January, 2017, Part 2, Political Class Insanity: Criminal Politicians, Out of Control Federal Spending, and Still Losing The War On Drugs

It is the beginning of another month which means it is again time to review the latest political class insanity from Washington and around the world. Political class insanity takes many forms including the wasting of taxpayer wealth, criminal fraud within government programs, inane and stupid political quotes and actions, the inability to create and implement effective and efficient government programs, stupid and ill performing economic policies and strategies, and other forms of insanity that continue to evolve and surprise and shock us. 

Today and for all of the insanity posts this month, let’s start off with a welcome piece of honest political dialog. It comes from a State Department spokesperson. Mark Toner, who is about to start the daily State Department press briefing. In a joking matter, he makes the following quote: "Welcome to the State Department. I think we have some interns in the back. Welcome. Good to see you in this exercise in transparency and democracy." 

He then burst out laughing at his own quote, indicating he also knew what a joke the Obama administration has been, especially Mr. Toner’s State Department, when it comes to cover ups, lack of transparency, denial of Freedom of Information Act requests, the prosecution of whistleblowers, etc. But at least it was a little refreshing to finally hear some actual honesty out of Washington as we see from the actual clip of the news conference:

http://www.againstcronycapitalism.org/2016/08/when-even-the-state-department-spokesperson-cant-keep-a-straight-face-about-things-anymore-video/

With that context of honesty, let’s see what other insanity has been going down:

1) Terence P. Jeffrey, writing for the CNS News website on December 12, 2016, showed how much Federal government spending was out of control:

• In the first two fiscal months of 2017, October and November, 2016, the Federal government collected a record $213,300,000,000 in individual income taxes.
• On average, this comes out to about $1,700 for every U.S. household in just two months.
• This two month total broke the previous record set in the first two fiscal months of last year.
• Despite this record setting collection of taxes from the American people, the Washington political class still managed to run up an amazing $180,843,000,000 spending deficit in the same two months.
• At this current deficit rate, the Washington political class will incur another TRILLION dollar worth of national debt this year. 

In other words, despite collecting more taxes than at any other time in the history of humanity, the politicians could still not run a balanced budget. Another trillion dollar deficit will place an additional debt burden of about $3,000 on every man,woman, and child in this country, piled on the current individual debt burden of over $60,000 for every man, woman, and child from the $20 TRILLION in national debt that the Washington political class has already incurred.

As this insanity proves, consistent with other spending insanity we have previously discussed, we do not have an under taxation problem in this country, we have an overspending Federal government problem in this country. HIghest tax collection rate in the history of the world and they still run a huge deficit. Pathetic.

2) An additional scary revenue/spending issue identified in the above article was the reality that while income tax collections hit an all time high in early fiscal 2017, Social Security and other payroll taxes totals actually declined in early fiscal 2017 vs. fiscal 2016. Social Security and other payroll taxes dropped from $165,746,890,000 in October-November of last year to $164,936,000,000 in October-November this year.

This is scary since we know that the Social Security expenses and costs will continue to get higher and higher every month as more and more Baby Boomers retire but it appears, at least in this time frame, that the revenues needed to pay these increasing costs are flat or declining a little. More proof that Social Security is heading towards a fiscal cliff unless serious and smart changes are made to the program, changes that were outlined in our book, ”Love My Country, Loathe My Government.”

Unfortunately, the word “smart” and the Washington political class are two concepts that rarely are mentioned in the same sentence or context.

3) An article in the Salt Lake Tribune,written by Tom Harvey and Jennifer Dobner on December 17, 2016, discussed a criminal investigation going on in Utah as it pertains to retiring U.S. Senator Harry Reid. Keep in mind, that Harry Reid is presumed innocent until proven guilty despite being the focus of a criminal investigation involving a potential kickback or bribe worth $2 million. According to the article:

• A $2 million cashier’s check was created at a St. , Utah bank on November 5, 2010.
• The check was then sent via FedEx to a lawyer in Los Angeles, a lawyer that was employed by Ireland-based Full Tilt Poker.
• The check was made out Mail Media LTD which was eventually deposited at Basler Kantonalbank in Switzerland where Mail Media LTD has an account.
• The article alleges that Mail Media LTD is a subsidiary that is owned by Full Tilt and that it is used to launder online gambling funds.
• From Switzerland, it appears the money went into a Marshall Islands account owned by Searchlight Holding Inc.
• And that is where Utah Davis County Attorney Troy Rawlings is trying to determine if that money eventually was used by Searchlight to benefit or bribe Senator Harry Reid.

In addition, documents obtained by investigative reporting by the Salt Lake Tribune, including state and Federal government court filings, public record requests, audio recordings and transcripts of interviews, emails, and other materials show that the Federal Department of Justice and the FBI failed to follow up in any way to see if Reid was the illegal recipient of the $2 million.

Even the Utah state attorney general has not turned over any funding that would help Rawlings determine once and for all, possibly via a grand jury, whether Reid is a dirty politician. Which has left Rawlings wondering who, if anyone, is telling the DOJ, the FBI, and others to stay clear of the case.

Of course, the FBI denies it is shirking its investigative responsibilities, according to FBI spokeswoman Sandra Yi Barker said, "At no time has the FBI or DPS been asked to back off of an investigation of any public official."

Rawlings provided some context for the FBI wavering in the article: "The FBI, via the Salt Lake City Field Office, was willing to investigate these allegations … wanted to actively engage. The Salt Lake office was taking steps to do so, but suddenly they were not."

Again, Mr. Reid is considered innocent until proven guilty. But given how the Obama administration has politicized and bastardized the DOJ and the FBI over the past eight years, it is not a stretch of the imagination for this administration to protect one of its own relative to self enrichment. That is the way of Washington where the rich get richer and we continue to pay record high taxes.

3) Let’s stay with the theme of crooked politicians for this next discussion where we have a politician that was actually proven guilty. According to Charlie Hoffman, writing for the Washington Free Beacon on December 12, 2016:

• Former Congressman Chaka Fattah was sentenced to ten years in prison in mid-December.
• He was found guilty of a number of Federal charges including corruption, fraud, racketeering, and money laundering.
• In total he was convicted on 23 charges for which the prosecutors wanted a sentence of 17 to 22 years in prison.
• Some of the charges including illegally taking a $1 million campaign contribution when he was running to become the mayor of Philadelphia, using campaign funds to pay off his son’s college debt, funneling money through a fake non profit organization, and taking $27,000 in bribes from a fundraiser.
• His ten year prison term is the second longest for any member of Congress convicted of corruption charges.

Just another in a long line of Washington politicians where self interest and self enrichment are their primary functions as opposed to serving those that elected them. And remember, Harry Reid is innocent until proven guilty.

4) While many Washington politicians are greedy and criminal, Mexican drug cartels have to at least be given credit for creativity and originality in their pursuit of profit. According to the MRCTV website’s Brittany Hughes, writing on December 12, 2016:

• Mexican drug cartel smugglers are using air cannons to launch shipments of marijuana into the U.S.
• Unfortunately, one of those packages was picked up by a couple of American teenagers that happened to be in the area who were subsequently picked up by U.S.Border Patrol agents.
• And this was not a couple of ounces, the projectile of grass weighed in at 34 pounds.

Never underestimate the creativity of a criminal when there is profit to be made regardless of whether or not that action is legal. Consider some other inventive ways that have been thwarted by the Border Patrol when it comes to smuggling illegal drugs into this country:

• In mid-December, the Border Patrol arrested a 23 year old Mexican after they found him trying to sneak a whopping five tons of grass into the country, street value over $5 million, via a shipment of vacuum pumps.
• That same day the Border Patrol agents found $370,000 worth of grass inside a horse trailer.
• They recently found 190 pounds of weed inside a Mazda, $80,000 worth of cocaine inside an SUV, 36 pounds of meth in a Toyota, 16 pounds of meth in a Honda, half a million dollars worth of cocaine in a Dodge truck, and 17 pounds of heroin in freezer bags in toy boxes in a car coming over the border.
• This should not be a surprise since in 2015, the Border Patrol seized, on average, 9,500 pounds of illegal drugs every DAY.
• In other words, almost five tons of illegal drugs were intercepted every day throughout the year.
• Border Patrol agent with the Grande Valley Sector of the the U.S.Mexican border testified for Congress that the Border Patrol nabs a pretty low percentage of drugs coming across the border, meaning that if almost five tons a day were being intercepted, many, many more tons were getting through to the streets of America.

We go over these numbers to prove once again what a failure that the Federal government’s “war on drugs” has been. Forty plus years and at least a trillion dollars later, the drug cartels and criminals are still smuggling tons of illegal drugs into this country every DAY, resulting in the deaths of upwards of 50,000 Americans every year. 

It is time to stop the war on drugs and start the war on treatment and prevention. What the Federal government has done over and over with failure at each turn reinforces an old Einstein quote: "The definition of insanity is doing the same thing over and over and expecting different results.” The failed war on drugs and the politicians who continue to support it prove Einstein right every day down on the Mexican and U.S. border.

That will do it for today’s insanity: a failed war on drugs, a convicted criminal politician, a potential criminal politician, and still spending more money than they are getting in Washington. 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:


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

July, 2016, Part 8, Political Class Insanity: Cronyism, Corruption, and Radical Islamic Terrorism

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 continue with the latest insanity from today’s American politicians one day earlier than we usually do:

1) Joe Schoffstall, writing for the Washington Free Beacon on June 17, 2016, talked about how the Cause For Action Institute out of D.C. submitted a Freedom of Information Act request to investigate how millions of taxpayer dollars were awarded by the Federal Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (CFPB) to a prefered Democratic political vendor who used to work for Obama’s political campaigns and who now works for Hillary Clinton’s campaign.

The vendor, GMMB INC., was contracted to create online advertisements for the CFPB. Which on the surface seems a little fishy since we are talking about simple online advertisements.We are not talking about big theatrical productions, we are talking about online ads. Difficult to believe that millions of dollars ($14.4 million to be exact) are needed for such a relatively simple need. 

Cause For Action president, Alfred J. Lechner, wrote in the FOIA application: “CFPB is a federal agency engaged, as part of its consumer protection responsibilities, in substantial consumer information collection activities. Given GMMB’s partisan political clients, CoA Institute is concerned about the nature of and safeguards applied to any CFPB information supplied to or received from GMMB.”

According to USASpending.gov, which tracks Federal contracts awarded to organizations, GMMB has already received nearly $40 million in government contracts since 2008 from various Federal agencies. Do we think there is some political patronage going on to the tune of tens of millions of dollars?

2) Amber Phillips, writing for the Washington Post on July 8, 2016, described how U.S.Congresswoman Corrine Brown has been indicted on multiple counts of corruption and other charges including having and operating a personal slush fund. The charges allege that Brown and her chief of staff set up a fake nonprofit organization that they then used for their own personal uses.

Details of the charges include the following details:

• The indictment includes 24 charges.
• She and her chief of staff allegedly raised $800,000 for a college scholarship fund based in Virginia.
• They then used the money on personal needs for themselves.
• These needs included luxury boxes for concerts and football games while the nonprofit handed out only two college scholarships worth only $1,200.
• The head of the nonprofit has already pleaded guilty in the scam.
• Justice Department Assistant Attorney General Leslie Caldwell said in a statement that Brown and her top aide used the nonprofit "as a personal slush fund."
• The charges include mail and wire fraud, conspiracy obstruction and filing false tax returns.

This is the second Democratic Congressperson and Hillary Clinton super delegate that has been in the news for illegal financial activities. Another Congressman, Chaka Fattah, was recently sentenced to jail for his nefarious ways. Looks like a peer of Congress might be joining him soon in prison. Are we seeing a trend here?

3) Both Obama and his Attorney General, Loretta Lynch, have issued multiple public statements that we should be more understanding of radical islamic terrorists and their vicious brand of terrorism, we need to give them and the problems they cause more “love,” in Lynch’s words. We need to realize that Islam is a religion or peace.

Well, as always when it comes to the Obama administration, what they say and the reality of our times is usually a major disconnect. In the the past month of the Islamic celebration of Ramadan, worldwide there were 238 fatal radical Islamic terrorist attacks that happened across 32 countries that killed over 1,800 Christians, Jews, Hindus, homosexuals, and others. 

In that same day period, there were no reports of other religions or their followers instituting a single terrorist attack. This comes out to about 60 innocent people being killed every day during the month of celebration.

The Nation Of Peace website tracks these terrorist attacks and recently compiled a list of radical Islamic atrocities from one five day period during the past month:

• Four people stoned to death for committing adultery,
• Six killed by a suicide car bomber,
• ISIS RPG kills over 24 civilians,
• Motorcycle bomb kills 10 people at a market,
• Suicide bomber kills 14 people riding a bus,
• Bombing and assassination kills 8 people.

In the last few days of Ramadan, radical Islamic terrorists:

• ISIS boiled alive seven people in Iraq.
• A suicide bomber killed 4 guards outside of a mosque in Saudi Arabia.
• A suicide bomber killed 30 outside of a Shiite bakery in Syria.
• ISIS captures 40 civilians, including women and children, and “mercilessly executes” them in Syria.
• A Shahid suicide bomber kills four family members in Afghanistan.
• 3 killed by Islamic bomb and shooting attack in Bangladesh.
• 22 killed at a Dhaka Bakery in Bangladesh.

I list these atrocities not to condemn an entire religion, these are obviously nutcases using Islam as a cover and justification for being barbarians. However, until our leadership, starting with Lynch and Obama 1) finally recognize that we are dealing with RADICAL Islamic terrorists, not normal Islamic worshippers and followers, 2) realize that barbarians are not going to respond to any amount of love we show them, the quicker we will rid the world of this evil. 

As with most politicians facing any crisis, their continual failure to recognize and identify the root causes of the problem usually means they will never resolve that problem, whether it is Obama Care or radical Islamic terrorism.

That will do it for today’s insanity: There is such a thing as radical Islamic terrorism, just ask the over 1,800 that were killed by it last month, another Congressional politician bites the proverbial corruption bullet and is likely headed to jail, and more crony capitalism on the part of Democrats and their financial backers. 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:

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

Our Political Leaders Today: Corrupt, Convicted, Inept, Ignorant, and Elitist

We have often discussed the reality that today’s American politicians do and say the darndest things. In fact, if you enter “darndest things” in the search box above, you will get a list of the dozens and dozens of times that today’s politicians embarrassed themselves, us, and the country as a whole.

Today, we will update some of their hijinx, quotes, and law breaking with a wide range of ways that the political class continues to fail us every day of every year. 

1) Kelly Cohen, writing on June 21, 2016 for the Washington Examiner, starts us off today with the recent news that Congressman Chaka Fattah was found guilty in his recent corruption trial. Details of his crimes include the following:

• He was found guilty of ALL of the Federal corruption charges that were brought forth on him.
• These charges included bribery, racketeering, conspiracy, money laundering and bank fraud stemming from efforts to repay an illegal $1 million campaign loan.
• Three of his political cronies, including his once chief of staff, were also convicted under the racketeering RICO Act.
• Two political consultants of the Congressman previously pled guilty to the charges.
• The Federal prosecutors argued that Fattah used Federal grant money and charitable donations to pay back the illegal campaign loan.
• Fattah once sat on the powerful House of Representatives Appropriations Committee.

This guy was earning over $174,000 a year, more than three times what the average American household earns, and he still could not keep his nose clean. So now, rather than continuing to get wealthy on the taxpayers’ back, he will now be in jail on the same taxpayers back. This is the quality of many people currently serving in the political class. At least this one got caught.

P.S.: Fattah’s son, Chaka “Chip” Fattah, was found guilty in 2015 of 22 counts of defrauding a school district and is now serving five years in prison.

2) But it is not only politicians that go to jail for getting greedy. According to Kosar, writing for the Political Insider website, the former head of the Veterans Administration in the Cleveland area was found guilty recently and will be going off to prison also:

• William Montague once was the head of the Louis Stokes Cleveland VA Medical Center.
• He was recently sentenced after pleading guilty two years ago to 64 corruption related accusations.
• Specifically, he pled guilty to defrauding the VA via bribery and kickback arrangements where he got thousands of kickback dollars from contractors.
• Apparently, he handed over insider information to outside contractors that helped them win large VA contracts for which they gave him thousands of dollars.
• He was part of an FBI investigation that involved over 60 government employees and executives and outside contractors, all of whom were involved in a so-called “pay-to-play” setup.

Maybe he and former Congressman Fattah can share a cell somewhere in a Federal prison.

3) But it is not just Federal employees and politicians that are corrupt, criminal, and greedy. According to Brent Scher, writing for the Washington Free Beacon on June 20, 2016, New York City and its mayor, Bill de Blasio, have found themselves deep into a government corruption investigation:

• The New York Post recently reported that Federal authorities arrested a bunch of New York City folks linked to de Blasio’s fund raising operations when he successfully ran for mayor of New York City.
• The arrests included four, high ranking NYPD police officers and a Jeremey Reichberg, a friend and political operative of de Blasio, who allegedly gave high ranking police officers expensive, lavish gifts.
• These gifts were allegedly in return for having police serve on security details and police escorts.
• Jona Rechnitz, a New York businessman who also allegedly gave gifts to high ranking NYPD officials, has already pleaded guilty to corruption charges and is cooperating with the investigators.
• Federal authorities are still “probing into the mayor’s fundraising practices and some of his closest confidantes in an effort to find out if favors, contracts, or positions were offered for campaign donations,” according to the New York Post report.

As you can see, political corruption in this country extends from local to national corruption.

4) But those in the political class also do and say just plain stupid stuff that does not cross the line of being illegal. Take the recent screw up and follow up quote form Loretta Lynch and the Justice Department and FBI. As everyone knows, a Florida resident recently invaded and committed the heinous terrorist act of shooting up an Orlando nightclub, killing and wounding dozens of innocent Americans.

News reports indicated that his wife was heavily involved since she may have helped him case out other targets and pleaded with him not to do the attack even though she never reported the planned attack to authorities. Thus, she is a pretty important person in the investigation, either as a possible co-conspirator or as a material witness. You would have hoped that the FBI and Federal government would have kept her in custody or at least under surveillance given how close she was to the whole terrorist attack.

But as with most aspects of dealing with the political class and the government functions they oversee, hope is usually dashed by ineptness. When asked where the wife of the terrorist shooter was, Ms. Lynch had this wonderful comment: “Right now I do not know exactly the answer to that, I believe she was going to travel but I do not know exactly her location now.” Unbelievable. 

The worst mass shooting in the history of the country and the most critical witness to the whole planning of the operation has been lost by the Federal government. For all we know, she has snuck out of the country already, especially if this terrorist operation was orchestrated from afar and was not a lone wolf attack. All the chief law enforcement officer in the entire country can basically say is, “we lost her.” Certainly a memorable quote for Ms. Lynch’s legacy but not a good one.

5) In any argument in any area of life, one would hope that both sides of the argument are dealing with basic truths and knowledge. Opinions can certainly differ but to have a mature and constructive conversation and follow up action plan, both sides should agree on basic realities of life. For example, if the two sides in an argument cannot agree that two plus two is four, any discussion of higher level math and statistics is futile.

Which brings us to a recent inane quote from President Obama. Obviously, Obama would like to shred the Second Amendment if he could. Since the Constitution prevents him from doing that outright, he and other liberals nibble around the edges of the Second Amendment, trying to restrict gun possession and usage as much as possible. That is obviously their right to do but they should at least know the two plus two of guns. Otherwise, they show their ignorance of the subject and ignorance never leads to constructive debate and arguments.

Consider a recent Obama gun control quote where he undermines his entire credibility to have an intelligent debate on gun control Referring to the recent terrorist shooter at the Orlando nightclub, Obama recently said that the shooter had “a Glock, which had a lot of clips in it.” Why is this Obama’s two plus two equals three moment? Consider:

• A Glock does not use clips, it uses magazines.
• Every handgun in the world can only hold on magazine at a time.
• Thus, the Orlando shooter’s gun could not possibly hold multiple clips at the same time.

Consider the following education on what a clip is and what a magazine is from www.gunsandammo.com:

Clip vs. Magazine

You know that boxy rectangular thingy that holds cartridges and slides into the bottom of your semi-auto pistol? It’s not a clip — no matter how often the term is misused. It’s a magazine.

A magazine holds shells under spring pressure in preparation for feeding into the firearm’s chamber. Examples include box, tubular, drum and rotary magazines. Some are fixed to the firearm while others are removable.

A cartridge “clip” has no spring and does not feed shells directly into the chamber. Rather, clips hold cartridges in the correct sequence for “charging” a specific firearm’s magazine. Stripper clips allow rounds to be “stripped” into the magazine. Other types are fed along with the shells into the magazine — the M1 Garand famously operates in this fashion. Once all rounds have been fired, the clip is ejected or otherwise released from the firearm.

In essence, clips feed magazines. Magazines feed firearms.

Difficult to have an intelligent conversation about gun control with anyone, including the President, when that person is so ignorant of what they are arguing about.

6) Last inane quote for today comes from a sitting U.S. Congressman. Charles Rangel has been in Congress for a long time. We have discussed some of his inane and stupid quotes many times in this blog. But his latest one is a real doozy. 

When recently asked if his constituents should be able to legally obtain a gun more easily in New York City which has notoriously difficult processes for law abiding citizens to get a legal firearm, Rangel said: “I’m glad to you say that very few people can get it. We don’t need that many guns … Overall if it’s difficult to get a concealed weapon permit, I’m glad to hear that.”

When the reporter pointed out to Rangel that his personal safety as a Congressman was guaranteed by the armed security and police that protect him and his peers, he flippantly replied: “Well, that’s a little different. I think we deserve, I think we need to be protected down here.” So he “deserves” to be protected, despite the crappy job that he and his Congressional peers do, but he is glad to hear that regular Americans have a hard time get their own protection. Nothing says elitism like my life is more important than yours.

There you have it, a quick snapshot of the political class today: corrupt, convicted, inept, ignorant, and elitist. That is who is leading the country today. Feeling confident about the future?

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

August, 2015, Part 7, Political Class Insanity: A Dead Lion Gets More Sympathy than 238,000 Dead Veterans, Massive Corruption In Philly, and Gas At $29 A Gallon

At the beginning of each month we take a week or so to review the latest insanity from the American political class. Insanity from them includes a wide range of very depressing actions which can include wasteful spending, idiotic quotes, an inefficient and ineffective government bureaucracy, failed economic policies, etc. Every month we continue to prove that we are being served by the worst set of politicians ever.

And as you will see, this month’s review and discussions do nothing to prove that this thesis is wrong in any way:

1) Despite Obama often promising to fix the broken Veterans Administration (VA) entity, a Federal government agency that paid its executives sky high salaries and bonuses while allowing the medical treatment of veterans to seriously deteriorate, apparently the problem has not gotten any better. According to a recent Huffington Post report:

• A VA report that the Huffington Post got hold of estimated that 238,657 veterans out of 847,822 pending applications for VA medical care have died waiting for medical treatment they never got.
• This is a failure rate of 28%.
• These numbers come from an April, 2015 report called, “Analysis of Death Services.”
• Even worse beyond this high fatality rate is that the VA has no idea what happened to account for the 238,657 deaths since: some of these veterans may have died many years ago but never got purged out of the system, some of these veterans may have gotten treatment via other sources such as Medicare, or never completed the application process since they got well or died. 
• Thus, the VA has a problem that they cannot even define.

A government failure that the government entity cannot even measure, understand, or obviously resolve.

2) Let’s continue with the disgraceful Veterans Administration situation and more failed government priorities. Twenty eight percent of veterans who applied for medical care via the VA may have died before they received that requested medical care.

However, when a single lion called Cecil gets killed in a legal animal hunt halfway around the world in Zimbabwe, Africa, the Obama administration somehow has enough resources to investigate the killing of that lion. That’s right, the death of a single lion gets immediate attention from this administration but 28% of veterans die before they get attention.

The director of the US Fish and Wildlife, Dan Ashe, tweeted out the news last week that his government agency would be investigating the whole shooting incident….of a single lion half way around the world. Now, I understand that many people are upset about the death of Cecil. I was so upset that I actually sent a check to the Wildlife Conservation Network at 209 Mississippi Street in San Francisco, California 94107. 

But it was a single lion, why do we as a nation mourn a single lion killed in a single hunting incident but we ignore the possibly preventable deaths of hundreds of thousands of veterans? That certainly seems to be the case with this administration and the current set of government bureaucrats.

3) Congressman Chaka Fattah is an eleven term Congressman from Philadelphia. He was one of several politicians who, along with Congressman Jesse Jackson, Jr., tried to get George W. Bush impeached for what they considered crimes against the country. But according to news reports, guess who is now being accused of committing crimes:

• Fattah was recently indicted on more than a dozen Federal criminal charges.
• In total, he and four associates received 29 Federal indictments including bribery, money laundering, falsifying records, bank fraud and other charges.
• Specifically, Fattah got 16 of those charges including conspiracy, mail fraud, falsifying records, bank fraud, and five other charges which in total could add up to over 100 years in jail.

Although we should consider him innocent until proven guilty, the fact that Fattah is a long term Democrat, he was recently photographed giving a hug to Valerie Jarrett, Obama’s top advisor, and recently traveled with the President on the President’s trip to Philadelphia, all indicate that the Justice Department had such a strong case that even Fattah’s political friends could not prevent him from getting indicted.

Oh, by the way, Fattah’s former cohort in trying to impeach Bush, Jesse Jackson, Jr, is already in jail for his criminal ways. Politicians and criminals, often a very thin line or a blurred line between the two.

4) No one in the Federal government can waste taxpayer wealth like the Department of Defense. In fact, the all time most read post in this blog talked about how the U.S.Navy spent $300 million to build two Navy ships almost to completion only to pay another $10 million to turn them into scrap metal before they were ever used.

Well, according to a recent article in the Washington Free Beacon that reported on a recent Government Accountability Office (GAO) study, the Department is up to its old wasteful ways again, this time relative to alternative fuel purchases. The Department of Defense paid $58.6 million for “alternative fuel” supplies for its operations from 2007 to 2014. This comes out to an obscene per gallon cost of $29 per gallon. Over the same time period, the cost of regular, petroleum based fuel was about one ninth the cost, about $3.35 a gallon.

Now, I understand the need to test different types of fuel for future use. If the flow of petroleum from the Middle East is cut off due to war or other conflicts or at some point in the distant future we actually start running out of petroleum, it is good to have a contingency plan in place. But I am sure you can test the viability of alternative fuels without buying 2 million gallons of the stuff at a rate of $29 a gallon. 

And this money is being wasted at a time when veterans cannot get the medical care they need, armed forces recruiters in country cannot get adequate protection from domestic based terrorists, and the national debt continues to explode.

That will do it for today’s insanity and this month’s insanity from the political class. As always, you often cannot make the many, many ways that today’s politicians screw things up and in the process screw up our lives, our futures, and our financial well being. And unfortunately, at this time next month we will be back with the next thirty days of insanity, ineptness, and idiocy from those that are in office through the country and the world. 

Until then, consider going to the following website and join the movement to at least put term limits on those in office today because really, how much worse could it be if we just replaced every current politician in office with a whole new set of people:

www.howmuchworsecoulditget.com

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