Furious shareholders are demanding to know why directors of Oklahoma City-based Chesapeake Energy Corp. paid CEO Aubrey McClendon $112 million last year, bought his personal art collection and co-sponsored his basketball team, even as the company’s stock price tumbled.

Chesapeake Energy chairman and CEO Aubrey McClendon was the top new search term on Muckety last week.

CEO Bob Simpson earned about $100 million from the sale of nearly 2.8 million shares of XTO early last week, as he raced to beat the meltdown of the market and his stock.

Risk-taking caught up to Aubrey McClendon, the outspoken energy company CEO who helped fund the Swift Boat attacks against John Kerry four years ago and has been busy touting the benefits of compressed natural gas in TV ads this election cycle.

Four years later, many of the wealthy donors who funded the Swift Boat Veterans for Truth campaign against Democratic presidential candidate John Kerry are still very active in molding public opinion.

Chesapeake Energy CEO Aubrey McClendon has a former Oklahoma governor (Frank Keating) and U.S. Senator (Don Nickles) on his Oklahoma City-based company’s board of directors. That seems only fitting. McClendon’s great uncle, Robert S. Kerr, co-founded Kerr-McGee and served as Oklahoma governor and senator.

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