Recently in Corruption Category

More red meat for Chan: Gerald Warner in the London Telegraph calls the establishment of a review by the United Nations-established IPCC "a whitewash," following the scandal of the released e-mails, which may have been an inside job or an outside hacker.

Instead, they [the IPCC] have opted for a very obvious whitewash, discredited from the day of its launch, that will provoke hilarity and increased skepticism when it reports. After that, there will be no road back. We should be grateful that the arrogance and over-confidence engendered by their longstanding immunity from challenge (but not any more) prompted the AGW [anthropogenic global warming] fraudsters to create so inadequate a smokescreen.

As Nixon found out, it's the cover-up that nails you to the wall.

A car in Washington, DC, abandoned in a traffic lane near a busy intersection close to an embassy remains there a week until public notice prompts the police to act. Harumph! And people pay taxes for this?

HT: Outside the Beltway

Stuart Taylor and KC Johnson's book on the Duke Lacrosse rape allegation and the ensuing madness on the left-wing campus never was the success it ought to have been. Great book, with a few minor typographical or grammatical errors.

The disgusting woman who started it all, Crystal Magnum, a real piece of backyard poop, is in the news. Again.

Even members of the MSM can learn the lessons of ClimateGate. One reporter from northern California even changed his mind about AGW after seeing the overwhelming evidence of scientific fraud committed in the name of "climate science".

A few years ago, I accepted global warming theory with few doubts. I wrote several columns for this paper condemning what I thought were unfair attacks by skeptics and defending the climate scientists.

Boy, was I naive.

Since the Climategate emails and documents revealed active collusion to thwart skeptics and even outright fraud, I've been trying to correct the record of my earlier foolishness. In one of those columns, I even wrote: "And see Real Climate (www.realclimate.org) for global warming science without the political spin."

In fact, Real Climate was and is nothing more than the house organ of global warming activists, concerned more with politics than with science.

When the self-blinded finally come to see the light, the transformation is amazing to behold. Even if this fellow at some point decides we are at fault for (the presently reversing) global warming, at least it's likely he will come to this conclusion based upon real science and not the political pandering that has been masquerading as science.

There is hope, as illustrated by this one reporter.

It has become quite apparent that our so-called representatives in both chambers of Congress have ceased to represent us and instead have gone off in a radical direction that will, in the end, cripple America with crushing debt, destroy an imperfect but working health care system that rivals that of any place else on the planet, erode even more of our rights, and create economic roadblocks that will do nothing but further weaken our ability to compete in the world's marketplace. It is the nightmare of Ayn Rand's Atlas Shrugged come to life. With all of this in mind, is it any surprise a large majority of Americans are so angry with Congress and their Leftist Overlord?

We're trying in every way legally and officially possible to make clear that we don't want the radical meal we're being forced to eat. We fervently do not want to "fundamentally transform" America. But there is such a huge disconnect from our world to our representatives'. It's as if we are ghosts whom they can't see or hear! When someone refuses to listen, going so far as to ignore you, don't you shout louder? Doesn't it anger you? When you're attacked and belittled because you have to shout to be heard and you're still ignored, doesn't that infuriate you? These people miss that we passionately don't want what they want. The more they refuse to hear us, the more we try to make them. We are not going away.

We're justly and increasingly angry because our reps not only refuse to hear us, but they also chastise us for wanting to be heard. How else would they expect us to react when we feel so helpless and hopeless? No matter what we want, say, or do, our government is going to force us to eat a meal we never ordered. In addition, we keep saying, "no, we don't want this," but they keep putting affirmations in our mouths and proceeding with their radical agenda anyway. We are not enjoying the governmental rape of our country. We said "no," and "no" means "no" in every language. Why doesn't this matter? Every poll reflects the president's rapidly declining approval rating -- for good reason. And still, Robert Gibbs flippantly dismisses it. How are "we the people" supposed to feel? Certainly we do not feel happy, or even just mildly upset, about being disregarded. Far-left ideologues who supposedly espouse "compassionate" causes have no compassion for how we feel, nor do they have a clue that we are an angry mob of their own creation.

I certainly feel angry, particularly with my Congressional Representative, Carol Shea-Porter (D-NH1), who has shown a penchant for dismissing any of her 'constituents' who do not ascribe to her particular political beliefs. On more than one occasion she is alleged to have referred to those of us non-Democrats living in her Congressional District as not being her constituents. That's funny as I thought everyone living in her district was her constituent, whether we agreed with her politics or not. So much for being our representative. Instead she represents only her own points of view and the hell with the rest of us. (I have a feeling Ms. Shea-Porter will have a very rude awakening come next November when she's booted, bag and baggage, from her seat.)

Obama's falling poll numbers certainly indicate a lot of our anger, particularly when his approval rating after a little over 11 months in office is worse than George W. Bush's after eight years.

Yet there's another twist that might make we angry Americans even angrier: Pelosi and Reid's move to short-circuit the normal conference process, where differences between House and Senate versions of a given bill are hammered out. Instead, reconciling the differences between the two health care reform bills will likely be done behind closed doors, out of the public eye, with little input from members of either house. In other words, the fix will be in.

When Democrats took over Congress in 2007, they increasingly did not send bills through the regular conference process. "We have to defer to the bigger picture," explained Rep. Henry Waxman of California. So the children's health insurance bill passed by the House that year was largely dumped in favor of the Senate's version. House Ways and Means Chairman Charles Rangel and other Democrats complained the House had been "cut off at the knees" but ultimately supported the bill. Legislation on lobbying reform and the 2007 energy bill were handled the same way -- without appointing an actual conference.

Rather than appoint members to a public conference committee, those measures were "ping-ponged" -- i.e. changes to reconcile the two versions were transmitted by messenger between the two houses as the final product was crafted behind closed doors solely by the leadership. Many Democrats grumbled at the secrecy. "We need to get back to the point where we use conference committees . . . and have serious dialogue," said Rep. Artur Davis of Alabama at the time.

But serious dialogue isn't what Speaker Pelosi and Majority Leader Reid are interested in right now. Look for the traditional conference committee to be replaced by a "ping-pong" game in which health care is finalized behind closed doors with little public scrutiny before the bill is rushed to the floor of each chamber for a final vote.

Is there any wonder why things like the TEA party movement have been growing? Is there any wonder why confrontations between members of Congress and the public have been becoming more heated and less polite? Why are the Democrats so surprised when far too many of them have been ignoring their constituents back home, ignoring their wishes, ignoring their phone calls, letters, and e-mails, and following the lead of Pelosi and Reid, neither of whom has the best interests of the American people at heart. Instead they have their own Leftist Utopia-driven agenda that has nothing to do with what the American people want or need.

And the anger grows.....

I heard Martin Gross, our present-day Jeremiah, on Michael Medved's show on this podcast. Five stars. Today I heard him on this G. Gordon Liddy podcast. Simply marvelous--you really have to listen to it. I mean I might even transcribe it; Mr. Gross goes on such tremendous riffs. Taped on December 4 and lasting 21:53, the podcast reveals what I've always thought but have been too timid to say: Obama is not only uninformed, not being a disciplined book reader, he's unintelligent.

Mr. Gross, a preeminent number cruncher and a old-time Democrat like Ronald Reagan, calls the current President "a master of deception [who] lies all the time." I know most politicians are liars, but this guy is on a Mt. Olympus-level of deceit. He also says, "The Democratic party has become the party of treason....The Democratic party has left us, and has left the United States in its loyalties, not consciously...[here he gets cut off at the end by a hard break]" Strong stuff, but increasingly an appropriate tonic, in light of how Democrats are treating the War on Terror with civilian trials, ridiculous mini-buildups lasting a year, not using the word victory at West Point (The cadets must have been groaning in their seats listening to the Community Organizer.), and not even calling the truth of Islamic terror by its true name, Islamic terror. I mean the Democratic primary was a joke on the whole topic, never once using the words "Islamic terror" in all their televised debates.

Gross, whose 1992 book received beaucoups media attention, is relegated now almost exclusively to the conservative and Christian talk radio circuit--my how times have changed!-- with an even more important book in 2009--National Suicide. (He says Christians, because of their belief in personal responsibility, have been marvelously receptive to his message.) His take on the vastly different levels of media exposure is that the media has changed. Boy, have they ever. All pretense of being disinterested purveyors of news and views has long gone by the wayside.

The Shallow Stream Media is not to be trusted, but Martin Gross is. What he has to say is jarring. Sometimes that's the way the truth is.

After the hacked and leaked e-mails and data files from the University of East Anglia's CRU became public, the hew and cry from both sides of the AGW debate rose to a level I've not witnessed before. The leaked information illuminated the fraudulent, dishonest, and in some cases, illegal activities of some of the 'premier' global warming researchers, both in the UK and elsewhere in the world. Cover ups, destruction and willful denial of publicly financed research data to those requesting it under both the UK and US Freedom of Information laws, and collusion to 'jigger' data to eliminate evidence that show climate models are wrong and to bolster preconceived ideas about human-caused climate change.

The AGW skeptics, including yours truly, can point to the files to show that scientific integrity has been lost, that all AGW alarmist doom-and-gloom predictions are based upon fraudulent, cherry-picked data and algorithms designed to produce a predetermined outcome regardless of the data fed into them.

That in itself might be a major news story, but the deafening silence from the MSM implies the fix is still in. Other than Fox News, the Wall Street Journal, and a few other news outlets, there has been little, if anything from the major media. About the only exception has been the New York Times, and that surprised me (though it appears they tried to downplay the significance of the leaked data). The rest of the media are acting like nothing's changed, still publishing iffy reports laying out "We're all gonna DIE if we don't impoverish ourselves NOW!!" scenarios. But readers/listeners/watchers aren't buying it, making comment after comment about Climategate and lambasting the media for acting like it doesn't exist.

But what disturbs me more than lack of attention by the MSM and the governments of the UK and the US are the comments posted by the faithful AlGoristas, bending over backwards to explain away the leaked e-mails, data, and jiggered computer code. Reading the comments to the WSJ article linked above, it is quite apparent that quite a few of those trying to debunk the leaked information have an ax to grind, their reasoning having absolutely nothing to do with the AGW fraud exposed. They blame the WSJ (as if reporting about the hacked and leaked data was somehow 'just not done'). They blame George Bush (I haven't quite figured that one out). They blame a nameless conspiracy bent on the destruction of the human race (I haven't figured out the logic of that one, either). Others seem to be lamenting the fact they won't receive the financial gains they expected due to AGW carbon credits/alternative energy schemes/complete control over the energy production portion of the economy. And yet others claim the multi-megabytes of e-mails, data, and computer code is all a hoax, created to discredit the researchers and their sainted AlGore. Never mind that the folks at the University of East Anglia say it appears the files posted onto the 'net are genuine. That will not deter the true believers.

As the old saying goes, don't confuse the issue with facts. The Warmists will not be denied despite evidence saying their beliefs are based upon falsified data and computer climate models that are little more than means of manipulating other data to 'prove' AGW regardless of what the data really says.

I rarely watch TV except to watch football, that violent collision sport.

But on one of my stops on the 'Net I read this on Neal's "Nuze" (the humorous video demonstrates the lie that the congressman utters over and over) and then did a google search to find this from Bill O'Reilly's TV show. My goodness!

Isn't this Alan Grayson (D-Orlando, Florida) the guy who called the lack of health insurance coverage a holocaust or something hysterical like that?

How he hides in his office, lies to a Fox news reporter shows a pusillanimity that reminds me of the classic American Commonwealth by British nobleman James Bryce who famously pointed out that the best men in America don't go into politics. That book is like a runner-up to De Tocqueville's classic Democracy in America.

Is this snakepit lawyer the best Orlando can vomit forth to serve in Washington?

Now that Obama has gotten his way in regards to Honduras and the return of Chavez protege Zelaya to the presidency, I have to wonder what he will do should Zelaya impose a Chavez-like socialist dictatorship, abolish the Congress, eliminate freedom of speech, muzzle the press, tear up the Honduran constitution, and 'disappear' his political opponents?

I have no doubt our own Chavez fan will praise Zelaya's actions and make some kind of noise about "correcting past American wrongs" by allowing a representative democracy to fall into the hands of his socialist brethren.

This was stolen shamelessly in its entirety from Maggie's Farm. It was too good to just link it. (The only changes made were in formatting and one or two minor spelling error corrections.)

I do not think it's so much because people want freedom and choice (although they do) as it is because people have no confidence in government entitlement programs (which the Dem plans are all about, ultimately). Why?

Social Security - bankrupt
Postal Service - bankrupt
Welfare - had devastating unintended consequences for which the nation still pays and from which the nation continues to suffer (eg huge rates - up to 70% - of single motherhood among beneficiaries)
Medicare - bankrupt
Medicaid - bankrupting the states
Government-run (ie union-controlled) schools: are people thrilled with them?
Fannie Mae and Freddy Mac - bankrupt
The "stimulus" - a failure, but it did create 25,000 new government jobs!

The future tax consequences of the above are daunting to people, and the idea of adding another trillion or so frightens the heck out of people who are thinking about their own well-being, their kids' futures - and also about the nation's.

The sad thing is that most of what people complain about in health care can be easily solved without giant government controls and bureaucracies:

1. Permit interstate competition among insurance companies so people can have a wide range of choices of types of policies including cheap major medical which is what makes sense for most people, and explain the basic fact that medical care has to be paid for, and even saved for, same as car repairs and house repairs and vacations (and legal costs). That is what grown-ups do. You can get major medical for a family for the price of a big-screen TV.
2. Portability of insurance - so you own it (that is complicated tho for companies that self-insure)
3. A law that says you cannot be canceled if you get sick
4. State "pools" for the uninsurable, same as for uninsurable drivers. We already have (bankrupt) Medicaid for the poor.

How easy and non-controversial would those changes be? Abundant, high quality, and fairly expensive medical care is one of the great blessings and privileges of a prosperous society, and thus an important economic engine. Why kill it? People want these things.

Do Americans want to be grown-ups, or children? It's our call.

The Barrister also suggests we contact our Senators and House Representatives and let them know our views on the Democrat health care reform plans. I have already done so and my congresscritter, Carol Shea-Porter (D-NH1), has made it quite clear she doesn't give a damn what I think. The same is true of one of our two senators, Jeanne Shaheen (D-NH). But that doesn't mean I won't stop contacting their offices (I use snail-mail rather than e-mail because it's too easy to hit the Delete key), and let them know my thoughts on various issues and legislation.

You've got to hand it to the French. When it comes to American companies they have no problems resorting to extortion to force them to make decisions that may not be in the best interest of the companies involved.

A French minister on Wednesday threatened to ask French automakers to blacklist an American electronics company if managers don't find a way to keep its French plant open.

Industry Minister Christian Estrosi has been trying to broker a deal with executives of Illinois-based Molex Inc., an electronic components maker. The company temporarily shut down its plant in southern France on Aug. 5 after charging that workers angry about the planned closure of the plant had injured an American manager and two security guards.

Unless Molex is willing to keep the plant open or to sell the plant to French interests, Estrosi is planning on instructing French automakers to "immediately suspend all orders for material including products made by the Molex group."

In the US such an act might be considered a violation of RICO statutes, leaving the Minister open to corruption and racketeering charges.

FairPoint Communications is in the news again, and not in a good way.

Local news outlets report an anonymous e-mail from a FairPoint "insider" alleges FairPoint "misrepresented test data" showing they were ready to take over operations from Verizon in northern New England.

FairPoint's cut-over to its independent systems began Jan. 30, 10 months after it acquired the landline business from Verizon in the three northern New England states. It leased computers and equipment from Verizon during the transition period leading up to cut-over. After the cut-over, FairPoint experienced delays in answering consumers' phone calls and processing orders for wholesale customers. There were also billing problems and other concerns.

An e-mail to the Vermont Public Service Board alleged that tests observed by Liberty Consulting Group on behalf of the three northern New England states were fakes -- not real-time, live demonstrations.

The attorney general offices of all three northern New England states are investigating the allegations.

Considering the troubles FairPoint customers have suffered since the cut-over from Verizon I have little problem believing the allegation. Customers haven't been receiving bills, have been unable to add, change, or terminate their phone service. Service calls takes weeks, if not months to complete. These problems have caused FairPoint to lose 13% of their customers over this past year.

The anonymous e-mail states FairPoint wasn't really ready for the cut-over.

In his original e-mail, sent Aug. 14 to regulators, the writer, who called himself "David Unavailable," wrote:

"As January neared and it appeared to everyone on site in Atlanta that there would be another delay, suddenly Peter Nixon (FairPoint's president) and Gene Johnson (its then-CEO) made the announcement that the cut to the new systems would take place at the end of January and the relationship with Verizon would end. Most people were stunned as it did not appear feasible."

In his later note to the AP, the writer said FairPoint had a strong incentive to complete the cutover: It was paying monthly fees to Verizon for continuing to use its system after the sale between the two companies closed. This was confirmed by a report filed by Liberty with state regulators.

If these allegations are true, then the people of northern New England were taken for $2.3 billion (the sale price of Verizon's landline assets) and will end up paying the price for the duplicitous actions of FairPoint's executives.

Received via e-mail:

(Whoever wrote this one deserves a HUGE pat on the back!)

Like a lot of folks in this state, I have a job. I work, they pay me. I pay my taxes, and the government distributes my taxes as it sees fit. In order to get that paycheck, I am required to pass a random urine test, with which I have no problem. What I do have a problem with is the distribution of my taxes to people who don't have to pass a urine test.

So here is my Question:

Shouldn't one have to pass a urine test to get a welfare check, because I have to pass one to earn it for them? Please understand, I have no problem with helping people get back on their feet. I do, on the other hand, have a problem with helping someone sitting on their rump - doing drugs, while I work. Can you imagine how much money the state would save if people had to pass a urine test to get a public assistance check? I guess we could title that program, 'Urine or You're Out'.

I have no idea of the origin of this e-mail, nor could I find any mention of it at Snopes.com. But I must admit I agree with the sentiment.

Something I find interesting about Thomas Daniel, the so-called "investigator" looking into the ethics complaint against Sarah Palin and the legal defense fund created for her by supporters, who determined her legal defense fund violates Alaskan ethics laws, happens to be tied in with a number of Democrat Party heavy-hitters, including John Kerry, John Edwards, and the Democratic National Committee. You can't tell me this guy has no ax to grind.

By the way, this is the same "investigator" who leaked his findings to the Associated Press, which ran with the story. As was asked at American Thinker, "Will someone please teach AP how to Google?" One would think they'd want to check their source for possible bias or underhanded dealings. But then, the AP isn't up on these newfangled things like the Internet, search engines, and such.

No partisan bias here, folks! Move along! Nothing to see here! Move along....

I have to wonder why Barney Frank is still in office.

First, he torpedoes any effort by Congress or President Bush to tighten controls on Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, declaring they were both financially sound even though their lending practices were sketchy at best.

We all know what happened to Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac.

Now dimbulb Barney wants Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac to loosen their lending standards again.

Back when the housing mania was taking off, Massachusetts Congressman Barney Frank famously said he wanted Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac to "roll the dice" in the name of affordable housing. That didn't turn out so well, but Mr. Frank has since only accumulated more power. And now he is returning to the scene of the calamity -- with your money. He and New York Representative Anthony Weiner have sent a letter to the heads of Fannie and Freddie exhorting them to lower lending standards for condo buyers.

You read that right. After two years of telling us how lax lending standards drove up the market and led to loans that should never have been made, Mr. Frank wants Fannie and Freddie to take more risk in condo developments with high percentages of unsold units, high delinquency rates or high concentrations of ownership within the development.

Isn't this how we got into trouble in the first place? He doesn't get it, does he? He really doesn't get it.

Two notable quotes that apply to the situation our nation faces today:

"I sincerely believe ... that banking establishments are more dangerous than standing armies, and that the principle of spending money to be paid by posterity under the name of funding is but swindling futurity on a large scale." - Thomas Jefferson to John Taylor - 1816

"Freedom is never more than one generation away from extinction. We didn't pass it to our children in the bloodstream. It must be fought for, protected, and handed on for them to do the same, or one day we will spend our sunset years telling our children and our children's children what it was once like in the United States where men were free. " - Ronald Reagan

Both our financial system and our freedoms are under attack, all in the name of "fairness" and "equality" and "sharing the wealth", by a President who seems to think the Constitution is something that can be ignored when it is convenient to do so, coddles our enemies, abandons our allies, and diddles with our economic system without understanding how it works, and taking control of some banks because they have been deemed 'too big to fail'.

You know something's screwy with the Democratic regime in Washington when even the Russians and Chinese are warning us not to go down the path of socialism. You'd figure they know better than anyone that socialism doesn't really work. That's why they've abandoned it.

It certainly bankrupted the old Soviet Union. Even the Chinese Communist Party has seen the wisdom of abandoning socialism, seeing it was nothing but a con game foisted upon the people. And now the triumvirate of Obama, Pelosi, and Reid want to put us in a position the Russians and Chinese have struggled so hard to leave behind? How stupid is that?

Considering Chicago's political machine and the history of Illinois governors and corruption over the past four decades, this headline comes as no surprise:

"Governor, chief of staff arrested in political in 'political corruption crime spree' "