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September 14, 2008
Allianz and Barclays: Joined at the hip
Fans For Fair Play
The official verdict in the Wide World of New York Stadium Naming Rights?1) The Holocaust is offensive.
2) Slavery, English colonialism, apartheid, the Congolese civil war, supporting the Mugabe regime...not so much.
After an amazingly brief explosion of justifiable anger at New Jers-- er, New York's two NFL teams' potential naming-rights deal with Allianz, the deal is dead.
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Bruce Ratner's Atlantic Yards project down the same trash-strewn path when they inked a $400 million deal with Barclays Bank, whose history includes involvement with the U.S. slave trade, South African apartheid, European colonialism, the Congolese civil war and support for Robert Mugabe's internationally condemned regime in Zimbabwe.In fact, Ratner went further -- he actually completed the deal. The Giants and Jets, no models of sports-industry decency, actually did the right thing and told Allianz to take a hike.
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If the Allianz deal was killed after a 48-hour whirlwind of indignation, CYA maneuvers, and a corporation made to capitulate with its tail between its legs, why is Bruce Ratner's deal with Barclays still alive eighteen months later?
Posted by amy at September 14, 2008 3:31 PM