Love My Country, Loathe My Government: corrine brown

Showing posts with label corrine brown. Show all posts

Sunday, December 10, 2017

December, 2017, Part 1, Political Class Insanity: A Congresswoman Goes to Prison, Baltimore Homicides Soars, and a Senator Howls With Ignorance

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.

1) We have previously discussed the reality that a former Congresswoman, Corrine Brown, had first been arrested and then prosecuted for defrauding a charity that she and others had set up. Now we know what punishment she faces, according to the Liberty Headlines website:

She was recently sentenced to a five year federal prison for various fraud and tax crimes.
This included raising hundreds of thousands of dollars for a sham charity she had established.
Her long time former chief of staff when she was in Congress, Ronnie Simmons, got 48 months in prison for her actions and the former head of the sham charity, Carla Wiley got a 21 month sentence.The judge chastised the three of them for stealing money from a charity that was set up to supposedly help kids and spent on themselves and their lavish lifestyles: “This was a crime born out of entitlement and greed committed to ensure a lifestyle that was beyond their means. Just think of the good that could have been done with that money if it would have been used for its intended purpose.”
The former Congresswoman will start serving her five years beginning on January 8, 2018.

Another example of the types of people that now populate our political class, classless, greedy, and totally out of integrity.

2) We have often talked how politicians in Chicago, Chicago’s county, and Chicago’s state have put forth some of the toughest gun control laws in the country and every year seem to set records for gun violence and murder by guns, most of which were illegally obtained and used despite the tough gun control laws in place. These politicians at the city county, and state level keep tighten gun laws, denying law abiding citizens the right to defend themselves, while never addressing the underlying root causes of gun violence and use.

But according to another recent article on the Liberty Headlines website, Baltimore, another city and state with ever restrictive gun control laws, is suffering the same fate of Chicago, the continual shredding of the Second Amendment without any discernible decrease in the city’s violent culture and underlying problems:

As of early December, 319 people had been violently killed in the city of Baltimore.
With a month to go in 2017, the city has now had more homicides this year, 318, vs. the 317 that occurred in all of 2016.
The annual Baltimore record for homicides occurred in 2015 when 344 homicides were reported which means that the all time record could be broken if 27 more homicides occur in December.
The city has become so dangerous that it is now reported that school trips to the city have been cancelled since it is now deemed to dangerous to enter the city.

Another case where politicians have no idea how to resolve the underlying root causes of violence and crime in the city and continue to enact and enforce useless gun control laws as the Baltimore record for annual homicides continues to be threatened in 2017.

3) One of the most inane and most stupid politician statement ever issued was done by Nancy Pelosi when she was Speaker of The House back during the early days of the Obama administration. That was the time when Obama and Congressional Democrats were trying to pass Obama Care, a piece of legislation that has turned out to be a complete failure as we have reported every month in this blog.

Pelosi made the public statement that the Obama Care legislation had to be enacted so that we, the country, could see what is in it. In other words, as Speaker of the House, she had no idea what was involved with the proposed legislation and would not know what was in it until it had been passed. You cannot make up this idiocy. What else do Washington politicians have to do but write, debate, READ, and enact laws? Pathetic.

But this statement of idiocy may have been recently challenged by Senator Elizabeth Warren. Ms. Warren recently harshly criticized the tax reform legislation that Congressional Republicans are close to passing:

According to Mike MIller, writing for the Independent Journal Review on December 2, 2017, the Senator stated that the legislation was,“Tax cuts for the rich, tax hikes for the middle class.”
She also called the legislation a “GOP tax scam.”
Seems like she has some strong objections and opinions on what is in the legislation.
But here is the idiocy, she admitted on Twitter that she had not read the legislation: “No, I haven’t had time to read the 500-page #GOPTaxScam bill that we’re voting on tonight. I couldn’t read it if I tried – and I did.”

Fabulous, here we have an important Senator spouting off about an important issue for all Americans and she has not even read the document she is bellowing about. Hell of a why to operate a government.

And even worse than this insanity, according to the Heritage Foundation there is a real good chance she is completely wrong about this begin a scam, hurting middle class and helping the rich. Rachel Greszler, writing for the Heritage Foundation on December 6, 2017, obviously had better data and more common sense than Warren since she wrote about a detailed financial analysis on how five different prototypical senior families would be treated by the GOP tax reform.

These five scenarios looked at five different family and income configurations and computed what the tax burden change would be under the GOP tax reform legislation that Warren never read. In two of those scenarios, the family would see no change in their tax burden, in two scenarios the family would see a good decrease in their tax burden and in one scenario, there would be a substantial rise in the family’s tax burden.

And guess which family would an increase in their tax burden Senator Warren. It was the hypothetical family earning a million dollars a year. Those in the lower and middle class families would see no change in their tx burden or a decrease in their tax burden, the exact opposite of what you howled about. And the Heritage Foundation analysis actually read and analyzed the legislation, something you seemed to deem not important before erroneously going berserk.

To see the detailed analysis that came to the above conclusions, go to:

http://dailysignal.com/2017/12/06/retirees-save-money-tax-reform-key-examples/?utm_source=TDS_Email&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=MorningBell%22&mkt_tok=eyJpIjoiTldRM01XWTNZelZoTUdaaCIsInQiOiJaQ2c1RUZFcUJmS21zMDlxdCs0SEwxVlVZSEh1NjV4TWp1a2VIbHZldGZcL1l4anN4em1pQTFLRWJiZm5OQ1NPSjBsYUFSckp0RGlcL1NrU0FHUHJqTkNsazVQSHVpdXZCTEJpNHJyWEdYc2wyR3BjSllCK2VQdlFUUlFTazE0RXcrIn0%3D

To see the detailed analysis that Warren used in her analysis go to her Twitter feed.

That will do it for today’s insanity, a good start for this month: a Senator that has no idea what she is yelling about, a former Congresswoman going to prison for despicable, selfish behavior, and more policy and politician failures in Baltimore with fatal results. More insanity to follow.

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

Tuesday, August 8, 2017

August, 2017, Part 6, Political Class Insanity: The Silent But Deadly Democratic Scandals

1) I do not think many would would deny that we have been served recently by the worst set of politicians possibly in the history of the country. They are ineffective, greedy, lazy, and unable to resolve any major issue facing the country. They are also scandal plagued in so many ways, 19 of which John Nolte listed out in a recent Daily Wire article in which he gave credit for most of them to Michael Sainto of the Observer:

Debbie Wasserman Schultz/Shady Pakistani IT Consultant Scandal - The Congresswoman employed a guy, Imran Awan, as a computer systems expert who was arrested recently just before leaving the country for Pakistan for potential banking crimes. But the scandal possibly goes much further than financial crimes in that Awan and his relatives had access to dozens of computers and devices owned and used by Democratic members of Congress and the information on those devices may have been compromised. Wasserman Schultz did not help the situation when she obstructed justice by refusing to cooperate with Capital police in their investigation of the matter, leading credence to the possibility that there was a massive security breach and she is trying to cover it up. The fact that smashed computer drives were found at the Aman home adds to the scandal.
Two former Pennsylvania Democratic mayors have been indicted after being investigated by the FBI. They are charged with accepting illegal gifts in return for political favors.
Democratic Congressman Robert Brady is being investigated by the FBI for possibly paying a political challenger $90,000 to drop out of the Democratic Party primary he was running in.
Six months ago, Democratic Congressman Chaka Fattah began serving a 10 year prison sentence for racketeering.
Current Seattle mayor Ed Murray terminated his campaign for a second term after long time allegations of child abuse came into the public eye.
Although the Democratic National Committee (DNC) sneakily sabotaged Bernie Sanders run to be the Democratic Party nominee for President last year, that scandal has new legs as a result of a current class action suit.
And the DNC has other legal problem in that it is also being sued for not paying the wages of campaign workers from last year.
Corrine Brown, a former Florida Democratic Congresswoman, has been convicted of stealing money from a charity she created and using the stolen funds for her own personal use.
A billionaire Democratic Party supporter stole the party’s chairmanship position.
Current Democratic Senator Bob Menendez will go on trial and face bribery charges.
Chicago Democratic Mayor Rahm Emanuel not only hid videotape of a police shooting in 2015, his biggest union supporter was recently indicted for extortion.
A former Democratic state government Assembly Speaker is on trial for corruption.
Staying in that criminal haven known as New York, a number of the current governor’s aides have been indicted for numerous corruption charges.
More in New York: the Governor himself has been accused of diverting emergency government funds and resources to his own pet projects.
Former Democratic Congressman, Anthony Weiner, pleaded guilty to sexting to a 15 year old girl and has to register as a sex offender.
Over 300 votes cast in a local California Democratic Party election turned out to be frauds, according to an official review board, which will likely lead to a lawsuit since the final election was decided by only 62 votes.
California Governor Jerry Brown’s political campaign was found guilty of money laundering, was fined $3,500, and given a warning letter.
In a massively illegal move, “In order to wiretap Trump and his campaign, the Obama Administration wiretapped foreign officials and then unmasked the names of the Trump officials they spoke with, something that is highly unethical and almost certainly illegal. Using national security to a political end is simply beyond the beyond. Moreover, much of this highly classified information was then leaked to a willing media, also for partisan political purposes.”
And finally, as the Democrats in Washington constantly are trying to prove that Trump is a Russian dupe and colluder, it turns out that a main driver of their effort, the infamous “Trumpo Dossier” was indeed “fake news” and put together by a group called Fusion GPS, a firm that has done business with Russia in the past and who may have created the fake dossier at the behest of the Russian government.

Nice people, these Democrats, who unfortunately, are usually protected by the mainstream media which try their hardest to bury, ignore or trivialize these crimes and unethical behaviors.

2) Senator Mark Warner is a long time U.S. Senator, he is very rich, and he has been a Democratic leader in trying to implicate Russia and Donald Trump as co-conspirators in stealing the election.

But it seems the hard core, anti-Trump Senator has his only Russia explaining to do. Apparently, he made a whopping $6 million from investing in a Russian search and technology company back in 2012, Yandex. According to the GotNews website, this $6 million profit is about equivalent to 10% of the good Senator’s net worth. These numbers have been found to be in line with reporting by the Christian Science Monitor, a more mainstream news outlet.

Maybe the good Senator should investigate himself first before trying to find that elusive Russian/Trump connection.

This will do it for today’s and this month’s political class insanity. Greedy politicians, inept politicians, crooked politicians, hypocritical politicians, not a good one among the whole lot. More insanity next month.

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:

Friday, February 17, 2017

Four Examples of Why The Washington Swamp Must Be Drained

Today’s stories we typically save for our monthly “political class insanity” series but they all kind of grouped together today so we decided not to wait for next month’s insanity review. Despite spending almost $4 TRILLION a year, the Washington political class runs a pretty shabby show when it comes to the efficiency and effectiveness of government operations. If we had spent a lot of our own money on a new car or a house or even a movie ticket and experienced such insanity and wastefulness, we would be clamoring for a refund. Why we do not do clamor for a refund on our taxes, given the following wastes of our resources and wealth, is a mystery to me:

1)Phoenix Brooks, writing for the Daily Caller website recently, reported on some massive ineptness on the part of the Secret Service organization:

According to her reporting, based on an investigation by Judicial Watch, the Secret Service has lost thousands and thousands of sensitive and expensive “assets” within their jurisdiction over the past 15 years.
The total number of assets lost or stolen comes out to 11,780.
These assets include 121 weapons, 736 cell phones, 571 Secret Service badges, and six cars during those 15 years.
Over 1,362 assets, more than 10% of the total, were lost in a single year, 2004.
As a further insult to incompetence, the Secret Service organization took almost a year to respond to the Freedom of Information Act request by Judicial Watch, which in a press release stated the obvious: “This is supposedly an elite law enforcement agency — how did all this equipment get stolen?” or lost. “This is alarming. Every American should be alarmed about this,” Judicial Watch’s Irene Garcia told The Daily Caller News Foundation.

How does a supposedly elite Federal government agency lose six cars? And most distressing is the lost of hundreds of Secret Service badges that if they fell into the wrong hands, would give criminals and terrorists access to important government buildings and personnel. Insanely pathetic.

2)The TSA is supposed to be our last defense against terrorist activity as it pertains to mass transportation. They should be always on the watch and on high alert to look for anything or anyone who might endanger a traveling American. But apparently some of these TSA employees had other things to do while “protecting" the traveling public, according to recent police reports:

A dozen TSA employees are each facing ten years in jail for using their jobs to participate in and cover up a massive drug smuggling ring.
They allegedly smuggled $100 million worth of cocaine into the country from their jobs spread across the U.S. and Puerto Rico.
These employees had job titles that including baggage screeners and security personnel, you know, the kind of people that should have been protecting you and not smuggling drugs.
Law enforcement says that as much as 20 TONS of cocaine may have been smuggled into the country by these folks over an 18 year period.
According to news reports, up to five smugglers were used in each airline flight, each carrying as much as 33 pounds of cocaine on each flight, with their security check-in process cleared by those in the smuggling ring.

We pay billions and billions of dollars every year for the TSA to “protect” us but it took them 18 years and 20 TONS of cocaine to finally realize what was going on. Again, pathetic management and use of taxpayer money.

3)There are very few people I respect in the Washington political class but one who I do respect, and one who gets it, is Congressman Trey Gowdy of South Carolina. Unfortunately, he is often a lone wolf crying out in the night against government's wasteful spending and stupidity. It is a shame we do not have five hundred more like him in Congress, people that would actually look out for the wealth and welfare of the American taxpayer. If this dream world existed, all of us would be paying far less in taxes and be enjoying a far more effective and efficient government.

He showed his disgust with how government bureaucracies and operations work in a Congressional hearing that is captured in the video linked below. His tirade was directed towards Federal GSA executives who had abused taxpayer funds on a conference in Las Vegas and committed all kinds of ethical and potentially criminal violations in the course of planning and executing a conference halfway across the country when most of the attendees were stationed in DC. What particularly irked him for the following wastes of money:

$44 dollar breakfasts for attendees.
$7 for mini-Monte Cristo sandwiches.
$800,000 for the conference itself.
The hiring of a mind reader to provide entertainment at the conference.
The fact that the American taxpayer paid for 15 people to fly out to Las Vegas to “scout out” the conference location beforehand.

His tirade can be viewed at the following link:

http://eheadlines.com/trey-gowdy-is-furious-with-gsa-committee-for-overspending-american-taxpayers-money/

Again, it is a shame that there are not so many more people like him looking out for our welfare and safety. If there were, than maybe TSA employees would not be smuggling illegal drugs and the Secret Service would stop losing cars, guns, and badges.

4) But it is not just government bureaucrats and employees who are inept and incompetent and waste taxpayer wealth. Consider the sad case of sitting Congresswoman, Corrine Brown, who is:

Facing 357 years in prison for her corruption and greed, all at the expense of the American taxpayer.
According to the Washington Examiner, she not only is facing 357 years in jail but is also facing a $4.8 million fine for diverting money from a charity (One Door For Education) that was supposed to give scholarships to kids to her own wild expenses.

Her chief of staff is set to testify at her trial that the Congresswoman diverted hundreds of thousands of dollars from the charity to her own accounts.
This corruption is independent of the other ethical and potentially criminally activities she incurred previously relative to the Federal Election Commission rules and regulations including accepting and not reporting campaign donations from foreigners and not reporting the use of a corporate plane.

Corruption and incompetence up and down the Washington political class, from a likely corrupt Congresswoman to greedy, party going GSA employees to TSA drug smugglers to an inept Secret Service. Now you know why “drain the swamp” is a proper strategy that should be used to fix the massive failures of 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:

Tuesday, July 26, 2016

Politicians Say The Darndest Things...Unfortunately - Inane Quotes and Thoughts From Today's Political Class

On a semi-regular basis we run a post or two under the theme, “Politicians Say The Darndest Things.” It is a theme stolen from an old television show, House Party, that was hosted by Art Linkletter and which contained a segment called “Kids Say The Darndest Things.” That show was cute and funny, our version of politicians saying the stupidest and most inane things would also be funny if they were not in charge of the government in this country. Instead, we should be very scared that these are the people in charge.

Previous memorable quotes from politicians we have covered include the following topics:

A Georgia Congressman wondered out loud in the middle of a Congressional committee hearing if the island of Guam might actually tip over.
A Texas Congresswoman wanted to know if a MARS Rover mission would be driving by the place where Neil Armstrong landed on the MOON.
The Speaker of the House Of Representatives said that we had to pass the Obama Care legislation in order to see what is in it. Yes, why bother reading a proposed law BEFORE you vote on it.
A state politician in North Carolina wanted to know how many women die every year from prostate cancer during a state government hearing on Obama Care.

Scary stuff, yes these people are in charge. Let’s take a look at what the latest blather from the American political class has been recently spoken:

1) Florida Congresswoman Corrine Brown was recently indicted on 24 Federal criminal charges. These charges revolve around an alleged fake charity her and her office manager ran that resulted in the two of them collecting money for the educational charity and then using the money for their own pleasure rather than awarding scholarships. If convicted on all charges, she could face up to 300 years in jail.

She really had two unbelievable quotes that need to be called out. Her first quote was: “Last week was very rough. Two black men were needlessly gunned down by police; five Dallas police officers were slain by a demented man; and on Friday I had to appear in federal court.” Yes, going to court is totally equivalent to two black men being killed and five Dallas police officers being ambushed and killed. Totally on the same level of importance….Not!

Her second quote pertained to her 24 count indictment that came about after an extensive FBI investigation: “These are the same agents that was not able to do a thorough investigation of [Omar Mateen, the terrorist shooter], and we ended up with 50 people dead.” Her attorney, Elizabeth White doubled down on this stupid quote: “Perhaps had it [the FBI] chosen to devote its resources more thoughtfully, 50 innocent people would be alive today.” So, in her mind, the FBI could have saved lives if they had just ignored her paltry 24 alleged felonies. Shame on the FBI, shame!

Hey, Congresswoman Brown, maybe if you were not possibly breaking the law at just about every opportunity, maybe the FBI could have been looking at potential terrorists. Instead, they were upholding the law against people like you that were totally disrespecting it for your own personal enjoyment and enrichment. You are the reason the FBi was not deployed elsewhere. Following your perverted logic, you are the reason those people died in the club in Orlando.

2) It is no secret that Hillary Clinton set up her own email computer server in a closet in her home while Secretary of State, totally and secretly bypassing the Federal government’s rules, protocols, and procedures for keeping secret and sensitive government information safe and secure. As a result, the FBI launched an extensive investigation that showed among other things that she was “careless” in using her own non-secure computer server to handle highly sensitive and secret government communications. The FBI Director also concluded, after his FBI experts and investigators looked deeply into the whole sordid affair, that simple Gmail email accounts had better security than Hillary’s private home server.

Despite the experts at the FBI and their long, deep investigation, a Democratic Congresswoman seems to think that she knows best. Congresswoman Zoe Lofgren sloughed off conclusions from FBI Director James Comey that Clinton’s email procedures were “extremely careless” and were possibly compromised by cyber attacks from hostile forces.

But the Congresswoman apparently has a better handle on computer security: “Certainly we know from press reports that the official State Department email account was the subject of the worst ever cyber intrusion of any federal agency. What we don’t know is whether her communications on her private email was actually more secure than had she used the State Department email system.”

Yes, a computer server in Hillary’s closet is more secure than a computer server being protected by the best the Federal government can give. If that actually is the case, contradicting the expertise of the entire FBI, than this country is in a lot worse shape than anyone can imagine.

3) Let’s review a little radical Islamic terrorism history before we go to the next quote:

Radical Islamic terrorists carried out the first World Trade Center bombing.
Radical Islamic terrorists were responsible for the 9-11 attacks.
Radical Islamic terrorists blew a hole in the U.S.S. Cole Navy ship.
Radical Islamic terrorists were responsible for the last three terror attacks, the only three terror attacks, in France over the past year or so.
Radical Islamic terrorists carried out the Brussels terrorist attack.
The San Bernardino, Orlando, Tennessee, and the multitude of other domestic terror attacks that happened on Obama’s watch were done by radical Islamic terrorists.
The recent attack on Turkey’s airport was done by radical Islamic terrorists.
The many attacks in Iraq which killed hundreds of people were done by radical Islamic terrorists.
The enslaving, butchering, and sexual abuse of non-Muslims in the Middle East was done by radical Islamic terrorists.
The brutal executions of homosexuals in the Middle East were done by radical Islamic terrorists.
An Israeli study found that at least 450 of the 452 terrorist attacks in 2015 were executed by Islamic terrorists.

In light of these realities, consider an amazing quote from president Obama: “Islam has a proud tradition of tolerance.”

Pardon me if you call me “skeptical” at that statement. I am sure the vast majority of Muslims are just ordinary, non-violent folks. But really, Islam has a proud tradition of tolerance? I would like to see his proof of that tolerance position. Hillary Clinton apparently shares his view: “Let’s be clear: Islam is not our adversary. Muslims are peaceful and tolerant people and have nothing whatsoever to do with terrorism.”

But let’s use some real world numbers to show and see if these two views are in touch with reality, courtesy of the Eagle Rising website:

83 percent of Palestinian Muslims, 62 percent of Jordanians and 61 percent of Egyptians approve of jihadist attacks on Americans. World Public Opinion Poll(2009).
1.5 Million British Muslims support the Islamic State, about half their total population. ICM (Mirror) Poll 2015.
Two-thirds of Palestinians support the stabbing of Israeli civilians. Palestinian Center for Policy and Survey Research (2015).
45 percent of British Muslims agree that clerics preaching violence against the West represent “mainstream Islam.” BBC Radio (2015).
38 percent of Muslim-Americans say Islamic State (ISIS) beliefs are Islamic or correct. The Polling Company CSP Poll (2015).
One-third of British Muslim students support killing for Islam. Center for Social Cohesion (Wikileaks cable).
78 percent of British Muslims support punishing the publishers of Muhammad cartoons. NOP Research.
80 percent of young Dutch Muslims see nothing wrong with holy war against non-believers. Most verbalized support for pro-Islamic State fighters. Motivaction Survey (2014).
68 percent of British Muslims support the arrest and prosecution of anyone who insults Islam. NOP Research.
81 percent of Muslim respondents support the Islamic State (ISIS). Al-Jazeera poll (2015).

The original article which sourced each of these numbers and studies can be found at:

http://eaglerising.com/35166/obama-islam-has-a-proud-tradition-of-tolerance/

You decide, who is right, Obama and Clinton or real world polls and attitudes. I say, politicians say the darndest, and most out of touch, things.

So we now know that the Orlando club terrorist attack could have been prevented if the FBI had not been wasting time on a corrupt Congresswoman, that another Congresswoman thinks that an unsecured computer server in Hillary’s closet was more secure than anything the Federal government could provide, and Obama's and Clinton's words seem to put them at odds with reality. Yes, politicians say the darndest things...unfortunately.

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:

Wednesday, July 13, 2016

July, 2016, Part 9, Polticial Class Insanity: Another Congressman Is Corrupt, Americnas' Low Faith In All Institutions, and More Corruption

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:

1) It has not been a good week for Democratic members of Congress, or for the integrity of the Federal government. In an earlier discussion within this month’s political class insanity stream we reported how Congressman Chaka Fattah has been sentenced to five years in jail for various felonies. We also discussed the newly indicted Congresswoman Corrine Brown who is facing 24 serious felony charges for allegedly running a nonprofit educational organization that served as her own personal slush fund.

Now, Joe Schoffstall, writing for the Washington Beacon on July 8, 2016, tells us about Congressman Bobby Rush’s legal and criminal problems:

The Congressman allegedly and illegally paid both his wife and the church that he founded hundreds of thousands from his campaign funds since 2002.
He also allegedly funneled campaign funds to other members of his family.
$14 million of American taxpayer dollars were sent to a wellness center that was associated with a church he had founded in Chicago.
Payments to his wife began in 2002 and in the 2010 election cycle she got $119,400 from her husband’s campaign accounts, she got $148,000 in 2012, and $66,000 in 2014.
Since 2002, she has received $550,000 from her husband’s campaign’s funds.
The church he founded received over $200,000 from his campaign funds and accounts.
A nonprofit organization that Rush also created has received almost $600,000 of Federal taxpayer money.
The Better Government Association, a watchdog group based in Illinois, found in 2013 that Rush and two of his non-profits failed to pay Federal, state, or local taxes on time and the actions dated back a decade in some circumstances.
The Federal Election Commission is also looking into Rush’s finances.

What a mess, but just another indication of how corrupt and despicable the Washington political class has become.

2) Paul Bedard, writing for the Washington Examiner on June 13, 2016, reviewed the latest Gallup survey which examined the confidence Americans have in their various institutions. Highlights, or lowlights, from the survey include the following:

Americans' confidence in newspapers has hit an all time low, with only 20% of those surveyed saying they have confidence in them, down 10 points in the past 10 years.
TV news also saw a 10 point drop in confidence in the past ten years, going from 31% to 21% in the latest survey.
Obviously, trust in news vehicles like newspapers and TV news was not high to begin with but they are viewed as even less trustworthy than they were ten years ago.
Banks took the largest hit in confidence over the past ten years, going from 49% to 27% in the past ten years, not surprising given the greedy and deceiving practices banks practiced in the lead up to the Great Recession.
But the worst performer as far as institutions is Congress, going from a horrible confidence level of 19% ten years ago to an unbelievably and insanely low level of only 9% in the latest survey.

Such a sad state of mind for Americans today. We believe, or realize, that we can no longer trust the press in various forms to tell us the untarnished and unslanted truth and we have an abysmally low opinion of those in Washington serving in Congress. Tough to govern when nine out of ten of your constituents have no confidence in you.

But given the corruption, lack of integrity, criminality, and greed of today’s political class, these results should not be surprising. Nothing screams ”term limits” more than a lowly 9% confidence rating.

3) The Crony Capitalism website recently had a graphic view of an analysis that was done by the New York Times. Using data from the Census Bureau and Department of Justice, the Times calculated the number of convictions of public officials on a state by state basis per one million people living in the state.

The results were quite interesting with Nebraska being the state with the least number of convicted public officials per million residents at .7. North Dakota had the highest number of convicted public officials per million of residents at 8.3 per million residents, about 12 times higher than Nebraska. The website gave no reasons on why one state was higher or lower than other states.

However, most interesting, the most corrupt area in the country according to the Times analysis was not a state at all. Washington D.C. had the most convictions of public officials per million of population at an amazing rate of 66.9. This is more than ninety times higher than the corruption in Nebraska and eight times higher than the most corrupt state, North Dakota. Conclusion: whether we are talking national politicians or local politicians, D.C. is by far the biggest cesspool of public official corruption in the entire country, by far.

4) In the past few days we have reviewed how three sitting members of Congress have either been sentenced for their felonies and corruption (Congressman Chaka Fattah), have been indicted on 24 counts for their alleged felonies and corruption (Congresswoman Corrine Brown), or under investigation for skimming money from their campaign coffers and illegally giving it to their spouse, their private organizations, and relatives (Congressman Bobby Rush).

But according to a Washington Free Beacon article by Kaitlyn Beiswanger on May 20, 2016, a top political operative in the Boston city administration of Mayor Martin Walsh recently pleaded not guilty to a single corruption charge that potentially carries a 20 year prison term if he is found guilty. Kenneth Brissette, the city’s director of tourism, sports, and entertainment, was allegedly accused of withholding city permits from a music festival until union workers were hired to staff the event.

This has resulted in a Federal indictment of alleged union-related extortion. Brissette allegedly denied the permits until after festival organizers hired union workers from the International Alliance of Theatrical Stage Employees, Local 11. Brissette and his boss the mayor declared him innocent of the charges.

Of course he is presumed innocent until proven guilty. However, it gets so tiring of hearing the constant drum beat of corruption out of all levels of government today, from the halls of Congress to local town halls throughout the country.

5) In our book, “Love My Country, Loathe My Government: Fifty First Steps To Restoring Our Freedom and Destroying The American Political Class,” Step 42 reads as follows: “Require ex-Presidents whose income is over $1 million a year to pay back one dollar for every two dollars earned over that amount to help fund their Secret Service protection. Also, require them to forgo their annual government pension if their annual income is over $3 million a year or their net assets exceed $10 million.”

The logic behind this Step is that over the past couple of decades, ex-Presidents have been able to parlay their Presidency years into vast fortunes after they left office. Bill Clinton and his wife are easily worth $100 million, Barack Obama and his wife are easily worth more than $10 million.

Given the dire straits the country is in today from a debt perspective and given how millions and millions of Americans are homeless, hungry, drug addicted, and out of a job, it hardly seems right that ex-Presidents who are worth millions and millions of dollars should be still taking wealth from taxpayers, wealth that could better be spent on far less wealthy Americans.

Well, never let it be said I never give recognition to a situation when the Washington political class is actually trying to do the right thing. It is just that that type of situation arises so infrequently, you do not see me giving a lot of praise to the Washington political class.

A recent piece of legislation passed by the House of Representatives was a small first step to implementing Step 42 discussed above. The House voted to place limits on the taxpayer funded expense accounts of former Presidents.

The spending caps are now $200,000 a year and this level is reduced further if the ex-President earns more than $400,000 in any year. The law's sponsors correctly said most ex-presidents did not need support from taxpayers since they make millions in book deals and speaking fees: "Upon leaving office, most presidents go on to make millions of dollars and are not in need of taxpayer subsidies," said the authors of the bill, Representative Elijah Cummings of Maryland and Representative Jason Chaffetz of Utah, in a joint statement.

Nice first step in recognizing that ex-Presidents are quite rich and undeserving of high taxpayer expense budgets. Unfortunately, the bill did not address the taxpayer funded Secret Service protection that ex-Presidents get for life. That is a much bigger taxpayer expense and one that the former Presidents should be paying for also if they are raking in the cash after leaving office. The reason they are raking in the cash is because they were in office so they should be paying for their own protection also.

But, nonetheless, this is first step to bringing a tinge of fiscal sanity and logic to Washington.

That will do it for today’s and this month’s political class insanity. It took us nine days to get through all of the failures, ego, greed, idiocy, and other forms of inanity that today’s politicians continually rain down on us. It was one day short of the ten days we needed several months ago to cover the insanity that month. Wouldn’t it be nice if we could go just one month without the ineptness, stupid quotes, and wasteful spending that we review every month?

Yes, it would be nice, but with our current set of American politicians, probably never going to happen. More insanity next month, I am sure.

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

Love My Country, Loathe My Government

Sunday, December 10, 2017

December, 2017, Part 1, Political Class Insanity: A Congresswoman Goes to Prison, Baltimore Homicides Soars, and a Senator Howls With Ignorance

Tuesday, August 8, 2017

August, 2017, Part 6, Political Class Insanity: The Silent But Deadly Democratic Scandals

Friday, February 17, 2017

Four Examples of Why The Washington Swamp Must Be Drained

Tuesday, July 26, 2016

Politicians Say The Darndest Things...Unfortunately - Inane Quotes and Thoughts From Today's Political Class

Wednesday, July 13, 2016

July, 2016, Part 9, Polticial Class Insanity: Another Congressman Is Corrupt, Americnas' Low Faith In All Institutions, and More Corruption

Blog Archive

About Me