This latest David Halbfinger-Allison Hope Weiner New York Times story about the Anthony Pellicano investigation is about how Pellicano tried to shake down billionaire Ron Burkle in 2002, telling him that he would not investigate him in exchange for payment of a fee between $100,000 and $250,000. It’s basically a portrait of how Pellicano used to drum up business by “holding himself out as a broker between rich and powerful adversaries, thereby drawing them into his realm at Hollywood’s underbelly,” the Times story says. Burkle, of course, had a similar-type enounter with New York Post “Page Six” reporter Jared Paul Stern, although Stern has maintained his meeting with Burkle wasn’t the blatant shakedown it’s been reported to be, and that he was somehow set up.