AND FINALLY

GE WHEEZE: Those cheeky Yes Men (see SchNEWS 744, 686, 569) have been up to their naughty tricks again, this time targeting the US’s largest corporate conglomerate, General Electric (GE).
Already under-fire for admitting that it’s paying bugger all tax due to losses made by its casino-banking financial arm during the credit crisis, the company was left smouldering with anger after news organizations swallowed a fake GE Press Release and started reporting that the company was donating a $3.2bn tax refund back to the government.

This all led to a lot of unwelcome attention and even dented the share price before the hoax was unmasked and a denial PR offensive helped it recover. Which all goes to make cynical SchNEWSers wonder whether the Yes Men are really a clever front for a bit of predatory short-selling. That’d be one hell of way to pay for some media activism come to think about it...

* See http://theyesmen.org