tagged w/ taxpayer
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Obama coughed during his speech and joked, "Excuse me. I'm choked up with anger here."
Responding to a populist firestorm over the news that AIG planned to pay out millions in bonuses to many of the executives viewed to be responsible for the firm's near-collapse in 2008, President Obama announced he has directed Treasury Sec. Timothy Geithner to "pursue every legal avenue to block these bonuses" in embargoed remarks obtained by RAW STORY.
Noting the substantial sums AIG has received from the federal government, Obama said late Monday morning Geithner should use that leverage in pursuing a block of the bonuses.
"This is a corporation that finds itself in financial distress due to recklessness and greed," said Obama. "Under these circumstances, it’s hard to understand how derivative traders at AIG warranted any bonuses, much less $165 million in extra pay. How do they justify this outrage to the taxpayers who are keeping the company afloat?"Obama coughed during his speech and joked, "Excuse me. I'm choked up with... more
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General Motors Corp. posted a $9.6 billion fourth-quarter loss and said it burned through $6.2 billion of cash in the last three months of 2008 as it fought the worst U.S. auto sales climate since 1982 and sought government loans to keep the century-old company running.
The nation's biggest domestic automaker said Thursday it lost $30.9 billion for the full year and expects an opinion from its auditors as to whether the company remains a "going concern" when its annual report is issued in March. That means the auditors will determine whether there is substantial doubt about the automaker's ability to continue operations.General Motors Corp. posted a $9.6 billion fourth-quarter loss and said it burned... more
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I know we don't have any money to be handing out, but how can you bailout the financial district and let them take advantage of taxpayers while continuing their spa and resort trips, but not bailout the American Auto industry which employs over 33% of our nations workforce?
The car companies aren't the ones who got us into this mess, but the financial district and all the corruption did. Yet we give them handouts of 700Billion, and therefore can't afford to bailout American car makers. Does this not make sense to anybody else???I know we don't have any money to be handing out, but how can you bailout the... more
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The world's largest insurance company, AIG, spent $440,000 on a lavish corporate retreat at one of California's top beachside resorts a few days after accepting an $85bn emergency loan from the US government to stave off bankruptcy.
Details of the week-long getaway enraged legislators at a congressional hearing yesterday where AIG's former bosses were accused of spending taxpayers' money on pedicures, golf games and cocktails.
Crippled by losses on financial insurance companies, AIG was bailed out by US taxpayers on September 17 to avert a collapse which risked causing further failures.
The House oversight committee, which is investigating the company's problems, confronted AIG executives with an invoice from the St Regis resort in Monarch Beach, south of Los Angeles, detailing an eight-day company event which began five days after the rescue.
"Average Americans are suffering economically," said Henry Waxman, chairman of the committee. "They are losing their jobs, their homes and their health insurance. Yet less than one week after the taxpayers rescued AIG, company executives could be found wining and dining at one of the most exclusive resorts in the nation."
The bill shows that AIG spent $139,375 on rooms, $147,301 on "banquets", $23,380 on spa treatments and $6,939 on golf at an eight-day company event which began on September 22.
"US taxpayers will be, in effect, paying for this," said Elijah Cummings, another Democrat, who demanded to know who was responsible for the outlay. "I think that person ought to be fired."The world's largest insurance company, AIG, spent $440,000 on a lavish corporate... more
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Sept. 15 (Bloomberg) -- John McCain and the Republican National Committee entered the two-month general election campaign with twice as much money to spend as Democratic nominee Barack Obama.
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McCain had about $200 million at the close of the Republican National Convention on Sept. 4, including $84.1 million in federal funds, $76 million in the Republican Party bank account, plus money left over from the primary campaign. Obama had about $95 million, with $77 million in his campaign account and $17.5 million from the Democratic National Committee.
``McCain will have more than enough communication dollars to display his message,'' said Republican consultant Eddie Mahe.
Since Obama is not taking taxpayer funds for the general election, he can continue to raise money privately; in August, he brought in a record $66 million. McCain can no longer raise money for his campaign, except to cover some legal and accounting costs. In addition, Obama has already paid for an extensive get-out-the- vote operation that the Republicans are just now funding.
Still, the Republican Party money can be spent promoting McCain as long as it's not directly coordinated with his campaign.
Timing
``Republican Party fundraising is always going to be really good,'' Democratic consultant Jenny Backus said. ``If Obama and the Democratic Party had to be behind any time in this race, it's not bad to have it now when you still have 60 days to raise money and spend it.''
Obama's record $66 million monthly fundraising haul in August, announced yesterday, provided one of the rare bits of good news for his campaign since the political conventions ended. The Democrat raised at least $16 million more than McCain last month.
Obama increased his donor base to 2.5 million contributors by the end of August, and took in at least $16 million more than McCain, 72, who also recorded his biggest month ever. The reported figures showed that Obama's fundraising did not slow down even with McCain's surge in the polls following his selection of Alaska Governor Sarah Palin as his running mate.
``Obama's team has insisted, since the Republicans' `Palin Convention' and accompanying Democratic hand-wringing, that they're sticking with their game plan,'' said Rogan Kersh, an associate dean of New York University's Wagner School of Public Service. ``This fundraising report affirms that approach, and should help tamp down Democrats' alarmist cries.''
Record Amounts
Obama, 47, is the first major-party nominee to forgo the public money since the finance system was overhauled for the 1976 elections. His previous fundraising record was $55 million in February, and now has taken in more than $450 million for his presidential campaign.
He got at least $10 million more soon after, when his campaign had a record fundraising day after Palin, 44, gave her nomination acceptance speech on Sept. 3 in St. Paul, Minnesota.
Palin today raised almost $1 million for Republican Party coffers at a fundraiser at a country club in Canton, Ohio. McCain took in $5.1 million at a Miami fundraiser.
Because he is raising money privately, Obama has to spend time away from the campaign trail in non-competitive states where the donors are. Tomorrow, he is to visit Beverly Hills, California, for a fundraiser-concert featuring Barbra Streisand.
``That's the nice thing about public financing that people often overlook,'' said Costas Panagopoulos, director of Fordham University's Center for Electoral Politics and Democracy in the Bronx. ``It's not that you get this giant check; it's that you also get the opportunity cost savings of not having to focus on raising money aggressively during the most critical phase of your campaign.''
Sept. 15 (Bloomberg) -- John McCain and the Republican National Committee entered the... more
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Fearing a financial crisis worldwide, the Federal Reserve reversed course on Tuesday and agreed to an $85 billion bailout that would give the government control of the troubled insurance giant American International Group. Fearing a financial crisis worldwide, the Federal Reserve reversed course on Tuesday... more
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I don't know why England insists on treating the lowest of their lows better than some other communities. Extremists in London are given free reign by a government they wish to overthrow, and a child molester gets a twelve thousand pound trip to an art gallery.
They're looking out for the wrong people. I don't know why England insists on treating the lowest of their lows better than... more
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Nearly one in five paternity claims handled by the Child Support Agency end up showing the mother has deliberately or inadvertently misidentified the father, figures show.
Since DNA paternity testing figures began to be collected in 1998-99, 4,854 paternity claims have turned out to be false after DNA testing.
Under child support legislation it is a criminal offence to make a false statement or representation, and to provide false documents or information.
But according to the CSA, there has not been a single prosecution of a woman for making a false claim.
Government-approved paternity tests, based on samples in multiple parts of the body, are deemed to be 99.99% accurate.
CSA rules state that if the DNA test establishes that the named father is the actual father, then he must pay for the cost of the test. If the DNA establishes he is not the father then the taxpayer pays, so there is no consquence for the mother in making a false claim.
The latest figures for 2007-08 show that out of 3,474 tests ordered, 661 or 19% named the wrong man. The negative results for tests taken in 2004-05 were 10.6%, in 2005-06 were 16.4%, and 13.6% in 2006-07.
Are the women claiming for Child Surport just uncertain of who their baby's father is? Or is this deliberate scamming? Should these wrongful claimants be prosecuted? What impact will this have on the children whose fathers are wrongly identified? And who should foot the cost of these investgations - the taxpayer?
Nearly one in five paternity claims handled by the Child Support Agency end up showing... more
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In this case it's the Mirror, saying that "There's an irony in granting a state funeral to a Tory leader who championed rolling back the state."
So is it right to give up 3 million of tax payers money to bury Thatcher? Or should we just fire her out of a cannon into the sun?
Or could the 3 million be spent on a big party?In this case it's the Mirror, saying that "There's an irony in granting... more
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The Justice Department has set up a web page at this link http://www.usdoj.gov/opa/media-shield.htm
were “the Bush administration has outlined its concerns with proposed media shield legislation. This page provides letters, testimony, public statements and views from officials throughout the government expressing their concerns with the proposed media shield legislation.” This was quoted from the Department of Justice’s web page.
Problem: This is a taxpayer funded Department of Justice web page that the Bush administration is using to quash S.2035, the Free Flow of Information Act of 2007, aka, the Media Shield Law.
A quote from the Society for Professional Journalists http://www.spj.org/
"A federal shield law has become essential now that prosecutors appear less constrained about hauling journalists before courts and grand juries," said SPJ President Irwin Gratz, a radio news anchor with the Maine Public Broadcasting Network. "Courts are proving little help either, setting aside the partial protections recognized by the U.S. Supreme Court in its Branzburg v. Hayes ruling."
Leahy, Specter Urge Senate Action On Media Shield Bill http://leahy.senate.gov/press/200803/030608e.html
To contact the U.S. Department of Justice Office of Public Affairs / 202-514-2007
The 1st Amendment is under attack by the Bush Administration!!
The Justice Department has set up a web page at this link... more
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The MP Derek Conway faces a possible police investigation and de-selection as a Tory Parliamentary candidate over £260,000 of taxpayer-funded payments he made to his two sons and wife, it has emerged.The MP Derek Conway faces a possible police investigation and de-selection as a Tory... more
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Washingtonians - and others with big egos - have a portrait fetish that is obscene especially when it involves taxpayers money.
Even half that nealry 50 grand could have been significant funding for the non-profit Native American and environment projects I volunteer for in northern Michigan.
More comment after a few sentences of the article and a look at this portrait:
Portrait Cost Indian Museum $48,500: Senators, Trustees Question Spending By Former Director
By James V. Grimaldi
Washington Post Staff Writer
W. Richard West Jr., the founding director of the Smithsonian's National Museum of the American Indian, spent $48,500 in museum funds to commission a portrait of himself.
The portrait of West by New York artist Burton Silverman hangs in the patrons' lounge on the fourth floor of the flagship museum, which is dedicated to the arts and culture of American Indians.
Silverman said West picked him after he saw a portrait Silverman had done of former Smithsonian secretary Robert McCormick Adams.
The Adams portrait, completed about a decade earlier, was smaller and cost about half as much.
Rest of the Washington Post story:
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2008/01/03/AR2008010304163.html
Portrait:
http://media3.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/photo/2008/01/04/PH2008010400031.jpg
[IMG]http://i235.photobucket.com/albums/ee225/YOOPERNEWSMAN/RichardWestcrookedSmithsonian.jpg[/IMG]
Native American on Native American crime - much like black on black crime - is especially insidious because so much good could have been done for First Nations peoples heritage with this wasted and misappropriated money.
It's also a crime against taxpayers and common decency.
Spending $48,500 on a self portrait is among the disgraceful financial crimes of W. Richard West Jr., the founding director of the Smithsonian's National Museum of the American Indian.
For this crime to occur in the hallowed halls of the Smithsonian shows again thievery knows no class boundaries - and should be treated just as severely as the poor man who sticks a gun into the face of a 7-11 clerk.
The Smithsonian needs to be thoroughly audited from top to bottom as this is at least the second huge scandal to tarnish its once respected reputation.
No doubt it's only the tip of the fiduciary iceberg that's tearing through the Smithsonian's highbrow richly-protected hull.
I do volunteer work for several Native American related non-profits whose budgets are much smaller than even the cost of that disgraceful portrait.
And the suggestion that it could not have been painted by an American Indian artist is as laughable as it is sickening with a hint of racism against one's own culture.
Even the portrait stance is borrowed and unoriginal, as a buttoned-down Mr. West gazes thoughtfully off to the east, his coat hanging on a crooked forefinger and tossed over suspenders with his soft thumb and the remaining fingers forming the "OK" sign.
The Washington ego commands that a portrait much be painted to prove one's importance.
No doubt many law offices, banking institutions and the halls of officialdom are plastered with the self-aggrandizing crafty art.
Prior to the Polaroid, a self-portrait may have been necessary to preserve one's historic legacy but in today's world it's merely a measure of one's self-importance that is more often scoffed at than admired by those it's meant to impress. Perhaps, a modern definition of irony.
Maybe the next exhibit at the Smithsonian will be portraits of former executives doing the proverbial "perp walk" - cuffed and stuffed for perp-etuity. Washingtonians - and others with big egos - have a portrait fetish that is obscene... more
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