These are my links for September 23rd through September 26th:

• Here comes another Koch/Tea Party smear – Evidence was found four years ago that other KGF employees had paid bribes to obtain business. An investigation was begun, and Egorova-Farines was one of the investigators. Ultimately, more than two dozen people were either terminated or allowed to resign.

  Koch USA officials say they were as surprised and angered as anybody else when they were first apprised of the bribery allegations, and moved as quickly as possible to get to the bottom of the situation and fix it.

  But, during this period, Egorova-Farines grew progressively unhappy with KGF, allegations of discrimination were lodged, and her case went to the Employment Tribunal of Paris.

  All of Egorova-Farines' claims were dismissed. She appealed and the decision was overturned on a technicality. KGF and Egorova-Farines then settled out of court.

  I spent a lot of my reporting years working with whistleblowers, mainly within the government, and generally find them admirable. But, like the rest of us, they're just human and can have very mixed motives, of which careful journalists must always be aware.

  A former U.S. government official of my acquaintance was approached recently by one of the Bloomberg reporters working on a Koch investigative piece. After some conversation about the French case, the reporter said, "the other interesting thing here is Koch has strong ties to the Tea Party."

  When the official asked what the Tea Party had to do with French bribery allegations, the reporter dropped the topic.

  I've also had occasion to meet a lot of Bloomberg journalists over the years and have been unfailingly impressed by their professionalism. But they're human, too, and can make mistakes.

  Joining the rampant Koch-bashing would be a mistake.

• Koch addicts seek another hit – As The Washington Examiner reported last week, Bloomberg Markets appears to be on the verge of dropping a lengthy treatise on the Kansas-based energy conglomerate Koch Industries.

  According to an individual interviewed by Bloomberg (who spoke to me on the condition of anonymity), much of the focus will likely be devoted to re-litigating past legal peccadilloes. But the piece may also reveal at least one previously unreported controversy: Koch Industries’ connection to the sale of petroleum industry equipment in Iran in the early-to-mid 2000s.

  Koch currently has a policy prohibiting its subsidiaries from doing business in Iran, and the past sales (some of which likely involved state-owned Iranian companies) appear to have been conducted by a foreign subsidiary of a subsidiary of Koch.

  Still, this comes on the heels of President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad’s speech to the UN General Assembly — and at a time when Tehran’s nuclear ambitions are receiving increased attention.

  All of this, of course, means the story could provide political fodder to Koch’s political enemies — which are legion. (In 2005, you might recall, Halliburton, the company once run by former Vice President Dick Cheney, also came under fire for doing business in Iran.)

  In reality, the revelation isn’t terribly newsworthy. While U.S. law bans American companies from making direct sales in Iran, foreign subsidiaries of multinational corporations may do so under certain circumstances. And many of them do.

  Dozens of multinational companies — including household names like General Electric, Exxon Mobil, Hewlett Packard, Caterpillar, and Honeywell — conducted business in Iran during the time period. For example, a 2010 New York Times analysis identified 74 corporations — many of whom received government contracts — that have conducted business in Iran over the last decade.

  Regardless of whether or not one finds this troubling, the fact that the practice was ubiquitous raises an obvious question: Why is Bloomberg singling out Koch?

  The answer seems pretty obvious.

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  Read it all

• Ryan to put ‘replace’ back in ‘repeal and replace’ | Campaign 2012 – Ryan to put 'replace' back in 'repeal and replace' | Campaign 2012
• foursquare – 10 miles and now Breakfast at Ronnie's with Alice and Tara (@ Ronnie's Diner)
• Untitled (https://lh4.googleusercontent.com/-dKap5IWFQ8c/Tn3EPSyF02I/AAAAAAAAATg/9blXVHx-dB4/CIMG0150.jpg) – Off soon to LA Marathon training with LA Roadrunners for 10 easy miles. Ronnie's Diner after.
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• @Flap Twitter Updates for 2011-09-24 | Flap’s Blog – FullosseousFlap’s Dental Blog – @Flap Twitter Updates for 2011-09-24 #tcot #catcot
• Ryan to put ‘replace’ back in ‘repeal and replace’ | Campaign 2012 – Ryan to put 'replace' back in 'repeal and replace' | Campaign 2012
• (500) http://flapsblog.org/2011/09/23/dilbert-september-23-2011-listen/?utm_source=twitterfeed&utm_medium=twitter – Dilbert September 23, 2011 – Listen
• Ryan to put ‘replace’ back in ‘repeal and replace’ | Campaign 2012 – RT @philipaklein: RT @conncarroll: @RepPaulRyan will give major speech outlining alternative to Obamacare Tuesday
• Flap’s Dentistry Blog: Los Angeles Roadrunners: My Saturday Mornings for the Next Six Months – Los Angeles Roadrunners: My Saturday Mornings for the Next Six Months
• Poll Watch: Obama Rated Same or Worse Than Bush – Obama Much Worse Than Clinton | Flap’s Blog – FullosseousFlap’s Dental Blog – Poll Watch: Obama Rated Same or Worse Than Bush – Obama Much Worse Than Clinton #tcot #catcot
• 43% of Twitter Users Access Twitter From a Mobile Phone [Data] – 43% of Twitter Users Access Twitter From a Mobile Phone
• 43% of Twitter Users Access Twitter From a Mobile Phone – The latest data on mobile phone usage is out, and the numbers show that mobile isn't slowing down. And where inbound marketing is concerned, some of the key mobile data centers around how people are using their phones to access content and social media.

  MarketingCharts' mobile research has found that people are increasingly using their mobile phones to access content on browsers, apps, and social networks:

  In March 2011, nearly 39% of US mobile subscribers were browsing the internet using their mobile device. That's up by 2.2 percentage points from just 3 months prior.
  Mobile apps are almost as popular as browsers; 37% of subscribers used downloaded apps.
  Subscribers are also increasingly using social networks on their phones. In March, 27.3% indicated they used a social network on their mobile phone, up from 24.7% just 3 months prior.

• Flap’s California Morning Collection: September 23, 2011 » Flap’s California Blog – Flap’s California Morning Collection: September 23, 2011
• Flap’s Links and Comments for September 20th through September 23rd | Flap’s Blog – FullosseousFlap’s Dental Blog – Flap’s Links and Comments for September 20th through September 23rd #tcot #catcot