May, 2016, Part 8, Political Class Insanity: Still Wasting Taxpayer Money On Stupid Projects, Food Stamp Fraud In Florida, 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. In fact, last month we set a record, needing ten full posts to cover it all.

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.

It looks like our politicians have been especially insane over the past month or so let’s get started with the latest insanity from today’s American politicians:

1) A recent online article by the Heritage Foundation reviewed a Congressional oversight report from Arizona Senator Jeff Flake entitled, “Twenty Questions: Government Studies That Will Leave You Scratching Your Head.” As you read these insanely wasteful uses of your tax dollars, keep in mind that 45 million Americans still need government food assistance every month, almost 50,000 Americans die from a drug overdose every year, millions of Americans go homeless in their lifetimes, our veterans are not getting the medical care they need and were promised, cancers and dementia kill thousands of Americans every month, and the country is about to go bankrupt with almost $20 TRILLION in national debt. Then decide if these examples are more important and better uses of your tax money:

• The National Institutes of Health spent millions of its $32 billion budget to study the appearance of Jesus Christ’s face on toast, the musical preferences of monkeys, and the contagious nature of yawning.
• But then cried that they did not have enough money in its budget to fight Ebola.
• The Oregon Health And Science University spent $5 million of taxpayer wealth to study whether zebra finches altered their singing habits when intoxicated, finding that alcohol did have an effect, something that anyone at closing time in their local bar could have concluded for far less than $5 million.
• Researchers at the University of Illinois at Champaign-Urbana spend almost a quarter million to observe and measure the impact of cocaine on honey bees, finding that cocaine usage caused the bees to tend to dance twice as much. Not only is this a stupid study but taxpayer dollars were spent to purchase cocaine, an illegal substance.
• Bowdoin College in Maine spent a whopping $3.6 million to find out that when male goldfish are given sex steroids, they exhibited more social behavior and swam closer to their female counterparts.

These are just a handful of wasteful government spending examples that go on everyday in Washington while Americans are hungry, homeless, drug addicted, and dying from uncured diseases. And to add insult to injury, the NIH, one of the biggest culprits in wasting taxpayer wealth, has the nerve to ask Congress for an additional $2 billion to fight the Zika virus despite having already wasted a ton of money on toast, yawning, and who knows what else.

And these examples are nickel/dime compared to the $100 billion in wasteful, useless spending that Flake recently published in his annual compilation of wasteful spending, “Wastebook 2016.” Enter the search word “wastebook” in the search box above to find out about recent and past Wastebook insults to taxpayers.

In light of the mega-wasting of taxpayer wealth every year, it is almost comical to review Obama’s massive whopper of lie when he was first elected when he promised to go “through the Federal budget line by line” to weed out wasteful spending. Seven plus years later we can see what a joke and deception that false promise was. But at least we finally know that sex steroids in goldfish make them more aggressive. 

2) There is an old baseball saying that goes: “You cannot tell the players without a scorecard.” And now apparently in New York state, you cannot tell the criminal state politicians without the Buffalo News acting as your scorecard. A recent online article by the Buffalo News reporter Robert J. McCarthy provided “A Guide To Political Corruption Probes In New York State:”

- Former Democratic Assembly Speaker Sheldon was recently sentenced to 12 years in prison.

- Former Republican majority leader Dean Skelos of the State Senate, and his son, were recently sentenced for their crimes.

- G. Steen Pigeon, a statewide political operative and previous Erie County, New York Democratic chairman, had his home raided by state authorities last May. Recently, a New York State Supreme Court Justice was questioned by state and Federal government authorities based on information obtained by that raid. A grand jury is expected to be convened to follow up on both the Justice and others.

- NYC Mayor Bill de Blasio found out that the state Board of Elections found reasonable cause to go after a de Blasio political operation for possible coordination to hanky panky when it comes to donation limits in various New York state Senate races. Federal, city, and state district attorneys are investigating.

- New York Governor Andrew M. Cuomo is seeing some of his political associates being investigated by state authorities relative to a state financed and sponsored manufacturing complex relative to how state government contracts are awarded. Additionally, a former Cuomo staff aide is being investigated to see if he and his wife improperly got tens of thousands of dollars from an engineering firm involved in the complex. Others are also being investigated, both individuals and companies. The Federal government is also investigating.

- State Democratic Senator Marc C. Panepinto is under investigation by a state ethics agency for undisclosed reasons after four Senate staffers resigned late last year. Panepinto suddenly decided not to seek re-election even though he was busy raising election campaign funds.

Just another day of political corruption, this time in the state government halls of New York.

3) The WSVN television station in Palm Beach County, Florida recently reported on the supposedly largest food stamp bust in U.S. history. The bust occurred at a flea market in Hialeah, Florida. The raid followed a complaint by an individual citizen who was a victim of identity theft. 

Details of the scam included the following facts:

• 500 Palm Beach County, Florida residents had their identities stolen which were then turned around and used to get fake Electronic Benefit Transfer (EBT) “food stamp” cards.
• The cards were then exchanged for cash at the flea market.
• Federal criminal charges involving 22 retail stores or operators who were involved in the scam were arrested.
• The scam resulted in at least $13 million of taxpayer wealth being illegally obtained by those charged.

More waste and more government ineptness. At least these people got caught. How many other similar taxpayer ripoffs are going on in every other county across the country that has not been busted by law enforcement? You can bet the Palm Beach County is not the only site of massive EBT corruption and criminal activity.

4) Earlier this week we reported on a recent opinion poll that showed only 6% of Americans believe that the media and today’s journalists are telling the truth when they report. We stated that we believe that most media and news outlets and sources have picked which political “side” they are in favor of and then report and slant any news coverage to make their side look good and the other political side look bad. 

This hypothesis and the opinion poll results get a little more credible when you consider the inane statement two, not one, MSNBC newscasters recently said on TV. According to MSNBC’s Thomas Roberts and Tamron Hall, Bill Clinton’s many, many instances of extra marital affairs are just “alleged affairs” and “alleged misconduct.” “Alleged?” Come on, Monica Lewinsky, Jennifer Flowers, Paula Jones, Kathleen Willey, and many, many others were only “alleged?” 

If you are going to tell a lie or stretch the truth, at least work with material that has a potential for truth. Bill Clinton was a serial philanderer and adulter, no American with any sense of politics from the Clinton administration on forward knows that. Do not insult our intelligence and try to put forth a false narrative, that only makes you a modern day Pravda. 

That will do it for today’s insanity: still wasting taxpayer wealth on stupid projects, New York state politicians look to be more involved in getting indicted than governing, criminal fraud in government welfare programs proven again in Palm Beach county in Florida, and delusional MSNBC political commentators who somehow cannot face the reality that Bill Clinton has had a few extramarital affairs. More insanity tomorrow.

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:

Term Limits Now: http://www.howmuchworsecoulditget.com
http://www.reason.com
http://www.cato.org
http://www.bankruptingamerica.org
http://www.conventionofstates.com
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=08j0sYUOb5w

Part 3, August Political Class Insanity:Food Assistance Abuse Goes Jamaican, Gang Membership Up, Political Integrity Down, Buffalo Teachers Looking Good In Front Of Uneducated Students

We are now into our third post in this month’s series on political class insanity and lunacy. It is a very good bet that we will break the record, set just last month, for the most consecutive days needed to cover all of the stupidity that continuing come out of the mouths and actions of the American political class. The first of this month’s series can be accessed at:

http://loathemygovernment.blogspot.com/2013/08/part-1-august-2013-political-class.html

Unfortunately, for us, our freedom, and our nation, the rate of insanity and the depth of its idiocy is accelerating quickly, as the following episodes illustrate:

1) Food stamp usage is at an all time high. The number of Americans requiring government food assistance has increased about 50% since Obama took office. There are over twenty million Americans who are either unemployed or under employed. Times are rough in this country, just feeding the hungry.

Which makes the antics and stupidity from Louisiana state government officials all that more insane. State health inspectors destroyed 1,600 lbs of deer meat donated by hunters to a local homeless shelter. And this was not road kill type quality. The meat had been handled, prepared, and shipped to the shelter by a state accredited slaughterhouse.

Reverend Henry Martin, executive director of the Shreveport-Bossier Rescue Mission, which provides food and shelter for the homeless in Northwest Louisiana, said that his organization had been serving deer meat donated by area hunters for decades without any problems, complaints, sicknesses or deaths from the donated and properly prepared meats. The Louisiana chapter of Hunters for the Hungry, which is also endorsed and approved by the state government via the Louisiana Department of Agriculture and Forestry and the Department of Wildlife and Fisheries on its website, donated the meat through the area meat processing facility.

Apparently, there is a state law that prohibits the serving of hunted deer meat and apparently some state bureaucrat just realized that what has been going on for decades is against the law and shut down the food source, hungry state residents be damned. The state confiscated the perfectly good meat and saturated it with alcohol to make it inedible to both humans and wildlife.

According to Reverend Martin, his effort serves three meals a day to an average number of 230 people every day. This comes out to over 200,000 meals a year and this deer meat program was a major source of those meals for hungry Americans. Again, remember, no one got sick or died from this program over decades, it died because of stupid government run by stupid bureaucrats and stupid politicians. 

Rather than work with all of these parties involved, the rescue mission, the hunters, the slaughterhouse, and public health officials, nearly a ton of meat was simply destroyed and the hungry went hungry. You know we are in a bad place when unnecessary laws trump hungry Americans. Pathetic.

2) On July 22, 2013, press secretary Jay Carney went off on a bragging jag, boasting how the Obama administration had added 7.2 million private sector jobs to the economy since Obama took office. But according to research done by the Daily Caller website, he left out some other, less encouraging statistics:

• Since February of 2009, 9.5 million Americans, 2.3 million more Americans than the Obama administration found jobs for, have actually dropped out of the labor force. 
• This equates to  1.3 Americans having dropped out of the labor force for every one private sector job the administration claims to have created.
• There are 15 million more Americans on food stamps today than when Obama assumed office, more than double the number of private sector jobs that Mr. Carney claims to have been created under Obama.
• At the end of January, 2009, 32,204,859 Americans received food help via the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program but by April 2013, there were 47,548,694 Americans on food stamps.
• Under Obama, 1.6 million more Americans are collecting disability insurance. In February 2009, 9,334,369 Americans received disability payments. Today, that number is 10,953,733.

The insanity here is on Mr. Carney’s part where he attempts to glorify this Presidency without showing the whole, sad picture of the mismanagement of the economy by the political class and the Obama administration over the past five years.

3) The FBI recently released their latest crime statistics regarding gang violence and the findings are not good. According to FBI tracking, gang membership has increased since Obama’s election in 2008: “Some 33,000 violent street gangs, motorcycle gangs, and prison gangs with about 1.4 million members are criminally active in the U.S. today.” 

In 2008, the FBI stated, “Approximately 1 million gang members belonging to more than 20,000 gangs were criminally active within all 50 states and the District of Columbia as of September 2008.” This is a 65% increase in the number of gangs and a 40% increase in the number of gang members. The latest report also concluded that gangs are responsible for an average of 48% of violent crime in most jurisdictions, and up to 90%  in others.”

I am not a sociologist so my explanation for this radical increase in lawlessness would be pretty shallow. However, I would bet that our failing public schools, our failing economy, the failing level of integrity, smarts, and morals in our political class, and the inability of the politicians in this country to do anything right and efficient have a lot do to with these alarming gang statistics.

And worse of all, I do not see any positive trends on the horizon that would reverse the trends in schools, jobs, and the competence of the political class.

4) The New York Post reported on gross abuses of the Federal government’s food programs in a July 21, 2013 article. According to the Post, many New Yorkers who are receiving taxpayer funded food assistance via the Federal government are using that assistance to buy and ship food to relatives overseas in Jamaica, Haiti, and the Dominican Republic.

Welfare recipients buy groceries with their government Electronic Benefit Transfer (EBT) cards and then pack them in giant barrels for the trip overseas. The Post investigation found that the practice of using U.S. food assistance money to feed relatives and friends overseas is so prevalent and widespread that it  is common to find hundreds of 45- to 55-gallon cardboard and plastic barrels along the walls of supermarkets in almost every Caribbean corner of the city.

A Federal government official quoted in the article stated that this is an illegal practice, the food assistance program is for Americans who need food assistance, not foreigners. However, grocery employees also quote din the article confirm that this practice is well known and widespread.

So, let’s review. One part of the political class steps in to terminate a decades old food program involving healthy deer meat that has not harmed anyone and which has provided millions of meals over time. Another part of the political class is so inept that it results in American taxpayers funding the food needs of people overseas using a food program that is supposed to feed America’s hungry. Maybe, the political class and the governments it operates need to get out of the food business due to incompetence. Insanity.

5) I love this story from the Education Action Group (EAG) website. It beautifully illustrates how out of control the priorities are in this country when it comes to government operations of any kind, in this case, government operations of the public schools in Buffalo, New York.

According to EAG, a recent Open Record request they filed with the Buffalo school district revealed the school district actually increased its spending on cosmetic medical procedures for teacher union members in the past year, to the tune of $2.9 million  between June, 2012 and May, 2013. And that is up from $2.7 million during the 2011-12 school year.

That’s right, $2.9 million for skin peels, dental implants, tummy tucks, and any other plastic surgery teacher union members decide they want done, all funded by local taxpayers and the school board. By the way, this $2.9 million for totally non-education related expenses would have paid off almost 6% of the school district’s projected $51 billion deficit for the next school year, what would have been a nice start of getting education expense in line with revenue without impacting classroom resources.

Now, the Buffalo teacher’s union might have a case for such stupid expenses if the Buffalo school district was as shining example of how great public education and teachers unions’ performance can be. However, that is not the case:

• The district’s graduation rate actually went down in 2012 to 47%
• One high school had an astoundingly low 24% graduation rate.
• For the 2011-12 school year, only 25% of 8th graders were rated proficient or better in English Language Arts and only 24% of the same group were proficient in 
• Scores for the New York state Regents Test, an assessment required to receive a diploma, showed that only 21% of the students received an 85 or higher in English, only 3% of students scored 85 or higher in Algebra, and only 19% of students scored 85 or higher in U.S. History and Government.
• In the 2009-10 school year, Buffalo reported spending $23,907 per student to obtain these types of results, according to the National Center for Education Statistics.

Thus, in Buffalo, the student performance is ugly but the teachers look marvelous, certainly not the combination that a taxpayer or citizen wants out of their taxpayer funded schools.

That will do it for today, more disgraces from your politicians tomorrow. Bad use of food assistance dollars, bad news on the gang and crime front, bad economic data on jobs, bad priorities when it comes to feeding the needy in this country, and bad test and education results because of bad priority setting in Buffalo. Will the “badness” continue tomorrow? Tune in and find out if you dare.

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:

Term Limits Now: http://www.howmuchworsecoulditget.com
http://www.reason.com
http://www.cato.org
http://www.robertringer.com/
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=08j0sYUOb5w