Daily Thought Pad: CORRUPTION

Showing posts with label CORRUPTION. Show all posts

Thursday, June 13, 2013

Hillaryville Imploding

A brewing scandal that potentially suggests some degree of State Department mismanagement during Hillary Clinton’s tenure could hurt not only her legacy, but also prospects for a 2016 presidential bid, some say. Others just say prosecution(s) are in order.

Photo: As (obvious) recent face work has been completed, a Twitter account has been opened, and the image rebuilding process is underway for another Hillary Clinton run for the presidency (2016), the State Department and Ms. Hillary’s record continues to implode.

By Marion Algier – AskMarion

The latest scandal and cover-up, which we will call State Dept-gate for now, started with a State Department memo alleging involvement with prostitution and drugs.

The timeline surrounding the allegations in said memo places the incidents during former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton's tenure, opening the possibility that a widening scandal might taint both her record and her possible political aspirations. Clinton has also taken heat for the department's response to the September 2012 attack on the U.S. diplomatic mission in Benghazi, Libya, but has managed to avoid intense scrutiny or prosecution, at least thus far.

Hillary Clinton's new Twitter page

Having just opened a Twitter account, Hillary Clinton Tweets the future is 'TBD' Some would respond to that with… “Only if the American people and the Congress are stupid will there be anything to announce but jail time or a private life!

The memo itself, purportedly written by Ambassador Larry Dinger, describes some of the information as coming from office chatter.

$Photos: Clinton\'s political career$

Hillary Photo (on a good day): Prior to recent ‘image rebuild’ project

"Sometimes the sources are one or more agents who became aware of the case from colleagues in what, given cubicles, can be a collegial environment," the memo says.

Regarding the latest allegations, supported by documents provided to CNN by a lawyer for a whistle-blower who is a former senior inspector general investigator, they include:

• An active U.S. ambassador "routinely ditched his protective security detail in order to solicit sexual favors from both prostitutes and minor children," the memo says. The ambassador's protective detail and others "were well aware of the behavior," the memo asserts. When a diplomatic security officer tried to investigate, undersecretary of state for management Patrick Kennedy allegedly ordered the investigator "not to open a formal investigation."

On Tuesday, CNN obtained a statement from the ambassador, who vigorously denied the allegations, calling them "baseless."

A source close to the investigation of the ambassador told CNN that the ambassador's security detail reported to the inspector general that the ambassador would leave his house at night without notifying the detail. The detail followed the ambassador and saw the ambassador once go to a park that's known for illegal activity, the source told CNN. The detail said they never witnessed the ambassador engage in any sexual activity, the source said.

The ambassador went to Washington and was asked what he was doing and he denied any wrongdoing, the source told CNN. The ambassador explained that sometimes he fights with his wife, needs air and he goes for a walk in the park because he likes it.

Kennedy also issued a statement Tuesday, saying it is his responsibility "to make sure the department and all of our employees -- no matter their rank -- are held to the highest standard, and I have never once interfered, nor would I condone interfering, in any investigation."

• A State Department security official in Beirut allegedly "engaged in sexual assaults" against foreign nationals working as embassy guards. The security official, the Office of the Inspector General says, was also accused of committing "similar assaults during assignments in Baghdad, and possibly Khartoum and Monrovia." The office's memo says that an inspector general's investigator who went to Beirut to try to conduct an investigation was not given enough time to complete the job.

• A member of Clinton's security detail allegedly "engaged prostitutes while on official trips in foreign countries." The inspector general's agent assigned to investigate "concluded" that the "prostitution problem was endemic."

• In Iraq, an "underground drug ring" may have been operating near the U.S. Embassy and "supplying" drugs to State Department security contractors, but an agent sent to investigate the allegations was prevented from completing the job.

The allegations were first reported Monday by CBS.

State Department spokeswoman Jen Psaki responded Monday.

"We hold all employees to the highest standards," she said. "We take allegations of misconduct seriously and we investigate thoroughly. All cases mentioned in the CBS report were thoroughly investigated and under investigation, and the department continues to take action."

During a Tuesday State briefing with reporters, Psaki reiterated that the memo contains "unsubstantiated allegations" and that some cases are ongoing and some are closed. But she would not, though repeatedly pressed by reporters, specify exactly which ones were open or closed.

"As a matter of policy, I'm not going to talk" about specific cases, she said.

"We take every allegation seriously," Psaki added. "We are seeing through the process."

On Tuesday, Nicholas Merrill, a spokesman for Hillary Clinton, said Clinton was completely unaware of any of the investigations mentioned in the Office of the Inspector General's reports and memos, including the case involving her personal security detail allegedly soliciting prostitutes.

"We learned of it from the media and don't know anything beyond what's been reported," Merrill told CNN in a written statement.

Photos: Hillary during Congressional Benghazi Hearing time frame… Is there any question that Hillary wants to run in 2016?

Clinton officially left her post in February, no doubt hoping to distance herself from her mess at the State Department?!?

Also Tuesday, U.S. Rep. Ed Royce, R-California, chairman of the House Foreign Affairs Committee, said he has asked his staff to begin an investigation into the allegations, and sent a letter to Secretary of State John Kerry demanding an explanation.

"The notion that any or all of these cases would not be investigated thoroughly by the Department is unacceptable," Royce wrote in his letter to Kerry.

CNN obtained a draft, dated December 2012, of a report by the inspector general's office evaluating the performance of the department's Bureau of Diplomatic Security Special Investigations Division.

The report says that the bureau "lacks a firewall" that would preclude higher-ups from "exercising undue influence in particular cases."

The bureau doesn't have a manual with approved guidelines on how to investigate cases, the report also says. Investigators with the inspector general's office "discovered uncertainty" among state agents about how to conduct thorough investigations, and noted that not going through the proper mechanisms can "ruin" a potential criminal investigation.

The report also calls the department's Criminal Investigations Division "unwieldy" and says that "frequent agent turnover" makes it harder for the Bureau of Diplomatic Security to conduct investigations.

The inspector general's office published a February 2013 final report whose key findings are, largely, the same as stated in the December 2012 draft.

The division's current management structure, the report says, does not "foster independence from career pressures and creates significant potential for undue influence, favoritism, and potential retribution.

But things for the State Department just keep getting worse.

Townhall: First we learned from CBS News that Department official covered up and interfered with inspector general investigations of sexual misconduct, including the soliciation of prostitutes by an ambassador. Then we learned those sexual solicitations involved minors. Now, we're learning State Department officials covered up the shooting of four Hondurans.

Saturday, June 1, 2013

The Lois Lerner Defense

File it the next time the IRS calls you up…

Lois Lerner

By Mark Steyn

We have the president of the United States’ word as a gentleman that he knew nothing about the Internal Revenue Service’s targeting of his enemies until he “learned about it from the same news reports that I think most people learned about this.”

Furthermore, although the commissioner of the IRS, Douglas Shulman, visited Obama’s White House no fewer than 157 times, which is 156 times more than his predecessor Mark Everson ever visited the White House, we know that this was for legitimate Easter-egg rolls, as he testified to Congress, and meetings to discuss Obamacare. The Easter Bunny, one should note, visits the White House two to four times as often as the average IRS commissioner did before Mr. Shulman came along. But you can’t make a health-care omelet without breaking Easter eggs: It is one of the many distinctive features of Obama-style “health” “care” “reform” that, while it has not led to the hiring of a single additional doctor, nurse, or hospital janitor, it did require the biggest expansion of the IRS since the Second World War. So, when he wasn’t rolling Easter eggs and advising the moppets on whether they needed to declare the luxury Belgian white chocolate balls with praline filling, he was participating in vital meetings on how many extra SWAT teams he was going to need to enforce the new colonoscopy non-compliance penalty.

Let us also overlook the excellent treatment received from the IRS by members of the president’s family. Although acting commissioner Steven Miller apologized for the “horrible customer service” conservative taxpayers had gotten, a gentleman by the name of Malik Obama received impeccable, express service when he took the precaution of mailing in his non-profit application from N’giya, Kenya, rather than notoriously slower mail processing centers such as Phoenix and Dallas. Malik, the brother of President Obama, runs the Barack H. Obama Foundation, named for the president’s father. On May 30, 2011, they applied for tax-exempt status, and had their approval signed less than a month later by Lois Lerner herself, and conveniently backdated by Lois to cover the two-and-a-half years the enterprising Malik had already been raking in “tax-deductible” donations from Americans. The Washington address of the Barack H. Obama Foundation appears to be bogus, and it’s not clear whether the funds are being used back in Kenya for anything other than supporting the famously lavish lifestyle of Malik and his twelve wives. Given that the IRS is not shy about asking American conservatives for Facebook posts and lists of who attends their meetings, Ms. Lerner surely would have been within her rights to ask Malik Obama about the “exclusive” photographs currently displayed on the Barack H. Obama Foundation website of a recent meeting in Sudan, one of only four countries the U.S. government designates as a “terrorist state,” and the Foundation’s apparently extensive association with the Sudanese president and blood-soaked genocidal war criminal Omar al-Bashir. Given that the IRS likes to ask conservative taxpayers whether their friends and relatives are planning on running for office, Ms. Lerner might like to ask Malik Obama when his friend President Bashir is planning on leaving office. After another quarter million corpses?

Whatever. Let’s take it as read that, when U.S. taxpayers wind up giving tax breaks to an entity linked to the butchers of Darfur, it’s pure coincidence that the racket turns out to be run by the president’s brother. Let’s accept that Malik Obama just got lucky that his letter landed on the desk of Lois Lerner, and that, when she backdated his application for two-and-a-half years, she’d momentarily forgotten that it’s illegal for her to backdate it more than two-and-a-quarter years. Indeed, let’s take the president at his word that the existence of this shadowy IRS entity working deep within the even shadowier U.S. Treasury planted in deep cover within the shadowiest conspiracy of them all, this murky hitherto unknown organization called “the Executive Branch,” that all this was news to him. What that means then is not that this or that elected politician is corrupt but that the government of the United States is corrupt.

There seems to be ever more evidence for that. Every day brings revelations that the IRS conservative crackdown went way beyond the Tea Party. McClatchy Newspapers reports that a woman known only as “Ms. Richards” in the Cincinnati office of the IRS told Coalition for Life of Iowa that their application for nonprofit status could only be approved if they signed a letter promising not to picket in front of Planned Parenthood. Mark Drabik, a military veteran, became politically active and started giving to conservative groups only to have the IRS challenge his church donations. Catherine Engelbrecht founded True the Vote to protect ballot integrity, and within a few months her family’s business, farm, and personal taxes had all attracted IRS audits. Hundreds and hundreds of groups were consigned to the purgatory of “pending” — a term for IRS customers not as favored as Malik Obama can stretch leisurely from six months to ten to twenty to thirty, and beyond. When the most lavishly funded government on the planet comes after you, eventual guilt or innocence is irrelevant: The process is the punishment.

I am an immigrant to this great land, and I love it, but I will make a small observation from my years in the United States which I hope won’t be taken the wrong way: Like citizens of almost all Western democracies in the 21st century, Americans are overly deferential to bureaucracy, but, in my observation, they are uniquely fearful of the state’s tax collectors to a degree I have never seen with Her Majesty’s Revenue & Customs in London or equivalent agencies in Paris, Ottawa, Rome, Canberra. The IRS has, in American terms, extraordinary powers. It was, for example, amusing to see Lois Lerner plead the Fifth Amendment and exercise her constitutional right not to put herself at risk of self-incrimination. As the great Walter Williams pointed out the other day, every single American waives his Fifth Amendment rights every time he signs that tax return on April 15. Americans are fearless if some guy pulls some stunt in a shopping mall, but an IRS assault is brutal and unending. Many activists faded away, and the media began writing stories about how the Tea Party had peaked; they were over; they wouldn’t be a factor in 2012. And so it proved. As Rush Limbaugh pointed out the other day, the plan worked.

But, of course, there was no plan, was there? So let’s take Obama at his word that he had no idea all this was going on. In that case, he might like to take the lead in calling for the abolition of a corrupt agency and its grotesque tax code, and their replacement by a bureaucracy with more limited powers commensurate with a free society and a simplified tax regime with lower rates and thus fewer bewildering, mercurial “exemptions” that make the citizenry dependent on the caprices of Ms. Lerner and her colleagues. That’s a prize worth fighting for. In the meantime, the next time the IRS call you up with demands for this and demands for that, simply tell them, “I am filing the Lois Lerner defense,” and then say as she did to Congress “I have not done anything wrong. And I will not answer any questions.” Every man his own Lois Lerner!

IRS in Defense Over Dance Video:

(CNN) – A newly obtained video has the IRS running damage control on a new front, as the embattled agency prepares for the release next week of an inspector general report that will be critical of how money was spent on staff conferences.

In the video, an apparent team-building exercise, employees are taught the Cupid Shuffle dance move as they prepare to present the dance as a group at a 2010 conference.

The IRS said Friday night the video “was unacceptable and an inappropriate use of government funds.”

The video’s narrator describes the group of individuals as executives from the Small Business/Self Employed (SBSE) department. They say they’re competing “to become the next great dance sensation.”

The IRS said the video cost $1,600 to produce, and it played at the end of a 2010 leadership and education meeting in Anaheim for 2,600 managers in the SBSE division.

“The meeting took place at a time where the IRS needed to ensure that managers had proper training to address significant new programs, major staff turnover and a substantial increase in security threats following the suicide attack on an IRS facility in Austin earlier in the year,” the IRS said in a statement.

Throughout the nearly-three minute video, the employees poke fun at each other as they try to learn the dance moves.

The new video comes as the IRS takes heat over its admitted targeting of conservative groups who sought tax exempt status.

Next week, the Treasury Inspector General for Tax Administration (TIGTA) will release an audit showing excess spending at the IRS conference.

The IRS has already come under scrutiny for Star Trek and Gilligan’s Island-themed training videos it produced that costs tens of thousands of dollars. The Star Trek video, reported earlier this year, played at the same conference as the dance video.

“And I thought doing the Star Trek video was humiliating,” one woman says in the new video.

In fact, one of the employees in the Star Trek video was also in the new dancing spot.

Acting Commissioner Danny Werfel, appointed in recent weeks, said in a statement that the report will focus on an IRS conference that took place in 2010 and labeled it an “unfortunate vestige from a prior era.”

Really????

Keep reading…

Obama Is In Charge; This Is on Him - David Limbaugh

Time to Kill the IRS Says Mark Levin

Incredible: The Official in Charge of the IRS Office Responsible for Targeting Conservative Groups Now Heads the Agency’s Obamacare Office

Obama Fires IRS Commissioner as Scandal Grows

Chief IRS council William Wilkins helped Rev. Wright’s church get out of probe

Why the IRS Scandal Should Lead to Obama’s Impeachment

Incompetent-gate, Corruption-gate and Progressive-gate – Part 1

IRS apologizes for targeting tea party groups

Technorati Tags: Lois Lerner,IRS,scandal,Obamaland,Mark Steyn,National Review,IRS-gate,smoke and mirrors,cover-up,cover-ups,lies,corruption,demand the truth,Internal Revenue Service

Wednesday, May 22, 2013

Watcher’s Council Nominations – Takin’ The 5th Edition

JoshuaPundit on May 22 2013 | Nominations:

Welcome to the Watcher’s Council, a blogging group consisting of some of the most incisive blogs in the ‘sphere, and the longest running group of its kind in existence. Every week, the members nominate two posts each, one written by themselves and one written by someone from outside the group for consideration by the whole Council.Then we vote on the best two posts, with the results appearing on Friday.

‘Nuff said.

This week’s contest is dedicated to Rep. Darrel Issa..for relentless courage.

Council News:
This week, Ask Marion and Liberty’s Spirit earned honorable mention status with some great pieces.

You can, too! Want to see your work appear on the Watcher’s Council homepage in our weekly contest listing? Didn’t get nominated by a Council member? No worries.

Simply head over to Joshuapundit and post the title a link to the piece you want considered along with an e-mail address ( which won’t be published) in the comments section no later than Monday 6PM PST in order to be considered for our honorable mention category, and return the favor by creating a post on your site linking to the Watcher’s Council contest for the week.

It’s a great way of exposing your best work to Watcher’s Council readers and Council members. while grabbing the increased traffic and notoriety. And how good is that, eh?

So, let’s see what we have this week….

Council Submissions

The Political Commentator – Nassau County Executive Ed Mangano going back…
The Noisy Room – The Enemy Among Us – Even in Idaho
Simply Jews – Glenn Greenwald or the douchebag’s lines of defense
GrEaT sAtAn”S gIrLfRiEnD – Shock And Shush
Bookworm Room – Is the IRS scandal the worst political scandal in American history? I say “yes
Gay Patriot – In 2008, we told you Obama wasn’’t the man you (thought you) were voting for. . .
Joshuapundit-DHS Is Training Law Enforcement To Give Muslim Brotherhood, Radical Islamists A Pass
The Razor – Scandal Scorecard
The Colossus of Rhodey – New “Scotty” Spouts Off on the New Trek’s Politics
Rhymes With Right – My Response To @WhiteHouse #ObamaCareInThreeWords Meme
The Glittering Eye -A Series of Unfortunate Incidents
The Mellow Jihadi – Autumn Sandeen, a Sailor with No ESWS Pin?
VA Right! - VA GOP Convention: Conservatives and TEA Party Send Republican Establishment a STRONG MESSAGE! Overcome DIRTY TRICKS and WIN!
The Right Planet – #Scandalpalooza

Honorable Mentions

Ask Marion – Incompetent-gate, Corruption-gate and Progressive-gate – Part 1
Liberty’s Spirit – The IRS, Obamacare,and Abuse of Political Power: An Issue

Non-Council Submissions

Craig McMillan/WND -The Chicago mob in D.C.submitted by The Political Commentator
Caroline Glick – Obama and the “Official Truth” submitted by The Noisy Room
A.J. Adler/The Algemeiner – A Campaign of Willful Blindness on Terrorism submitted by Simply Jews
Contentions – Exploit Hizballah’s Vulnerability submitted by GrEaT sAtAn”S gIrLfRiEnD
American Thinker/Thomas Lifson-Never Mind Impeachment; Keep your Eyes on the Prize submitted by Bookworm Room
Commentary -Accepting Responsibility Would Blow Obama’’s Circuits submitted by Gay Patriot
Jonathan Rosenblum – The Price Of Blindness submitted by Joshuapundit
Reason –The Myth of the Scientific Liberal submitted by The Razor
OpenMarket.org – IRS Abuse of Americans Is Nothing New submitted by The Colossus of Rhodey
Big Jolly Politics – The Real Scandal with the IRS: Organizing for Action and the Chicago-style Misuse of Governmental Power submitted by Rhymes with Right
Ta-Nahisi Coates/The Atlantic – How the Obama Administration Talks to Black America submitted by The Glittering Eye
Amil Imani –Saluting Pamela Geller: a Champion of Liberty submitted by The Mellow Jihadi
Tea Party News Network – Lerner Pleads the Fifth, Issa Issues Subpoena for her to Appear Anyway submitted by VA Right!
Doug Ross – That Crazy Benghazi Conspiracy Theory? It Just Got Less Crazy submitted by The Right Planet
Mark Steyn – The Autocrat Accountants submitted by The Watcher
Kirsten Powers/Daily Beast – How Hope and Change Gave Way to Spying on the Press submitted by Watcher

Enjoy! And don’t forget to like us on Facebook and follow us Twitter..’cause we’re cool like that!

Technorati Tags: Watcher’s Council,collection of articles,news,news nuggets,alternative media,bloggers,blogosphere,educate yourself,history,Lois Lerner,IRS,politics,scandals,cover-ups,morality,responsibility,knowledge,lies,media,Obamaland,Obamaville,ep. Darrel Issa,Congressional Hearings

Tuesday, May 21, 2013

Incompetent-gate, Corruption-gate and Progressive-gate - Part 1

By Marion Algier – AskMarion

The list of corruption, fraud, scandals, cover-ups, overreach and incompetence by the Obama administration is staggering and growing by the day. Voter fraud and manipulation in both 2008 and 2012, Fast and Furious, Benghazi-gate, IRS-gate, Press-gate and now Sebelius-gate and EPA-gate are all coming to light, yet we are really only seeing the tip of the iceberg and if it were any other president he would never have been elected for a second term and impeachment would be on the table.

But when you start looking at the long list of infractions, it really narrows down to 3 main ‘gates’: Incompetent-gate, Corruption-gate and Progressive-gate. Everything else falls within the parameters of those 3. It is a story of incompetence or feigned incompetence and lies, a Culture of Corruption and the philosophy of Progressivism. The amazing part is that President Obama himself, former Secretary Hillary Clinton, and head cop Eric Holder have all already admitted both directly and indirectly to the first one: Incompetent-gate. They have all admitted over and over again through their testimonies, speeches and press conferences that they were, have been and are incompetent. And anyone paying attention has realized that the buck stops with anyone they can pin it on except themselves. Even Obama’s detachment is strategic!

We are finally reaching the point where half of America wants Obama impeached; worshippers like Chris Matthews are questioning what President Obama likes about his job; courageous journalists are saying it like it is and whistleblowers are coming out of the woodwork.

The panic is obviously building on the left when you look the amount of energy and time both Obama himself and the administration have spent denying their involvement and tap dancing, especially the past 10-days. IRS official Lois Lerner To Plead the Fifth At Congressional Hearing Tomorrow. If you know the law, you can only take the Fifth if you testimony could incriminate you of a crime, not just because you don’t want to answer.

You know they are nervous or someone is getting close when they throw a liberal icon like Bob Woodward under the bus!

But for the first time the mainstream media outlets, that has always been in Obama’s pocket, are beginning to cover the “gates” getting some information to the average Americans who don’t pay a lot of attention to politics.

Joseph Curl tweeted a report from a CIA source on Monday afternoon regarding the Obama administration's developing scandal surrounding monitoring the email accounts of Fox News' James Rosen:

Urgent -- CIA: Fox News Scandal “Goes Much Deeper,” White House Sitting On Something Top Obama Aides “Terrified” About…

We will continue to monitor and review the proceedings and updates as we have since 2007 to help the truth come out before the 2014 Election. Drastic changes in the make-up of the U.S. House and Senate are perhaps the only and last hope to turn the tide back toward the center and save America. Check back next week for part 11 and daily for updates.

It is now time for all Americans to pay attention, demand answers, stand up, and share what they know and suspect for you cannot love or honor what you do not know, miss or understand … and you certainly won’t fight for it. Yet the details of the scandals before us will (and already have) affect all our lives (including those of the libs) as well as the lives of our children, grandchildren and future generations of America!! But those with the courage to stand up will surely pay a price if we don’t all stand together for the truth!

Sign the GOP petition and demand accountability from President Obama and his Administration.

Sign the petition urging Congress to impeach Obama.

What Did the President Know About the IRS Scandal and When Did He Know It?

The Great Unifier Didn't Need to be Told About the IRS Targeting Conservatives

WH spokesperson stumped: Where was Obama on night of Benghazi attack?

Foreign vote-count firm expands U.S. reach

Hey, IRS: Here’s the WW II prison camp survivor you asked about

Obama Isn't Just Too Big to Fail, He's Too Big to Know

‘First they came for Fox News…’

Wednesday, April 17, 2013

Congress Acts Quickly to Kill Transparency For Their Own Shady Insider Trading

While distracted with the Boston Bombing……

Ever see anything done this quickly?

4/11/2013 Introduced in Senate
4/11/2013 Passed/agreed to in Senate: Introduced in the Senate, read twice, considered, read the third time, and passed without amendment by Unanimous Consent.
4/12/2013 Passed/agreed to in House: On passage Passed without objection.
4/12/2013 Presented to President.
On Tuesday the 15th, the President signed the legislation.

Image: CBS

Sarah Jones – Politicususa – h/t to MJ:

What could make the House pass something in 30 seconds that the Senate also passed? What would motivate them to put aside their alleged “differences” and act in the best interest of the people? The answer is when they are not acting in the best interest of the people, but rather, in their own best interests.

To that end, late last week, your congress quickly approved a measure that modified (aka, killed) a part of the STOCK Act (Stop Trading on Congressional Knowledge Act ), which was only enacted a year ago. The STOCK Act was supposed to address shady stock trades based on insider information.

Senator Harry Reid (D-NV) is taking credit for sponsoring the measure, but clearly he got no pushback from either side of the aisle. Check out the fast movement of this bill, and tell me if you’ve seen anything fly through like this in recent years, sans committee referrals and Speaker John Boehner’s (R-OH) deep debate over what he can even allow for a debate about a vote:

On Tuesday the 15th, the President signed the legislation.

The Sunlight Foundation notes that the amendment passed with unanimous consent, though many members had gone home already. Huh. This doesn’t seem to work for measures that protect the security of the American people, like say, jobs. The Sunlight Foundation also pointed out what might be seen as a precursor of times to come, “The bill was not available to the public on the Library of Congress website until after the vote.” NPR noted that it took the House all of 30 seconds. “NPR’s Tamara Keith tells us the House procedure took exactly 30 seconds.”

The STOCK Act took aim at insider trading and insider information, and also required some 28,000 federal employees from the congressional and executive branches post their conflict of interest disclosures online. It followed “a ’60 Minutes’ report on how many members of Congress are making money on stock trades that are illegal for everyone else, correspondent Nancy Cordes reports a bill to ban lawmakers from insider trading is now on the fast track.”

So, while you were paying attention, they passed The STOCK Act, and now, a year later on a Friday, when you’re not paying attention, they quietly killed the parts they don’t like by unanimous consent (the coward’s way, so you can’t hold them individually accountable on the record).

Yes, senior officials will still have to fill out disclosure forms, but news agencies and anyone else who’s interested will have to dig deeply in order to get access to the information. Your congress claims it’s a security measure (apparently, when you hear “security”, you’re supposed to automatically bend over and initiate invasion, paying off too big to fail, etc.). However, the Sunlight Foundation pointed out that they did not merely address the alleged security issues, but found a way to deeply obscure and bury any path to the transparency:

The sweeping exemption goes even farther than critics of the disclosure requirements requested. For those to whom online disclosure would still apply (the president, vice president, members of Congress, congressional candidates and individuals subject to Senate confirmation) the Senate bill made electronic filing of the information optional and struck the requirement that online information be searchable, sortable and downloadable, making even the disclosures that remain in the bill tepid and relatively unusable.

Not only does the change undermine the intent of the original bill to ensure government insiders are not profiting from non-public information (if anyone thinks high level congressional staffers don’t have as much or more insider information than their bosses, they should spend some time on Capitol Hill) but it sets an extraordinarily dangerous precedent suggesting that any risks stem not from information being public but from public information being online.

Are we going to return to the days when the public can use the Internet to research everything except what their government is doing? Will Congress, in its twisted wisdom, decide that information is public if journalists, academics, advocates and citizens are forced to dig through file cabinets in basements in Washington, DC to find it? And does anyone think that makes us safer?

This is heartening, indeed. Your congress can act and does act quickly, in a bipartsian manner, to address their privacy and security. No concerns about who’s read the bill and how it might destroy democracy or cover up crimes against citizens. No debate needed.

Your government can and does at times function much better than conservatives would like you to believe, but this is not one of them. If there’s ever a time when both sides should come together, it’s when elected officials betray the trust of the people in this manner. Not only is it apparent that these bodies can act quickly when their interests are at issue, but the haste with which they’ve agreed to bury transparency without debate should trouble citizens from both sides of the aisle.

Capitol Punishment - The Hard Truth About Washington Corruption From America's Most Notorious Lobbyist – Some things really never change…

Technorati Tags: Congress,tranparency,killing transparency,watch the other hand,insider trading,double standards,smoke and mirrors,STOCK Act,Sunlight Foundation,hanky panky,Obamaland,they represent us,corruption in Congress,CORRUPTION,Washington D.C.

Thursday, January 26, 2012

This Should Be an Eye-Opener - Van Jones Group and Unions Putting Up Anti-Romney Billboards… Why? Because They Know They Can Beat Gingrich

Rebuild The Dream (Van Jones) Putting Up Anti-Romney Billboards!

I just received my email from Rebuild the Dream and it looks like they are going to give Newt Gingrich and all other NON ROMNEY candidates a helping hand. How and Why? Well, take a peak at this newsletter and perhaps you will get as big of a chuckle out of this as I did. I am still laughing! Go put up the billboards RTD and we will thank you for it later! :)

Wow. Just hours before the president called for fairer taxes in the State of the Union address, millionaire Mitt Romney released his tax returns, revealing that he paid a tax rate of just 13.7% on more than $45 million of income.

That is grossly unfair, but these kinds of outrages disappear from the headlines after a few days all the time. We can't let the Romney Loophole become old news, and we need to keep the pressure up on Congress.

Rebuild the Dream is planning to put up billboards in Washington, D.C. with bold headlines proclaiming, "CLOSE THE ROMNEY LOOPHOLE."

The billboards will help keep this tax fairness issue at the center of the debate in Washington. But to get them up, we need to raise $50,000 in the next few days. There are thousands of us reading this email. If we chip in just a few dollars each, we can reach our goal. Can you help?

Hours after we all learned about Mitt's low tax rate (and his Swiss bank account), the president called for fairer taxes including a new minimum tax for millionaires and no higher taxes for 98% of Americans.

That is good, but the tax debate is going to be as tough this year with the Tea Party in Congress as it was last year. We can put the opponents of fairer taxes on defense if we all do our part. Can you chip in?

Thanks,
Natalie, Van [Jones], Billy, Jim, Ian, Somer and the rest of the Rebuild the Dream team

Posted at TPN by Katie Baker on January 26, 2012 at 12:42pm in Tea Party Nation Forum - Send Message View Discussions

Wake-up Peeps… Team Obama is afraid of Romney and are creating this whole Gingrich phenomenon because they know Newt has too much baggage and the the independents won’t vote for him and we are playing right into their hands.

This is another one of of these “the truth doesn’t matter” campaigns on Team Obama’s part. They want to run against Gingrich… not Romney!

The Truth About Romney’s Taxes:

As Dennis Miller explains:

Romney (the wealthy) pay 35% corporate taxes. Then they pay 15% capital gains taxes (again, a second bite of the apple on that same money) if it is invested, plus money given to charity and his church. And then when he dies they hit his family with a huge estate tax.

50% of Americans now pay ‘no’ taxes at all. So who is not paying their fair share. Think about it… don’t let the muckrakers convince you of things that aren’t true… or it will hurt our country and economy in the long run.

--> Video: 'Miller Time' State of the Union & Romney’s Taxes <--

Or at the Dennis Miller Show

Video: O’Reilly on the State of the Union & Taxes

Also see:

Tic… Tic… GOP Toc… or Rather Talk

Romney Releases His Tax Returns

Rubio Stays Neutral But Defends Romney

Also: Gingrich admits ABC claim was false

After nearly a week on the defensive, CNN's John King reports tonight that Newt Gingrich's claim about offering witnesses to ABC News in his defense — to rebut the network's interview with his second wife, Marianne Gingrich — was not true. "Tonight, after persistent questioning by our staff, the Gingrich campaign concedes now Speaker Gingrich was wrong — both in his debate answer, and in our interview yesterday," King said on tonight's edition of John King USA. "Gingrich spokesman R.C. Hammond says the only people the Gingrich campaign offered to ABC were his two daughters from his first marriage." An important victory for John King in his ongoing effort to justify last Thursday's confrontation. (Politico)

--> DON’T FORGET: DEBATE TONIGHT! <--

On CNN at 8 ET Thursday night. 1.26.12, as the GOP candidates debate the issues from Jacksonville days before Florida's primary. Watch it live on CNN.com/Live and CNN's mobile apps. Lea el artículo en español/Read this article in Spanish.

Latest Poll: Florida GOP Primary: Romney 39%, Gingrich 31%, Santorum 12%, Paul 9% - This Florida survey of 750 Likely Republican Primary Voters was conducted on January 25, 2012 by Rasmussen Reports.

Sunday, January 8, 2012

Sunlight Down the Spider Hole

Sunlight is said to be the best of disinfectants; electric light the most efficient policeman. – Louis Brandeis

This is the defining statement that The Sunlight Foundation claims to base their cause on. Oh, if that were only even remotely true…

Founded in January 2006, the Foundation has a stated goal of using the revolutionary power of the Internet and new information technology to enable citizens to learn more about what Congress and their elected representatives are doing and thus help reduce corruption, ensure greater transparency and accountability by government and foster public trust in the vital institutions of democracy. At the declared core of all of the Foundation’s work is a focus on the power of technology and the Internet to transform the relationship between citizen’s and their government.

The truth is somewhat different however. The Foundation and its many tentacles, began in 2006 during the Bush Administration. I suspect it was meant to be used to skew political instances against the Republicans in order to assure an Obama win in 2008 – to snare them in a web of record so-to-speak. It made for a great political weapon and it certainly didn’t hurt. However, during the current Administration, much of what The Sunlight Foundation and its minions record is either soft-balled, inaccurate or twisted to make it look more favorable. Politics at its finest! It is a very insidious and clever form of propaganda, claiming one thing, while in reality doing the opposite. A classic Progressive tactic.

Claiming non-partisanship and not officially supporting any candidate, in 2007, the Foundation did have three specific priorities for the incoming Congress in 2007:

· Contemporaneous online filing: “The public reports about campaign receipts and expenditures, personal financial disclosure, trips, gifts and travel currently required of lawmakers should be filed electronically [on a monthly basis] and shared online within 24 hours of their filing.” Moreover, the Foundation believes that candidates’ Personal Financial Disclosure reports should be amended to require disclosure of the affiliations of lawmakers (and their family members) with political organizations or charities.

· Ending secret legislation: “All earmarks, bills, and amendments should include an identification of the proposing Member’s name. All non-emergency legislation should be posted online, in its final form, at least 72 hours before a vote.”

· Meaningful lobbyist disclosure: “All who are paid to engage in direct issue advocacy with lawmakers and their staff should be required to register, and all registered lobbyists should disclose all legislative contacts, all legislation and regulations discussed, all contributions they make and coordinate to Members and organizations affiliated with members, all prior government employment, and any relationship to a current Member of Congress, staff member, or executive branch employee.”

Now, I ask you, has ANYONE made any noise about the above three priorities during the Obama Administration that you know of? Token at best and primarily against the right side of the aisle. In fact the left side of the aisle has done the opposite of the above – they have gone all gonzo on financial corruption, meetings in secret, undecipherable legislation for nefarious purposes, power grabs and shredding the Constitution. Either The Sunlight Foundation is massively incompetent or corrupt. I vote for number two, Bob.

The Foundation’s initial projects – from the establishment of a Congresspedia, the making of “transparency grants” for the development and enhancement of databases and websites and two separate efforts to engage the public in distributed journalism and offer online tutorials on the role of money in politics efforts – are based on the premise that the collective power of citizens to demand greater accountability is the clearest route to reform.

Unfortunately, the supporters of The Sunlight Foundation are suspect and funding is provided, in part, by George Soros. Therefore, the transparency and the claim of participants of self-policing blogs etc., while reducing corruption and increasing accountability, is highly doubtful and most likely is being used to an extent as a propaganda outlet.

The Sunlight Foundation was founded by Ellen Miller and Michael Klein because of claimed concerns about the influence of money and relationships, as well as a fear of corruption, in Congress. The Sunlight Foundation was launched in April 2006 with a $3.5 million contribution from co-founder Michael Klein, a securities lawyer.

From Discover The Networks:

The Foundation’s co-founder and Executive Director is Ellen Miller, who previously served as Deputy Director of the Campaign for America’s Future, where she directed its Project for an Accountable Congress. She also established the Washington-based Center for Responsive Politics (which is funded by the Carnegie Corporation of New York, the Ford Foundation, the Schumann Center for Media and Democracy, the Joyce Foundation and Pew Charitable Trusts) and Public Campaign (funded by the Ben & Jerry’s Foundation, the Carnegie Corporation of New York, the Columbia Foundation, the Compton Foundation, the Educational Foundation of America, the Ford Foundation, the JEHT Foundation, the Open Society Institute, the Rockefeller Brothers Fund and the Schumann Center for Media and Democracy). Miller is the former publisher of TomPaine.com, a former fellow at The American Prospect and an occasional contributor to The Nation.

Michael Klein is co-founder and Chairman of The Sunlight Foundation. In January 2006, he retired from the law firm of Wilmer, Cutler & Pickering after 35 years as a practicing attorney. He now serves as a trustee of the American Himalayan Foundation and the Pen Faulkner Foundation.

A Senior Fellow at The Sunlight Foundation is veteran journalist and editor Bill Allison, who for nine years worked for the George Soros-funded Center for Public Integrity, where he co-authored The Cheating of America, whose central thesis holds that “the rich and powerful shirk their responsibilities” as taxpayers. Allison was also senior editor of The Buying of the President 2000 and co-editor of The Buying of the President 2004.

Another Senior Fellow at the Foundation is Larry Makinson, who was a journalist in Alaska in the mid-1980s and then worked for fifteen years at the Center for Responsive Politics (CRP), including two years as its Executive Director. After leaving CRP he spent a year as Senior Fellow at the Center for Public Integrity.

The National Director of The Sunlight Foundation is Zephyr Teachout, who formerly worked as a lecturer at the University of Vermont and was Director of Online Organizing for Howard Dean‘s 2004 presidential campaign. A licensed attorney, Teachout has represented indigent death-row inmates in North Carolina for the Center for Death Penalty Litigation; she was also the co-founding Executive Director of the Fair Trial Initiative, a fellowship program that trains young lawyers in death penalty trial work.

The Sunlight Foundation’s major disbursements (ranging from $25,000 to $325,000) in 2006 included grants to Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington (which also has received financial backing from George Soros‘ Open Society Institute, Democracy Alliance, the Tides Foundation, the Streisand Foundation and the Arca Foundation), the Young Elected Officials Network, (a project of People for the American Way), MAPLight.org, the Center for Responsive Politics, OMB Watch, the Center for Media and Democracy, the Center for Citizen Media, NewAssignment.Net, Room Eight, the Project on Government Oversight and ReadtheBill.org. Smaller grants (ranging from $1,650 to $16,000) were made to Metavid,More Perfect, Arizona Congresswatch, the Connecticut Local Politics Blogspot,WashingtonWatchdog.org, the National Institute on Money in State Politics, the Project on Government Oversight and the BluegrassReport.

Are you seeing a pattern yet? I am. Almost all of these lean left and/or are Progressive. Well spent funds indeed.

The Sunlight Foundation website features or featured four blogs on the subject of ethics and money in Washington D.C.; they are run by four of its principals: Citizen’s Notebook (Zephyr Teachout); Sunspots (Ellen Miller); Under the Influence (Bill Allison) and Dollarocracy (Larry Makinson). I’m not sure if all of these still exist, but they are leftist in nature and purpose. The Sunlight Foundation’s site currently reads like a conservative hit piece.

· Assets: $2,066,772 (2009)

· Grants Received: $7,111,704 (2009)

· Grants Awarded: $2,640,282 (2009)

But wait, there’s more:

Contributions

2011

· $1,000,000.00 Michael R. Klein
For general support.

· $1,000,000.00 Rockefeller Family Fund
For general support.

· $500,000.00 Rita Allen Foundation
To fully develop and implement the Open States Project which will provide a new resource for identifying and tracking activity within state legislatures. (Grant awarded over two years)

· $300,000.00 Open Society Foundations
To advance transparency and open government through reporting, tools and policies that will further expose for public scrutiny the influence of lobbying in Washington and will promote the full implementation, codification and expansion of the Open Government Directive. (Grant awarded over 15 months)

· $200,000.00 Atlantic Philanthropies
To establish a new pilot, post-graduate journalism fellowship program, the “John E. Moss Fellowship,” at Sunlight which will intensively train journalism post-graduates in new techniques and technologies. (Grant awarded over two years)

· $156,000.00 Pew Charitable Trusts
Contract

· $110,000.00 Kaphan Foundation
For general support.

· $100,000.00 Mark Cuban
For general support.

· $93,077.00 Stanton Foundation
To create a national, legislative alert system on the basis of issue or keyword – a Google Alerts for public policy.

· $75,000.00 SRA International, Inc.
For general support.

· $60,000.00 William and Flora Hewlett Foundation
For development of open-source software that reveals the patterns of influence behind public comments.

· $50,000.00 Chang K. Park Foundation
For general support.

· $40,000.00 Open Society Foundations
To expand and diversify a coalition of groups that will publicly demand transparency from the “Super Committee” and to coordinate action among the coalition.

· $40,000.00 Rockefeller Brothers Fund
To ensure greater transparency of the effects that corporations have on American public policy.

· $37,000.00 Minnesota Historical Society
Contract

· $27,525.00 OSI-ZUG
For support of TransparencyCamp 2011.

· $25,000.00 Alan A. Fischer
For general support.

· $25,000.00 Craigslist Charitable Fund
For general support.

· $25,000.00 Stephen M. Silberstein Foundation
For general support.

· $23,245.87 Omidyar Network
For support of TransparencyCamp 2011.

· $5,000.00 Esther Dyson
For general support.

· $5,000.00 Fidelity Charitable Gift Fund, Helianthus Fund
For general support, at the recommendation of Marjorie B. Roswell.

· $5,000.00 Google, Inc.
For support of TransparencyCamp 2011.

· $5,000.00 James and Theodore Pedas Family Foundation, Inc.
For general support.

· $5,000.00 M & M Foundation
For general support.

· $5,000.00 O’Reilly Media, Inc.
For support of TransparencyCamp 2011.

· $5,000.00 Raymond C. Clevenger, III
For general support.

· $4,423.23 O’Reilly Media, Inc.
Royalties from the book Beautiful Data, 1st Edition

· $2,500.00 Adobe Systems Incorporated
For support of TransparencyCamp 2011.

· $2,500.00 David Bonderman
For general support.

· $2,500.00 Fidelity Charitable Gift Fund, Andrew C. Florance Fund
For general support, at the recommendation of Andrew C. Florance.

· $1,000.00 Lederer Foundation, Inc.
For general support.

· $600.00 Scott Crabtree
For general support.

· $500.00 Warren H. Haber
For general support.

That’s just 2011. Question – is charity in the name of political expediency still charity? The Foundation doesn’t try to hide any of its connections – it’s right there for all to see. George Soros is The Open Society Institute. Do you really think these organizations are being ethical and transparent when they are bought and paid for by the likes of George Soros? If you do, I have a bridge to sell you and some great swamp land that you really must see or not.

Just how deep does Sunlight go down the Soros spider hole? All the way to the bottom baby. Don’t mistake sunlight for an on-coming Progressive freight train bent on manipulating political data online.

By: Terresa Monroe-Hamilton - the NoisyRoom

Will Ignorance Lead to a Second Obama Term??

Stealing Election 2012

Good reads if you haven’t already:

The Road to the White House 2012, Barack Obama and the Enemies Within and Throw Them All Out

Let Congress Hear You... Call, Fax, Email, Write or Show-Up In Their Offices!

The hottest places in Hell are reserved for those who, in a period of moral crisis, maintain their neutrality. -- Dante Alighieri / Often Quoted by and credited to Mark Twain
If you choose not to go this route… call and fax your Senator and as many of them on the list yourself, but don’t sit idly by!!
United States Capitol switchboard at (202) 224 or 225 -3121
Senators from your State.
Call the White House at 202-456-1414 or 1111 and tell President Obama you have had enough!

Find Out Here: How Did Your Congressman Vote ????

Call the switchboard for the house of Representatives in Washington today... your Congressperson and Nancy Pelosi and tell them "NO on Cap and Trade" & NO on the Carbon Tax!!!

Stop the Insanity!!! Stand-Up American... You Are Not Alone!!!

"...there comes a time, ladies and gentlemen, when ideology can cause death. I am so tired, so tired, of zealots, primarily on the left, putting their insane personal agendas above the safety of fellow Americans. Do you think the brave soldiers and Marines operating in dangerous areas right now want [unreleased photos of alleged abuse of prisoners] all over al-Jazeera and the terror websites? So let's look out for the military, OK? Nancy Pelosi has an obligation to get the loons in her party under control. If the Speaker can't do that, she doesn't deserve her position." ... Bill O'Reilly