McCain Helping eBay Stocks In Speeches

Am I the only one who notices John McCain plugging eBay into his speeches?

Do you think this is a coincidence that one of his advisers is in fact Meg Whitman, who has made millions of dollars off eBay stocks?

Do you think McCain has eBay stocks in his investment portfolio?

I am surprised to see I am one of the only people bringing this up in blogs today. I noticed McCain consistently plugging how well eBay is doing right now in his speeches, how so many Americans make a living from auctions, and so on. However, that type of promotion comes on the heels of a lay off of 1,000 eBay employees.

I have mentioned this in my comments about the debates last night:

I also thought it was hilarious that McCain mentioned eBay and how many people are doing business on the site, but he left out the fact that eBay has just laid off 1,000 employees... this really shows how out of touch he is with the rest of us. Why? One of his advisers is ex eBay executive Meg Whitman. The people at the top are doing great, but the people who just lost their job aren't doing so well, but McCain will try and make it look like eBay is doing great and everyone is happy. Not the 1,000 who just got laid off.

Should politicians use heavily promoted events such as Presidential Debates to promote companies they are investing in? If these people own stocks in the companies they are promoting in their public speeches, this is like free advertisement.

Meg Whitman has made a lot of money with eBay stocks, and one has to wonder, how much will McCain make?

AuctionBytes says..

eBay CEO Meg Whitman exercised options on shares of eBay stock in June and twice during the month of August, and sold the stock for a total of $64.9 million for a net gain of $45.7 million for the year. The transactions were conducted under a prearranged trading plan that allows Whitman to sell up to 6,400,000 shares between June 2007 and February 2008.

McCain has touted Meg and her economic prowess as why she is his adviser, however, this comes at a time when eBay is laying off 10% of its workers!

According to Reuters & The Huffington Post...

McCain touts the economic prowess of, and suggests as a future Treasury Secretary Meg Whitman, the former CEO of eBay and someone who he has turned to for economic advice in the past. Normally, this is a solid point for McCain to press, highlighting entrepreneurship and the growth of female business leaders. The problem: eBay just announced that it was firing 10 percent of its work force.

EBay announced on Monday that it would cut 10 percent of its global workforce, representing the most significant layoffs in its history.

This is what McCain had to say about Meg Whitman and eBay during his speech... just like an advertisement.

I like Meg Whitman [former CEO of eBay and current McCain campaign adviser], she knows what it's like to be out there in the marketplace. She knows how to create jobs. Meg Whitman was CEO of a company that started with 12 people and is now 1.3 million people in America make their living off eBay. Maybe somebody here has done a little business with them.

At a time when the stock market is falling and Wall Street is in trouble, I highly doubt he is just dropping names like eBay in his speeches for free. Politicians never promote companies or corporations for free.

My grandpa told me long ago, "follow the money." I would place a wager that if you follow the money on this, you'd find out exactly why McCain talks so much about eBay in his speeches.