Showing posts with label dick durbin. Show all posts
Showing posts with label dick durbin. Show all posts

Saturday, May 7, 2022

May, 2022, Political Class Insanity:, Part 3: Fleeing Oppressive California and Covid Relief For Hitmen, Terrorists, Sexual Predators, and More

 It is the beginning of another month which means it is time again to review the latest political class insanity from the American political class. Each month it takes us multiple posts to cover the wasteful spending, incompetent government organizations and employees, government programs that usually make a problem worse than resolving it, inane and idiotic politician comments, etc.

To review past posts on this insanity and idiocy, just click on the first few posts in each month listed to the right of this page. After reviewing just a handful of these insanity posts we think you will agree that we are currently being served by the worst set of American politicians ever to hold office in our entire history.


1) We have often asserted that a very basic desire of most humans is to be free. Free from excessive taxation, free from excessive governmental business and personal regulations, free from the fear of crime and violence, free to live their lives the way they want, to spend their income and time based on their own priorities and income.


And when people cannot fulfill that basic freedom need, they eventually take steps to maximize their freedom. And that reality was recently demonstrated in the state of California:


  • According to the California Department of Finance, the state’s population dropped by 117,552 people in 2021.

  • These results follow up on the 2020 results where about twice that number of people left the state. 

  • This is a state that seemingly forever saw annual growth in its state population.

  • 34 out of 58 state counties saw a decrease in population.

  • The three most populated counties, San Diego, Los Angeles, and Orange county saw substantial population decreases.

  • Only two counties saw population increases greater than 1%.

  • Cities who lost population in the state outnumbered cities that saw population increases by more than a three to one ratio.


Sky high taxes, sky high government regulations, sky high violent crime rates, and a raft of other problems. People want to be free and one way to do that is to leave California for more freedom oriented regions when their own political class cannot provide that freedom they desire.


2)Washington politicians and bureaucrats never ever do anything right, efficient, or effective. And as we have discussed many times, the legislation and implementation of the covid relief programs are no exception to this incompetence:


  • For example, Valesky Barosy received $2.1 million in government covid business loans.

  • He then used that taxpayer wealth to buy a Lamborghini, Rolex and Hublot watches, and designer clothing from high end retailers including Louis Vuitton, Gucci, and Chanel.

  • He created bogus business expense reports when he applied for $4.2 million in government loans of which the government gave him half the amount he requested.

  • Fortunately, he and his accomplices have been indicted on five counts of wire fraud, three counts of money laundering, and one count of aggravated identity theft.

  • He faces up to 132 years in Federal prison.


The good news is this guy got caught. But the bad news is that the Small Business Administration (SBA) Inspector General found that the SBA may have improperly paid out $3.6 billion in taxpayer wealth to people and businesses who did not deserve it or obtained it fraudulently. The Inspector General found that the SBA did not follow fraud prevention protocols that were designed to prevent this waste.


3) While it seems most of those that have been caught defrauding the government were doing the covid fraud to simply enrich themselves and their lifestyle, Jasmine Martinez had a different purpose in mind when she defrauded a government covid program:


  • Miami police allege that Martinez used her stolen covid relief taxpayer money to put together a plot to murder Le’Shonte Jones and her three year old daughter.

  • The effort was successful in murdering Jones while critically injuring her 3 year old daughter.

  • Specifically: "The suspect, Jasmine Martinez, is now in jail along with two others identified by police as Javon Carter and Romiel Robinson. They are each being held on charges related to the May 3 murder of TSA Agent Le’Shonte Jones and the attempted murder of Jones' 3-year-old daughter, who was injured in the shooting.”

  • Martinez used $10,000 in covid relief money to hire Carter as the hit man for the murder.

  • Apparently Jones was going to be a prosecution witness in a criminal case against Martinez and the two had a long history of antagonism between themselves.


Great, taxpayer money being funneled in to murder plots. Insane.


3) But it is no just those that hire hitmen that can get free taxpayer covid relief money:


  • According to recent findings from a Freedom Of Information filing, IRS records show that 645,000 prison inmates received covid relief money under Biden’s American Rescue Plan in 2021.

  • These 645,000 convicted criminals received $900 million in total.

  • “In one of the most inexplicable votes in Senate history, Senate Democrats sent terrorists and perverts $1,400 checks paid for by U.S. tax dollars. It is a vote that should tick off every American,” NRSC Chairman Sen. Rick Scott (R-FL) said.

  • We have previously discussed the disgusting reality that the Boston Marathon bomber received a $1,400 covid relief check in prison.

  • Larry Nassar, a convicted sexual predator that preyed on young college athletes also received taxpayer funds in prison.

  • The really sad part of this fraud is that Senators knew it would happen and yet defeated a move to prevent prisoners from getting taxpayer money.

  • Senator Dick Durbin, a Senator who supported giving money to prisoners, had this sick justification for sending almost a billion dollars to convict prisoners: “Children [of convicts] should not be forced to go hungry because a parent is incarcerated. Relief payments would allow families to replace lost income and pay rent and put food on the table. I would urge my colleagues to understand what we are facing with our criminal justice system today. We need to bring more justice to it and caring for the families of those who are incarcerated.”


I would ask the Senator: a few questions: 1) how many of those convicts who received taxpayer money actually have children who need support? 2) How many of those convicts actually care about their kids if they have them? I would bet that the answer is that the vast majority do not have kids to support or care about their kids. If they cared about their kids they likely would not have involved themselves in criminal activities.


And finally Senator, how much of that $900 millon actually made it out of prions to directly support their kids? If you want to support the kids of convicts, that is fine. But get the money directly to those kids, do not give it to convicts that may not even have kids, do not care about their kids, or who can use the money for their own personal needs.

That $900 million could have fed a lot of hungry and homeless Americans, it could have provided a lot of drug addiction support to drug addicted Americans, none of whom committed crime against other Americans or society. The horrid  priorities of Congressional people never seem to amaze or disgust me.

Politicians continue to fail the country whether at the state level in California or the national level in Washington.


Our book, "Love My Country, Loathe My Government - Fifty First Steps To Restoring Our Freedom And Destroying The American Political Class" is now available at:

Please visit the following sites for freedom:

Thursday, March 22, 2012

Should Stupid Priorities Be An Impeachable Offense? Exhibit A: Senator Dick Durbin

Before we discuss whether stupid political priorities should be an impeachable offense for any politician in Congress or the White House, two sets of background information:

1) Earlier this week, the NFL commissioner and league office handed down some very severe penalties for the National Football League's New Orleans Saints. Apparently, the Saints and their coaches had been practicing a "bounty" system over the past few years that rewarded defensive players on the Saints for physically and intentionally injuring players on the opposing teams. Those that inflicted injuries were provided monetary bonuses for their injury producing play.

Now, while football in the NFL is a violent game and many injuries do occur throughout a season, most people, fans, players, and NFL executives alike, all thought this was just a random part of the game. However, when the Saints implemented a system that intentionally meant to maim and injury, and then lied to try and cover up the process, the NFL came down hard on them.

Their head coach was suspended for a year without pay (an action that will cost him millions of salary dollars and possibly end his coaching career), the defensive coach was suspended from the NFL indefinitely, the team lost two second round draft choices, the general manager was suspended, and fines were imposed on the team itself. Very severe, and appropriate punishment, for heinous behavior.

2) Think about where the country is today:
  • Gas prices have doubled since President Obama took office.
  • Over $5 TRILLION has been added to our crushing national debt in just the past few years.
  • We are losing a war in Afghanistan that is costing us lives and money.
  • Unemployment and under employment remain stubbornly high.
  • The U.S. government received its first ever credit downgrade last year.
  • The number of Americans on food stamps is at an all time high.
  • We continue to lose the war on drugs and enrich and empower the violent drug cartels of Central and South America.
  • Our borders still leak and we still do not have a coherent, fair, and compassionate illegal immigration strategy and policy.
  • Iran and North Korea continue to push headlong to having nuclear weapon capabilities.
  • We still do not have a coherent and strategic national energy policy.
  • Social Security, Medicare, and Medicaid continue to lose more than $200 billion a year of taxpayer wealth to fraud, waste, and criminal activity.
  • The IRS continues to be so incompetent that it fails to collect over $300 billion a year in taxes owed every year.
  • Our 70,000 page tax code is cumbersome, expensive, unfair, and inefficient.
  • Obama Care has turned out to be an atrocity that will not curb escalating health care costs, will not provide heath care insurance for tens of millions of Americans, will not solve the root causes of high health care costs, and according to a recent analysis by the head actuary of Medicare and Medicaid, Obama Care will add over $300 billion to the national debt in the next ten years.
  • Our nation's infrastructure of roads, bridges, and tunnels is crumbling.
  • Recent government economic programs have almost always been abject failures relative to their promises and results (e.g. Economic Stimulus Program, Cash For Clunkers, Cash For Caulkers, Cash For Appliances, HAMP, etc.)
  • Recent government alternative energy programs have almost always been abject failures, rife with cronyism, relative to their promises and results ( e.g. Solyndra, Beacon, Spectra, Evergreen, E.ON, Terra-Gen, Iberdrola, etc.)
  • Our Washington politicians are more interested in their personal enrichment and furthering their political careers than solving the nation's problems.
  • Our overall economic growth has been sluggish, at best, over the past few years.
  • Our trade deficit with China and the rest of the world is still sky high.
  • Our kids continue to be under educated vs. most of the kids in other countries around the world.
Pretty depressing stuff. The country is really facing some tough issues, many of which have been with us for decades.

Which gets us to the question of the day: should there be a process in place that would allow us to impeach and remove from office any politician that has priorities that are screwed up beyond belief? Exhibit A in this discussion is the recent actions by Illinois Senator Dick Durbin.

Apparently, the above list of daunting issues and priorities, problems that probably touch just about every American in one way or another,  are not important enough in Senator Durbin's view. According to a recent Associated Press report (http://www.courier-journal.com/usatoday/article/38865793?odyssey=mod%7Cnewswell%7Ctext%7CSports%7Cs):

Sen. Dick Durbin is setting up a Judiciary Committee hearing about bounties in the NFL and other major sports in the wake of news that New Orleans Saints players received extra cash for hits that hurt particular opponents. The assistant Senate majority leader, an Illinois Democrat, says he wants to examine whether federal law should make such bounty systems a crime.

Never mind that the NFL has already harshly and appropriately handled the situation.

Never mind that gas per gallon prices are rapidly approaching $4.00 a gallon.

Never mind that the government wastes hundreds of billions of dollars a year either through criminal activity, fraud, waste, tax evasion, inefficiency, or ill run and ill thought out programs.

Never mind that our kids are under educated, our debt is over the top, and our border leaks like a sieve.

Never mind that millions of Americans cannot get a job and millions of them need food stamps to survive.

Never mind that the country's fiscal house is in disarray and the financial viability of the country and our democracy is in danger of collapsing.

Never mind that the nuclear arms club is about to expand to include two of the most unstable countries in the world.

No, rather than deal with and address the right priorities, the good Senator would rather expend government and taxpayer resources, time, and money on an issue that affects just about no American outside of the New Orleans Saints organization. There is absolutely no chance at all this bounty behavior will occur again since the league has proven that it will cost future offenders money, time, and their careers.

But no, the Senator wants to have Congressional hearings on something as trivial as this. I am not sure it is because the Senator and his peers do not know how bad life is outside of the Beltway or it is because they really have no clue how to solve our truly serious problems and waste their time on this type of trivial nonsense.

In either case, there should be a process put in place that would remove such politicians in office for wasting our time and our resources and for not focusing on the highest priorities challenging us all. I would suggest that every year when we file our tax returns, we be allowed vote out of office any Washington politician that spent time on trivial matters such as what Senator Durbin is planning to do.

If two thirds of those filing their taxes feel that any politician wasted the country's time on idiotic priorities (like NFL bounties), that politician would be banned from any future Federal political office and would step down when their current term was over. Longer term, implementing Step 39 from "Love My Country, Loathe My Government" would be the better solution since it would impose term limits on every Federal politician.  If a politician knew that he or she had only a limited time to make an impact on Ameircans' lives, hopefully they would not waste that time on NFL bounties and other types of silliness. 

I do not mean to single out Senator Durbin. We have previously reported on other acts of stupidity such as when the Federal political class passed a law that regulated the sound volume of television commercials, or when Congress held hearings the process for determining the national champion in Division I college football, or when a Congressman wanted to establish a tax deduction for house pets.

The idiocy is not confined to one politician, it is rampant across many. That is why the answer to the question posed in today's title is a definite "Yes." I bet if you removed just one from office by the process proposed above, you would never have to remove another since finally, we would have a process in place that focused politicians on real issues and not nonsense.


We invite all readers of this blog to visit our new website, "The United States Of Purple," at:


http://www.unitedstatesofpurple.com/


The United States of Purple is a new grass roots approach to filling the office of President of The United States by focusing on the restoration of freedom in the United States, focusing on problem solving skills and results vs. personal political enrichment, and imposing term limits on all future Federal politicians. No more red states, no more blue states, just one United States Of America under the banner of Purple.


The United States Of Purple's website also provides you the formal opportunity to sign a petition to begin the process of implementing a Constitutional amendment to impose fixed term limits on all Federally elected politicians. Only by turning out the existing political class can we have a chance of addressing and finally resolving the major issues of or times.

Our book, "Love My Country, Loathe My Government - Fifty First Steps To Restoring Our Freedom And Destroying The American Political Class" is now available at www.loathemygovernment.com. It is also available online at Amazon and Barnes and Noble. Please pass our message of freedom onward. Let your friends and family know about our websites and blogs, ask your library to carry the book, and respect freedom for both yourselves and others everyday.

Please visit the following sites for freedom:

http://www.cato.org/
http://www.robertringer.com/
http://realpolichick.blogspot.com/
http://www.flipcongress2010.com/
http://www.reason.com/
http://www.repealamendment/