lobbyists come calling.
The issue pops up in other states, as well, although no one does the indignity cha-cha with the panache of Richard Blumenthal.
It’s probably not the state’s business whether you, your insurer, or your Momma chooses the body shop that fixes your car. And you should be free to make any deal you want to select the best person, which is to say, Cohen the Columnist, to chair the board’s compensation committee. Wink, wink.
Laurence D. Cohen is a freelance writer.
