Pigeon, Parenti team up with General Wesley Clark

T-b General Clark, Pigeon and Parenti

When former Supreme NATO Commander and former presidential candidate Wesley Clark visited WNY last week, his hosts were former Erie County Democratic Chairman Steve Pigeon and Niagara Falls' Gary Parenti.

Parenti and Pigeon guided the man who led American forces through the Balkans War through a series of appearances and conferences here.

How did Parenti, local political activist, former Assembly candidate, and son of the well known Parenti Accounting family, become a close associate of this international military, business, and political leader?

According to Parenti, it started during Clark's 2004 presidential campaign.
“We got to know the General during that campaign and also through his work and ours back then with the (William Jefferson) Clinton Global Initiative,” Parenti recalls. “General Clark runs an investment banking firm and does technology consulting with governments internationally and so do we. So we've been able to help each other since then to identify clients and also to find clients whose products are suitable for investment by the General's investment bank.

“We get calls from clients who say, 'How can I solve this problem?'...Very often, General Clark, who is extraordinarily astute in economics and technology, can help.”

Parenti, Pigeon and Clark were seen at Chefs restaurant, and Club 31 in Buffalo, at the offices of local Niagara Falls attorney John Bartolomei and touring the parkway viewing the Niagara River and the spectacular gorge.

Pigeon said the General and Parenti and he have mutual clients in Canada and the USA and recently did consulting work together in Rumania.

While in western New York, Pigeon and Clark appeared together on WBBZ (Channel 5) which will air this week.

What impresses Parenti most about General Clark?

“It's his tenacity,” he said. “Once he tackles a problem, he will keep working on it and keep working on it until he gets it solved.”