Sir Bono

rather see him become pope thats more rock n roll.

Phoenix Magazine wrote:

SIR BONO'S PROFIT FROM WARGAMES

WHEN NOT saving the world or relocating companies off-shore, Bono KBE (Knight Commander of the Most Excellent Order of the British Empire) has been busy recently in making interesting investments – with one such gambit being into a software firm which specialises in "extremely realistic videos to be used as training games for the US military".

The recently elevated knight has become part owner in Elevation Partners – a massive US-based investments company set up in 2005 where, along with five other non-U2 partners, Sir Bono has a one sixth partnership. But, regrettably the activities of this and related companies don't always seem to match the world-saving rhetoric of Hewson's finer words.

Only last August Elevation bought a substantial stake into Forbes Media, publisher of Forbes Magazine, which is responsible for printing various "Top 100" type lists – the best known being that of billionaires. Editor-in-chief Malcolm 'Steve' Forbes is, of course, well- known for his "traditional" US Republican agenda. Featuring on a variety of platforms such as his own TV show, "Forbes on Fox", Steve is known for being against gun control, pro death penalty, opposing pollution control, and a world perspective that promotes, as he succinctly puts it himself, a "US not UN Foreign Policy".

Happily the part acquisition of Forbes ran smoothly, with Elevation partner, Roger McNamee, telling the NYT that Bono "was attracted to the magazine because it has a 'point of view,' adding that Bono 'drove this part of the discussion and likes the fact that there has been a consistent philosophy throughout its history'".

However the really cool move by Elevation is over on the US west coast, where it invested a reported $300 million in 2005 on a company called Pandemic/Bioware Studios. As reported in the Boston Globe, Pandemic is currently preparing to launch a product called 'Mercenaries 2: World in Flames, "a violent video game in which players become hired mercenaries who invade Venezuela, where a tyrant has tampered with the country's oil supply" – in other words the opportunity to re-run the CIA's failed 2001 coup attempt in cyberspace, except this time there can be victory.

Not surprisingly, this has not impressed a number of parties including the Venezuela Solidarity Network and the Boston Bolivarian Network, who last July first wrote to Bono to protest.

Helpfully Venezuela Network issued a release stating "Pandemic is a sub-contractor for the US army and the CIA funded Institute for Creative technologies which uses Hollywood techniques to mount war in California's high dessert in order to conduct military training. Pandemic's target market is young men of military recruitment age and indeed this is not Pandemic's first military adventure. Micro Soft NBC reported that the videogame Full Spectrum Warrior was created through the Institute for Creative Technologies in Marina Del Rey, California, a $45 million endeavor formed by the Army five years ago to connect academics with local entertainment and video game industries. The institute subcontracted work to Los Angeles based Pandemic Studios."

Despite the fuss, 10 months on, with the product due out this autumn, there's still no word from the new KBE about the ethical criticisms of his investments. This hasn't stopped a head of steam building up in the meanwhile. One petitioning letter by US clerics Reverend David A Bos, Rabbi Michael Lerner, and Pax Christi USA Ambassador for Peace, Fr. Joe Nangle OFM, has secured further signatures from the US Fellowship for Reconciliation and other religious organizations.

Degsy wrote: »

So what's he done to deserve it?Written songs about moles living in holes?Sued people over a pair of trousers?Moved offshore to avoid paying tax for nine months of the year?The swine deserves nothing.