Airline Lobbyist's Job Is a Dogfight

His career otherwise has been largely as a lobbyist. He was mentored by the legendary George Koch at the Grocery Manufacturers of America and earned his reputation as a hard-charging advocate during his 15 years at the National Association of Broadcasters. He took over the ATA in 2003.

May's latest job has proved to be even more complicated and contentious than his work with the broadcasters, which was not a milquetoast assignment by any means. "I believed naively that this was a deregulated business," he said. "It's one of the most highly regulated businesses in the world."

"Sometimes it seems like I live in Kip Hawley's back pocket," he said, referring to the head of the Transportation Security Administration.

That means he sighs at the end of almost every day. "I feel like I was rode hard and put away wet," May said, evoking the old cowboy saying. "That's my life."

New Chief for Restaurant Group

The National Restaurant Association has a new president: Dawn M. Sweeney, currently the head of AARP's business ventures.

The appointment, scheduled to be announced today, puts a woman at the helm of the nearly 50,000-member group for the first time in its 88-year history and promises to convert the place from a reliable Republican bastion into something more even-handed.

"The challenge in any effective organization today is to find friends where you need them, that are important to the industry, and that's how I will approach it," Sweeney said in an interview.

Sweeney, 47, is not affiliated with a political party. Her predecessor, Steven C. Anderson, now chief of the National Association of Chain Drug Stores, is a well-known Republican.

Sweeney has worked for the AARP, the senior citizens' lobby, since 1999, and since 2002 she has been in charge of AARP Services, its more than $700 million-a-year business operation. She supervises 250 people there and oversaw massive businesses including mutual funds and health insurance.

She has worked at associations in a variety of capacities since she graduated from Colby College: first for the International Dairy Foods Association and then the National Rural Electric Cooperative Association. She hails from tiny Westbrook, Maine, where her father was once the mayor.

Dozens of people in town wanted the restaurant association job; one person who was rumored to be interested and who chose not to pursue it is Labor Secretary Elaine L. Chao, industry sources said.

Picking Sides on Private Equity

It's hard to imagine, but cash continues to pour into the fight by private equity firms -- the new moneybags of Wall Street -- to beat back two bills that would raise their taxes.