Richard Scaife, Newspaper Billionaire and Andrew Mellon Heir, Has Untreatable Cancer

[MADem]

Source: Forbes

5/18/2014 @ 11:43AM

Richard Scaife, the media billionaire and heir of the Mellon fortune, says he has an untreatable cancer.

Scaife, 81, owns a Pittsburgh-based media company that includes the Pittsburgh Tribune-Review and has been a noted supporter of conservative causes. He sits on the board of the Heritage Foundation and has given hundreds of millions of dollars since the 1980s. He is seen as the bankroll behind the Republican renaissance under Ronald Reagan, funded investigations of Bill Clinton’s Troopergate and once gave Richard Nixon $1 million. His patronage of conservative groups won him many enemies. “Some who dislike me may rejoice at this news,” Scaife writes in a Tribune-Review column revealing his diagnosis. “Naturally, I can’t share their enthusiasm.”


The roots of his $1.45 billion fortune lie in the wealth accumulated by his great uncle, banker and industrialist Andrew Mellon. He never likes to use his middle name, Mellon, because he feels his parents were mistreated by his uncle, R.K. Mellon. His sister, Cordelia Scaife May, was another Forbes 400 member until her death in 2005. Brother and sister hadn’t spoken in decades after a falling out over the death of Cordelia’s husband. Like his sister, Scaife is press shy and almost never grants an interview.

An ironic situation for a man so immersed in media. While acknowledging the changing landscape of the media business, Scaife says his newspapers will out live him. ”I believe they are essential to our communities and will be my most valuable legacy,” Scaife writes.

Read more: http://www.forbes.com/sites/abrambrown/2014/05/18/richard-scaife-newspaper-billionaire-and-andrew-mellon-heir-has-untreatable-cancer/

---

Posted without additional comment.

[Faygo Kid]

1. Goodbye.

[hobbit709]

2. What goes around comes around.

[eallen]

25. Cancer gets many his age, the good and bad alike.

[Archae]

3. Notice the Clintons are out-living their most vicious enemies?

"Justice" Johnston, the arch-segregationist who gladly smeared the Clintons.

Jerry Falwell.

Now this swine, who funded the Clinton smear machine called the "Arkansas Project."

[former9thward]

11. Those enemies are a generation older than the Clintons.

I would hope they are outliving them.

[Archae]

13. For me it's like something I thought about the day Pete Seeger died.

"Pete, you out-lived all those bastards who wanted to lock you up."

[former9thward]

17. Well, I would not put the Clintons at the level of a Pete Seeger ...

but I agree with your point.

[tech3149]

22. He didn't limit his actions to national politics

His is the only paper that offers home delivery locally. Back in 2004 they ran hit pieces on local elections and funded corruption charges just before the elections only to have them to be found without merit after the elections.
I'll just say I"m sorry for the family but not sorry to see him go.

[hlthe2b]

4. Won't wish untreatable (or any) cancer on ANYONE...

That said, I won't ignore his ugly role in perpetuating the "Swift-boating" of John Kerry, or as others have pointed out, the Arkansas smear campaign on the Clintons.

[Vogon_Glory]

5. I Loathed Most Of His Political Activities BUT

I loathed most of Richard Scaife's political activities, but Is it too late to hope for a genuine 11th hour 57 minutes genuine repentance?

[DFW]

6. It is definitely too late for that

He doesn't repent his activities, he only regrets he has so little time left to continue them.

[DFW]

7. No, you odious old turd, we do not "rejoice at this news."

We are not Republicans.
We are not Fox "News" commentators.
We are not rabid right-wingers with our ears glued to National Hate Radio.
We do not "rejoice" at hearing someone has terminal cancer.

The fact that Mellon-Scaife will soon no longer be personally conducting his dirty propaganda war against the "other" 99.99% of America is our only consolation, and considering the company he's in these days, it's a small consolation at that.

[calimary]

9. Beautifully put.

I'm sorry ANYONE has to face a terminal cancer diagnosis. But that does not change the fact that he is a SCHMUCK of the first order. All that money spent trying to destroy good people, and using his power and financial muscle for evil purposes and negativity galore. I will NEVER forget the Arkansas Project. His passing will unfortunately not squelch or in any way lessen THAT shitty business.

Oddly enough - he's a relative small-fry in the Billionaires Club. His fortune is listed at one-point-five billion dollars? That's ALL? Sure doesn't measure up that well to what we're used to having to deal with these days - the adelsons and kochs - does it?

[7wo7rees]

59. So well put to both of you.

Well said. Thank you.

[Hekate]

42. Very, very well put, DFW. nt

[freshwest]

63. Plus a million. But his millions couldn't save him. And his 'legacy' stole lives. n/t

[Psephos]

75. Well said indeed. But far from unanimous on this thread. n/t

[DFW]

78. If I EVER post something on DU that gets universal accolades, I'll assume the world has ended

Believe me, I'm used to getting trashed on here by someone or other for almost every post I make.

The symptoms are not fatal

[Psephos]

83. heh heh - so true

I always enjoy your posts, btw.

[DFW]

84. Thanks for that

As you noted, the sentiment is never universal!

[MADem]

87. Hmmmm. I resemble that remark!!!

[DFW]

88. Yeah, I don't have exclusive rights to those symptoms!

[Zorro]

8. Boo hoo hoo

[CanonRay]

10. He says as the Karmic wheel rolls over him

David Koch, you next in line...

[Joe Bacon]

33. Karma for Steve Kangas.

That is all I will say.

[JanMichael]

40. Yep

thought the same thing. I wouldn't want to face what Scaife is going to- even if it's only his own terror at the end.

[grasswire]

43. that was my first thought

Steve Kangas was found dead in a bathroom outside Scaife's office. Kangas was a fearless reporter of truth. He was on the right side of history.

Scaife? A villain.

[UpInArms]

53. kangas was the best and one of the leaders of knowing what and who was dealing the cards

WELCOME TO STEVE KANGAS' WEB PAGE!


am so glad it still out there

[joshcryer]

61. +1

See my first journal post.

[muriel_volestrangler]

12. He could call it 'Richard'

As a writer you will know that one of the favourite fantasy plots of a writer is, a character's told 'you've got three months to live,' and who would you kill? I call my cancer Rupert, so I can get close to it. Because that man, Murdoch, is the one who, if I had the time (I've got too much writing to do...) I would shoot the bugger if I could. There is no one person more responsible for the pollution of what was already a fairly polluted press. And the pollution of the British press is an important part of the pollution of British political life, and it's an important part of the cynicism and misperception of our own realities that is destroying so much of our political discourse.

"The Long Goodbye," The Guardian (6 April 1994); the quote is from Potter's final television interview with Melvyn Bragg (5 April 1994)

http://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Dennis_Potter

[bigworld]

14. I'd like some more details

There are plenty of cancers that are "untreatable" in older folks. I think, for example, they usually do not treat prostate cancer in most 80 year olds because chances are high something else will kill you before the cancer spreads.

So until he releases some more information, I'll hold my sympathy.

[MADem]

74. You have a point.

If it were pancreatic or brain cancer, that would be very different from prostate.

I haven't seen any articles that say anything to add to what I've posted in the OP yet. If I do I will slap 'em up here.

[Hassin Bin Sober]

15. Too bad he didn't donate his hundreds of millions to help find a cure for cancer.

[area51]

64. Or he could use his wealth now to push for single-payer

and thus save a lot of lives which the ACA won't be able to do.

[Duer 157099]

77. Exactly.

Wealthy people don't seem to realize how desperate the research community is for funding. They feel if they give a million or so that they are doing enough. What good is money when you don't have your health? Too bad they learn this lesson way too late.

[wordpix]

82. we know the cure---stop industrial pollution, including our food supply and water

but of course, our industrialists would never go organic/natural, even to save themselves.

BTW, I have cancer and have always led a healthy lifestyle.

[Kelvin Mace]

16. “Some who dislike me may rejoice at this news,”

No, actually I don't. If I did, that would make me like you.

[happyslug]

18. His sister had not talk to him in decades for the death of her husband?

Last edited Mon May 19, 2014, 03:07 PM - Edit history (5)

That is all Forbes have to say!!!!!

She only accused her brother of shotgunning her husband. The official position is while hunting, her husband accidentally shot himself. His sister rejected that ruling.

Now her husband was under federal indictment at the time (early 1970s) and a good republican. My comment is if you are going to mention her not talking to her brother, at least say why.


http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Robert_Duggan

Pittsburgh Press report on his Funnel:

http://news.google.com/newspapers?id=uSpmAAAAIBAJ&sjid=S3cNAAAAIBAJ&pg=2800%2C1154889

I love the quote "No fingerprints were found on the weapon but State Police Captain... said this was not unusual". Duggan and Richard Scaife were out bird-hunting with shotguns and when they climbed over a fence the shotgun Duggan was carrying went off. You are carrying a shotgun, your fingerprints should be all over it, but none were found.......

More on Scaife's sister:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cordelia_Scaife_May

First time I ran across her name was on the Club attached to my National Guard Armory. She had paid for the club, with one stipulation, that it be opened to all ranks. Our armory was small so it was rarely opened, but when it was, anyone in the armory could enter and it was a nice club room.

In 2013 he sold off local All News Radio Station KQV:

http://www.post-gazette.com/ae/tv-radio/2013/05/14/Scaife-to-sell-his-interest-in-KQV/stories/201305140255

Pittsburgh Post Gazette's report on Scaife's Cancer (they just cite the Tribune Review where Scaife first announced the cancer:

http://www.post-gazette.com/business/2014/05/18/Pittsburgh-Tribune-Review-publisher-says-he-has-untreatable-form-of-cancer/stories/201405180211

Scaife's actual Article in his Greensburg Tribune Review:

http://triblive.com/news/editorspicks/6132589-74/newspapers-lives-media#axzz328IocqZS

[daleo]

62. Reminiscent of Cheney and that lawyer

It seems like hunting with right wingers can be bad for one's health.

[MADem]

76. Cheney never apologized to Whittington, either...

A walk down memory lane:

Still, the injuries were more dire than previously disclosed. Whittington suffered a collapsed lung. He underwent invasive exploratory surgery, as doctors probed his vital organs for signs of damage. The load from Cheney's gun came close to, but didn't damage, the carotid artery in his neck. A rupture could have been fatal, particularly since it took the better part of an hour to transport him from the vast Armstrong ranch to the Kingsville hospital.

Whittington recalls that he was standing off to Cheney's right, looking for a downed bird. He doesn't remember exactly how far away he was when Cheney, tracking a bird, twisted quickly in his direction and fired. Whittington was angled toward Cheney at the time; hence, the wounds on his right side. Cheney later told a police investigator that he was standing in a slightly elevated position relative to Whittington, meaning he was aiming downward. The police report notes that Whittington would have been wounded on the lower half of his body if he and Cheney had been on same level.

But did Cheney ever say in private what he didn't say in public? Did he ever apologize?

Whittington, who has been talking about his life and career for hours, suddenly draws silent.

"I'm not going to go into that," he says sharply after a short pause.

Harry Whittington is too gracious to say it out loud, but he doesn't dispute the notion, either.

Nearly five years on, he's still waiting for Dick Cheney to say he's sorry.

[Tom Ripley]

19. Well, I woke up this morning, feeling around for my shoes...

the dancing pair.
I make no apologies. Fuck him.

[McCamy Taylor]

20. Sad for him, but I'm not supporting any Tea Baggers in his honor and I still support Hillary.

[LeftofObama]

21. Too bad he didn't put all of that money he used to destroy good people into cancer research.

He might be singing a different tune today. Bye Richard.

[DirtyDawg]

23. It's a start...

...now if it could make its way to Wichita.

[jmowreader]

24. A life spent in hate is no life at all

Richard Mellon Scaife's whole life revolved around hate. According to his baby book, his first words were "Mommy, I hate you."

He hated Democrats and liberals and, by all accounts, chocolate ice cream. He hated to get up in the morning. Hated to go to bed at night. He hated paying his workers but also hated not making money, for which he needed them. He hated his car but hated shopping for different ones worse.

His whole life was consumed by hate, and he used his considerable wealth to spread it far and wide. He hated that too, if only to be consistent.

There is no afterlife; we only live on in the memories of others. His time on earth will be remembered as one filled with hate.

This should be a lesson to us all: Richard Mellon Scaife stands as a gray-painted, barnacle-covered example of how not to be.

[UpInArms]

54. beautiful prose

about a barnacle

[Cleita]

26. Goes to show that all the billions and the selfish deeds done to acquire and

keep the billions count for nothing when the Grim Reaper makes his appearance. No matter how rich you are, you can't buy a new life. The Koch family should take note.

[bemildred]

27. Well I hope he doesn't suffer too long. nt

[graegoyle]

56. Seconded.

[Doctor_J]

28. Too bad he lived long enough to bring irreparable harm to the US

[onecaliberal]

29. Karma.

Too bad it took so long to catch up with him.

[Beacool]

30. I don't rejoice in the news, but I'm not heartbroken either.

[Shrike47]

31. He's no loss and won't be mourned, but I don't cheer his cancer or wish it on him.

What a miserable person.

[Marrah_G]

32. At least he will have the best end of life care possible

Unlike those whose lives have been destroyed by his "vision".

[winstars]

34. Sorry folks but having lived thru this fuckers antics: Great News, not a second too soon... nt

[Kingofalldems]

35. Back then: Whitewater!

Now: Benghazi!

Same shit.

[Yo_Mama_Been_Loggin]

36. We all have to go sometime

Could you please take Dick Cheney with you?

[BlueStater]

37. “Some who dislike me may rejoice at this news,”

That's what happens when you devote your life to being a bastard, Rich. You brought it on yourself.

[grasswire]

45. His is an ugly statement, actually.

He's implying that those who would rejoice do so because they "dislike" him.

He takes no responsibility for his insidious actions.

[MADem]

73. It's as if he's Frank Sinatra, singing "My Way."

Unfortunately, though, his 'way' involved a lot of blatant cheating, corruption, mendacity, and dirty tricks.

He will be remembered for his deeds. That's probably the bottom line, and he can't rewrite his own history with a simple editorial essay.

[Grins]

38. Was it from the cheap prostitutes you were fucking...?

Was it from the cheap prostitutes you were fucking...?

"At some point in late 2005, (Scaife's wife) started having suspicions about her husband and hired a private investigator named Keith Scannell, a specialist in high-end surveillance for insurance companies. In December of that year, Scannell followed Richard Scaife to nearby North Huntingdon, home of Doug's Motel, a place where the TVs are bolted to the furniture and rooms can be rented in three-hour increments, for $28. ...There, according to Scannell, Scaife spent a few hours with Tammy Sue Vasco.

Why a billionaire would shack up at Doug's Motel, of all places, is a mystery. Ditto his choice of companions. Vasco is a tall, blond 43-year-old mother who in 1993 was busted in a sting operation after showing up at a Sheraton hotel and offering to have sex with an undercover cop for $225, the Post-Gazette reported.

The two usually met each other twice a week, for months, at the motel, says an employee of the motel. Scaife would show up in a chauffeured car, dressed in a suit, wearing cuff links, always bearing flowers. Vasco would be waiting in same room every time, Room 5 on the ground floor, facing the parking lot, said the employee. Mr. Dick, as he was known at the motel, would stay for two hours or so, then get back in the car, which had been waiting, and leave."

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/10/21/AR2007102101643_3.html?sid=ST2007102200563

Being chauffeured to cheap motels for sex with your favorite prostitute! Doesn't get any more Republican than that!

[lastlib]

39. I thought he WAS a cancer!....

Certainly he was an infection on society. I wonder how much of his billions was gained on the backs of working people. While I'm not inclined to cheer another's misfortune, I will say that his greatest contribution to our society will come when he shuffles off this mortal coil.

[Algernon Moncrieff]

41. I don't rejoice in his suffering

I can only hope that, in his waning days, he gains perspective on the human condition and uses his wealth to help those in need. May God have mercy on him.

[JNelson6563]

44. No surprise here.

Hate is so much like cancer...maybe it actually becomes cancer when present in such significant amounts.

Julie

[Hekate]

46. As a financial backer of Xian Reconstructionism/Dominionism...

I do have to say, Mr. Scaife, you've earned your place in Hell alongside Rushdoony.

Aside from that, I have no opinion on your current sufferings.

[valerief]

47. I care as much about this asshole as he cares about most people.

In other words, he's a total waste of oxygen.

[UpInArms]

48. What happened to Steve Kangas

Death sparks conspiracy theory

Sunday, March 14, 1999

A former Army intelligence officer shot himself to death last month in a restroom outside conservative philanthropist and publisher Richard Mellon Scaife's Downtown offices, and Scaife has assigned a private investigator to determine whether the incident was a bungled assassination attempt.

Steven R. Kangas died in the late hours of Monday, Feb. 8, on the 39th floor of One Oxford Centre.

The shooting of the 37-year-old Las Vegas man attracted little attention at the time, and Pittsburgh police and the Allegheny County coroner's office quickly ruled it a suicide.

<snip>

Kangas had recently sold his share of a gambling business in Las Vegas, and he ran the "Liberalism Resurgent" page on the World Wide Web. The page published extensive criticism of conservatives, and some of its writings asserted that Scaife was the financier of a right-wing conspiracy to topple President Clinton.

According to a city police report, One Oxford Centre building engineer Don Adams was making a routine check of electrical circuit breakers in the men's room down the hall from the Scaife foundation offices when he found Kangas lying face up, his head protruding from beneath a toilet stall.

<snip>

Scaife is one of three tenants on the 39th floor, a location he specifically requested when he moved his family foundations and personal offices there several years ago. Also on the floor are Staley Capital Advisers and the law offices of T.W. Henderson.

[Skittles]

49. I despise him but I would never rojoice that someone has cancer

and I hope I never become the kind of person who does

[UTUSN]

50. R#19 & K for, that's just ME!1 n/t

[Todays_Illusion]

51. Considering the damage done, no mention of his funding the big Arkansas Project, against Clintons,

The investigation of the investigation that Hillary was correct about the vast right wing conspiracy.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-srv/politics/special/clinton/stories/scaifeside050299.htm

[Owl]

52. Awww

[onehandle]

55. 'Billionaire Lives Long Happy Life. Eventually Will Die.'

This is news?

[struggle4progress]

57. I've hated his politics ever since I first encountered them thirty years ago. But

No man is an Iland, intire of itselfe; every man is a peece of the Continent, a part of the maine; if a Clod bee washed away by the Sea, Europe is the lesse, as well as if a Promontorie were, as well as if a Manor of thy friends or of thine owne were; any mans death diminishes me, because I am involved in Mankinde; and therefore never send to know for whom the bell tolls; It tolls for thee

[LyndaG]

58. Haven't heard that name in many moons

He was a right-wing villain in the '90s like the Koch brothers are now.

[MADem]

60. He bought up all those books of Coulter's to put her on the (faux) best seller lists. nt

[father founding]

65. The naked billionaire

He walks out of life without the billions , you can't take it with you.

[iandhr]

66. As a son and nephew of breast cancer survivors...

… I am offended that the are some people here cheering.

[MADem]

72. I am not seeing a lot of that.

It's more to the point of "Circle of life; what goes around, comes around; even the rich can't buy many more chances, death is the great equalizer..." That kind of thing.

At the end of the day, what do we leave behind? Our properties, which are scattered to our heirs, our bones, which are burnt or buried, and our reputation. That last thing tends to endure, for at least a generation and if we'd made a big enough mark on the globe, longer.

History won't be kind to that fellow. That's plenty enough for me.

[yurbud]

67. the rich can't buy immortality--yet.

[Dawson Leery]

68. Scaife is a greater threat to the US than OBL ever was.

[MADem]

70. He'll be in the same place OBL is, soon enough, it would seem.... nt

[Dawson Leery]

71. Neither will be missed.

[warrprayer]

69. ....

[lovuian]

79. Money doesn't make you happy

and you can't take it with you

[MADem]

86. I concur--you can rent a little happiness, you can pay people to pretend to like you, but

when the race is run and done, the finish line looks the same if you're living in a mansion or homeless.

[warrprayer]

80. Say Goodnight Dick

[wordpix]

81. I wonder how many energy, chemical and agribiz companies he invested in?

Just sayin' b/c industrial and agricultural pollution = cancer

[MADem]

85. It's true, that.

That Miss Beasley scottie dog of the Bush's died this week at ten years of age.

Of cancer. I wonder how much CHEMLAWN graced the lawns at the WH?

I remember FLOTUS had to remove/replace dirt to make her garden a semblance of organic...!

I've had a lot of terriers, and absent a health issue, they usually make it to the teens. I had just one (a rescue they were going to put down, I took her for what amounted to just two years, good dog, too) with liver disease (shunt) that I kept going only until ten or eleven years of age, but most of 'em lasted at least fifteen years (another rescue) to as long as 19 (a "terrier mix" of several terriers that looked like a mop that we got as a pup).

Of course, I don't use CHEMLAWN and I don't take my dogs places where that kind of stuff is all over the joint--they're awfully close to the grass, they don't have a chance...!