Tag Archives: corruption

Big Brother–our Congress and President

A commentator today explained why the Democrats are pushing forward with health care legislation, despite overwhelming disapproval by the American public.  Even in Massachusetts, a liberal state by anyone’s definition, 51-60% are adamantly against the Democrats’ proposals.

The legislation is so distasteful, expensive, costly, and ineffective, that even Democrats like Ben Nelson demanded a break from the onerous provisions of the bill.  He got it for his vote.  Mary Landrieu, too, was devious enough to sell her vote with 300 million reasons to vote in favor of the bill.  And, the other Senators undoubtedly got behind-the-scene benefits, too. And, then, the unions got their piece of the action by not having to pay the Cadillac tax on health premiums like the rest of us will have to.

The reason these Democrats are willing to sell their vote is not because they believe in the legislation’s benefits.  No, they are selling their vote to gain an advantage for their constituents so that these same constituents re-elect them.  How crass.  How corrupt.

And, why are they willing to risk the public’s wrath?  Today’s commentator says that Democrats understand that the American public does NOT want this health care legislation to pass.  But, guess what?  The Democrats think that the public can be talked into accepting the government running health care WHEN THE ENTITLEMENTS START.  As Juan Williams commented today,  “People love entitlements!”

Sure.  Everyone wants a free ride.  But, for some of us, we are tired of being the donkey carrying the entire load.  Let Big Brother, i.e., Obama, the Congress, and other free-loaders, step away from their plush jobs, enter the workforce like the rest of us, and, at least give the pretense of paying their own way.

Obama vs. Bush

This was a forwarded email. (I’ve removed images to keep it short and sweet.)

If George W. Bush had made a joke at the expense of the Special Olympics, would you have approved?

If George W. Bush had given Tony Blair a set of inexpensive and useless (to Tony Blair’s UK video formatting) DVDs, when Tony Blair had given him a thoughtful and historically significant gift, would you have approved?

If George W. Bush had given the Queen of England an iPod containing videos of his speeches, would you have approved?

If George W. Bush had bowed to the King of Saudi Arabia, would you have approved?

If George W. Bush had visited Austria and made reference to the non-existent “Austrian language,” would you have brushed it off as a minor slip?

If George W. Bush had filled his cabinet and circle of advisers with people who cannot seem to keep current on their income taxes, would you have approved?

If George W. Bush had ordered the firing of the CEO of a major corporation, even though he had no constitutional authority to do so, would you have approved?

If George W. Bush had proposed to double the national debt, which had taken more than two centuries to accumulate, in one year, would you have approved?

If George W. Bush had then proposed to double the debt again within 10 years, would you have approved?

So, tell me again, what is it about Obama that makes him so brilliant and impressive?

Can’t think of anything? Don’t worry. He’s done all this in 10 weeks — so you’ll have three years and nine-and-a-half months to come up with an answer.

Fixing the System

Washington, D.C., has become the political cess pool of America!

We’ve all known that many, if not most, of our Congress people are greedy, self-serving people.  And, because they have such low personal morality, they are willing to let any kind of riff raff serve in any capacity.  Take, for example, the nominee for Secretary of the Treasury who admits that he, inadvertently (so he says), FORGOT to pay social security taxes on money earned while he was at the IMF.  Now, if any one of us taxpayers had done the same thing, we would be tarred and feathered, and most likely in jail.  Remember Leona Helmsley who had a vast hotel empire, and whose tax “forms” would have been mountains and mountains of paperwork?  She was convicted of tax evasion , despite everyone acknowledging that she did not have  the financial training to check her taxes.  She claimed to have signed her tax forms without reading through them, just like almost any business person does.  But, her “embarrassment”  didn’t carry any weight in the courts and she served jail time.

Now, we have a nominee for the Treasury who couldn’t even get his own taxes right!  Shouldn’t he have questioned whether all his taxes were paid?  And shouldn’t the Senate consider his mistake serious enough to exclude him from serving in the Treasury?  Oh, I forgot.  Apparently, he is given a pass by the Senate because “he was obviously embarrassed”!!!! 

What?   What are our representatives  thinking?  They are supposed to root out unworthy nominees.  They should tell President elect Obama ,  “No.  This man is not qualified for the position because of his past errors!”   Unfortunately, even Senator Hatch was making excuses for this man — a man  who was obviously incapable of  managing even his own, personal  taxes.  If he can’t take care of his own affairs, how could he possibly be capable of running a governmental agency ? 

When our system of checks and balances no longer checks and balances, our entire system is likely to suffer.  We need good, upright, and MORAL people to run our government.  We need the Congress to do their job of certifying candidates for public service.   Or, are we supposed to excuse every mistake and every misdeed because the perpetrator is “embarrassed”.  Maybe we have to excuse those who are “sorry”, too. ….or, how about “misinformed” candidates? 

In Washington, politicians are excused for all the problems in their past;  but, if Obama wants to fix the system, he needs nominees who themselves are examples of good, clean living.  So far, his nominees include the notorious Senator Clinton, the defrocked Daschle, and now this rotten apple. 

Obama had it right during his campaign when he said that the system  needs fixing.   Unfortunately, with yet another morally-challenged nominee, it doesn’t look as though Obama is going to fix anything!  He has become a true Washington, D.C., insider!

Never ending corruption……

Or, maybe the title should be “you gets what you pay for!”. 

After all, President elect Obama promised change for America, but then he brought in all the old, corrupt, Democratic  leadership from years past.  Some of “you” asked for him, and you got him!  Unfortunately, now we all have to live under his learning curve and mistakes!

Take his nomination of Hillary Clinton for Secretary of State.  Well, that pleased many of the Lieberals who, for some weird reason, believe she is “their” leader.  But, in choosing her, and others with similarly corrupt histories (can you say Daschle and Richardson?), Obama exonerates her and others from all their past misdeeds.

Hopefully, the nomination process will reveal many of Hillary’s past activities which, in anyone else except a Kennedy, would be criminal.  Online sources reveal that Hillary made many inappropriate requests for help from those who later donated to her husband’s charities.  Maybe this is not quite as blatant as taking the silverware when you leave the White House, but its deviousness alone should be a warning to not confirm her.

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20090113/ap_on_go_ca_st_pe/clinton_letters___dollars

After all, pretty is as pretty does.  If she was corrupt in the past, odds are she will be corrupt in the future.  I’m afraid, with Obama’s submission to the old Establishment of the Democratic party, his presidency  will see never ending corruption.

Innocent?

The debacle now facing Illinois due to their governor’s arrest reveals the conflict between the demands of our  political system and our rule of law.  Everyone knows the basic tenet of our judicial system  that we are  “Innocent until proven guilty.”   However, now it appears that being charged has become tantamount to being guilty.   What happened to the governor’s right to his day in court?  After all, undermining the rights of anyone, even a governor, reduces Constitutional protections that all of us would need if  charges were made against any one of us! 

No one is arguing the illegality nor the immorality in  attempting to sell a senate seat.  But, did he actually do that?  We won’t know until the verdict is read.   And, even then, sometimes justice goes awry because the judge can make bad rulings on evidence or the jury can be blinded by tangential issues. 

However, we have to at least try to let the system work.  And, throwing someone out of office, based on an arrest warrant, is not the way our system is supposed to work.  So, is the governor guilty — without a trial — or is he innocent until PROVEN guilty?

Who’s for "go" and who’s for "show" ?

The difference between the political parties in dealing with scandals is strikingly clear when you compare the reactions of both parties to the despicable actions of the Florida legislator.

When a Democrat shows bad behaviour, the Democrats circle the wagons and use every means, fair and foul, to keep that person in office. President Clinton was the most recent and egregious betrayer of the public trust when he abused a White House intern and lied about it to the public. He was not the only Democrat to commit immoral and even criminal acts, but he certainly was the most public figure to do so. What happened? Most Democrats tried to defend him rather than impeach him.

Now, a Republican has been caught and what happened? The Republicans immediately forced the miscreant to resign. While the Democrats are whooping and hollering, happy to witch hunt with questions about who knew what, when, and how, the Republicans acted.

That is the difference between the two parties. The Democrats scheme to gain the most political mileage from every event. The Republicans act honorably and evict the offender.