Tag Archives: Corruption

The National Park’s Service’s Million Dollar Out-House

THEY DON’T EVEN FLUSH!!! If the national parks department can pay a million dollars for an outhouse, how much do you think the national healthcare system will pay for hospitals?

“Heading to a national park this holiday weekend? As I reported before, if you go to the right one, you may have the privilege of using a million-dollar outhouse.

In Pennsylvania, the National Park Service built a one-seater outhouse that looks more like a chalet than a toilet.”

“When the government spends your money, they decide local slate isn’t good enough. The slate must be imported from Vermont.

They must use flower seed that costs $700 a pound. The outhouse must have windows and a porch. Why does an outhouse need a porch? And of course, the paint must be epoxy that costs $78 a gallon.

When the smoke cleared, more than $780,000 had been spent to build the outhouse. How did they spend that much? Well, bureaucracy costs money.

It took more than a dozen Park Service engineers and architects two years to design the outhouse. That cost over $100,000. Then to oversee the project, a supervisor from Denver lived onsite in Pennsylvania for about a year. That cost another $80,000.

Then they had to get environmental approvals and meet all government construction rules. That meant hiring minority-owned firms; size requirements mandated by the Americans With Disabilities Act; and paying union-like construction wages. It adds up.

And it gets worse. In Montana, the Park Service has built a four-hole outhouse. The cost: One million dollars. Give me a break. ” (from blogs.abcnews.com)

Madoff Claimed He Was “On The Short List” To Be Next SEC Chairman

The crooks are in charge.

Bernard Madoff once boasted that he ‘was on the short list’ to be the next chairman of the Securities and Exchange Commission, according to a report issued Wednesday by the agency’s internal watchdog.

The blistering report offers new details into how the agency missed the multi-billion-dollar Ponzi scheme.

Madoff’s claim came during a 2005 interview with agency investigators. The report doesn’t detail whether Madoff’s claim was ultimately verified but it did note that Madoff told the investigators that Christopher Cox — the now-disgraced former SEC chairman — would be appointed to the position ‘a few weeks prior’ to the official announcement. (Read more from huffingtonpost.com)

Congressman Rangel (D – NY), chairman of tax-writing Ways and Means Committee, also ducks taxes

This is scarcely worth posting. It seem very clear that taxes are for us little people, and not our leaders who feast off them.

“Earlier this month the Chairman of the tax-writing Ways and Means Committee ‘amended’ his 2007 financial disclosure form—to the tune of more than a half-million dollars in previously unreported assets and income. That number may be as high as $780,000, because Congress’s ethics rules only require the Members to report their finances within broad ranges. This voyage of personal financial discovery brings Mr. Rangel’s net worth for 2007 to somewhere between $1.028 million and $2.495 million, while his previous statement came in at $516,015 and $1.316 million.

When you’re a powerful Congressman and working diligently to increase tax rates to pay for President Obama’s health-care plan, we suppose it’s easy to lose track of one of your checking accounts.” (online.wsj.com)

Firms with Obama ties profit from health push

More change we can believe in.

“President Barack Obama’s push for a national health care overhaul is providing a financial windfall in the election offseason to Democratic consulting firms that are closely connected to the president and two top advisers.

Coalitions of interest groups running at least $24 million in pro-overhaul ads hired GMMB, which worked for Obama’s 2008 campaign and whose partners include a top Obama campaign strategist. They also hired AKPD Message and Media, which was founded by David Axelrod, a top adviser to Obama’s campaign and now to the White House. AKPD did work for Obama’s campaign, and Axelrod’s son Michael and Obama’s campaign manager David Plouffe work there.” (Read more from news.yahoo.com)

U.S. Banking crisis just BEGINNING

“The dichotomy between the fantasy-world of U.S. business reporting and the real world continues to widen. While media propagandists have unequivocally claimed that ‘the worst is over’ for the U.S. banking sector, the employees and shareholders of the 77 U.S. banks which have already gone belly-up this year might choose to dispute this claim.

Five more insolvent U.S. banks were seized by the FDIC in its weekly salvage operations Friday night. As is becoming increasingly common, even with the large bribes which it offers potential buyers, it couldn’t find takers for all of these bankrupt companies.

Bank bankruptcies have already more than tripled the total for all of last year, and are steadily accelerating. Meanwhile, for a nearly endless list of reasons, the crisis in this sector can only get much worse.

Thanks to the U.S. accounting ‘watch-dog’ – the FASB – legalizing fraudulent accounting (see ‘FASB strong-armed into mark-to-fantasy accounting’), the ‘solution’ which the bankster oligarchs have come up with to the mass-insolvency of U.S. banks is to simply hide a lot more bad loans. Indeed, fraudulent accounting has become a way of life for the U.S.” (Read more from seekingalpha.com)

Goldman Sachs & Climate Change

As Matt Taibbi detailed in last month’s rollingstone, Goldman Sachs is poised to make huge profits from Cap & Trade legislation if it goes through.

“Last year when the firm spent $3.5 million to lobby climate issues. (One of their lobbyists at the time was none other than Patterson, now Treasury chief of staff.)” (More at failedexperiment.com)

And as of not-too-long-ago, the front page of Goldman’s website depicts a melting glacier:

Makes me say HMMMMMMmmmmm….

In a Savings Shocker, the Government Discovers That Paper Has Two Sides

“WASHINGTON — With the budget deficit soaring toward $2 trillion, the Department of Justice has figured out how to play its part: double-sided photocopying.

There are other acts of national sacrifice. The Forest Service will no longer repaint its new, white vehicles green immediately upon purchase. The Army will start packing more soldiers onto R&R flights. The Navy will delete unused email accounts.

Three months ago, President Barack Obama ordered his cabinet secretaries to find $100 million in budget cuts for the current fiscal year to emphasize the point that he, too, was serious about belt-tightening. They responded with $102 million. That is 0.006% of the estimated federal deficit.

The list of 77 spending cuts, which the White House is calling ‘the $100 million savings challenge,’ reflects the vastness of government — and its vast inefficiency. Hundreds of millions of dollars in savings were found simply by casting around for areas to trim.” (Read more from online.wsj.com)

Let us never forget that government is a disgusting, lazy, inefficient slob which finances itself by collecting money at the point of a gun. Let us be mindful of this when we consider giving government authority over, say, our healthcare, or anything else.

List of Obama’s Czars

A partial list:

1. Technology Czar: Aneesh Chopra

2. Drug Czar: Gil Kerlikowske
“Obama’s drug czar: Marijuana ‘has no medical benefit'” (Read more from prisonplanet.com)

3. Copyright Czar: Not appointed yet

4. Energy Czar: Carol M. Browner
“Obama’s Energy Czar: Socialist Agent For World Government” (Read more from infowars.com)

5. Car Czar: Ed Montgomery

6. Terrorism/WMD Czar: Gary Samore

7. Health Care Czar: Nancy-Ann DeParle

8. Education Czar: Not appointed yet

9. Economic Czar: Paul Volcker

10. Mortgage Czar: Not appointed yet

11. Urban Affairs/Housing Czar: Adolfo Carrion

12. Guantanomo closure Czar: Danny Fried

13. Great lakes Czar: Cameron Davis

14. Stimulus accountability Czar: Earl Devaney
Ha! Public Relations, psychological operations, and media control will come long before we see any Accountability.

15. Cyberspace Czar: Not appointed yet
“The cybersecurity chief will report to both the National Security Council and the National Economic Council, a compromise resulting from a fierce White House turf battle over the responsibilities and powers of the new office.” (Read more from online.wsj.com)

16. Border Czar: Alan Bersin (Former US attorney)

17. Intelligence Czar: Admiral Dennis Blair

18. Regulatory Czar: Cass Sunstein

19. Pay Czar: Kenneth “Kiss my ass if you want your paycheck” Feinberg
“Czar Kenneth Feinberg has the authority to set the pay scale for executives at any company receiving government money (and how many aren’t, these days?). Czar Feinberg has the power to say that someone’s pay is excessive, and to make companies cut that pay until the czar is pleased. Congress did not give Czar Feinberg this authority. For that matter, Congress has not authorized any of the czars that President Barack Obama has created.” (Read more from townhall.com)

20. Iran Czar: Not appointed yet

21. Tarp Czar: Herb Allison

22. Middle-East peace Czar: George Mitchell

23. Science Czar: John Holdren
“In a book Holdren co-authored in 1977, the man now firmly in control of science policy in this country wrote that:
• Women could be forced to abort their pregnancies, whether they wanted to or not;
• The population at large could be sterilized by infertility drugs intentionally put into the nation’s drinking water or in food;
• Single mothers and teen mothers should have their babies seized from them against their will and given away to other couples to raise;
• People who ‘contribute to social deterioration’ (i.e. undesirables) ‘can be required by law to exercise reproductive responsibility’ — in other words, be compelled to have abortions or be sterilized.
• A transnational ‘Planetary Regime’ should assume control of the global economy and also dictate the most intimate details of Americans’ lives — using an armed international police force.” (Read more from zombietime.com)

24. Green jobs Czar: Van Jones
“Jones was himself arrested and detained briefly during a protest after the Rodney King verdict that same year. Jones told the East Bay Express in 2005: ‘I was a rowdy nationalist on April 28th [1992], and then the verdicts came down on April 29th. By August, I was a communist. . . . I met all these young radical people of color – I mean really radical: communists and anarchists. And it was, like, “This is what I need to be a part of.” I spent the next ten years of my life working with a lot of those people I met in jail, trying to be a revolutionary.'” (Read more from examiner.com)

25. Afghanistan Czar: Richard Holbrooke
“The Curious Case of Richard Holbrooke – Obama’s Neocon” (Read more from counterpunch.org)

26. Sudan Czar: J. Scott Gration

27. Mideast policy Czar: Dennis “Mr. AIPAC” Ross
“Outside of the hard-line neocons such as Douglas Feith, Norman Podhoretz, Richard Perle, etc., it would be hard to come up with someone who would be less of an honest broker in the Middle East. . . . His post-Clinton record includes supporting the pro-Iraq War campaigns of the neocon Project for the New American Century and serving as a senior fellow with the Washington Institute for Near East Policy (WINEP), a significant pro-Israel think tank in Washington. . . . Ross has taken a very hostile position toward Iran Ross helped to produce the 2008 report “Meeting the Challenge: U.S. Policy Toward Iranian Nuclear Development,” The report argues that despite Iran’s assurances to the contrary, its nuclear program aims to develop nuclear weapons and is thus a threat to the U.S. This conclusion is contrary to the CIA’s November 2007 National Intelligence Estimate, which found that Iran had put its efforts to develop nuclear warheads on hold. . . .The report actually calls for the new US president to expand American military forces in the Middle East! Commentator Jim Lobe quite accurately refers to the report as a ‘roadmap to war.'” (Read more from rense.com)

28. Information Czar: Vivek Kundra

29. AIDS Czar: Jeffrey Crowley

30. Faith-based Czar: Joshua Dubois

31. Climate Czar: Todd Stern

32. Food Safety Czar: Michael “Monsanto” Taylor
“If GMOs are indeed responsible for massive sickness and death, then the individual who oversaw the FDA policy that facilitated their introduction holds a uniquely infamous role in human history. That person is Michael Taylor. He had been Monsanto’s attorney before becoming policy chief at the FDA. Soon after, he became Monsanto’s vice president and chief lobbyist.” (Read more from huffingtonpost.com)

Are you f@cking kidding me??? AP Praises Goldman

I suspect the masters of the universe didn’t like all the Goldman hate and made some phone calls to friends in the media.

Goldman Sachs’ $2.7B profit shows firm’s prowess
“Goldman Sachs is emerging as the king of post-meltdown Wall Street. The New York-based banking giant took advantage of improving markets to widen the gap between itself and its competitors, earning more than $2.7 billion during the second quarter.” (from news.yahoo.com)

How the hell can these guys be praised for their prowess after taking BILLIONS of dollars from people like me and you???

That’s it, I’m adding www.goldmansachs666.com to my blogroll. That’ll show them!

Goldman to Manipulate Cap and Trade

“Goldman Sachs, the Wall Street leviathan that is heavily invested in the cap-and-trade carbon market scam, has admitted it has developed and used software that can manipulate such financial markets.

The revelation came during proceedings in a legal case with enough plot twists to make even John Grisham proud; it was made, not by Goldman, but by an assistant U.S. Attorney.” (Read more from goldmansachs666.com)