Tag Archives: taxpayer

Most Transparent Administration Ever Makes Effective Reporting from Gulf a Felony

Effectively reporting on the Gulf oil spill is now a Class D felony, punishable by a fine of up to $40,000. That’s right, the most transparent administration in history has made it a felony, effective July 1, to get within 65 feet of what the Coast Guard determines are essential recovery efforts. According to Anderson Cooper, officials tried to up that number to 300 feet. Cooper, who claimed federal officials prevented CNN on two occasions from taking photographs in the gulf, seemed frustrated when he reported on the new laws the day they went into effect. The press is “not the enemy here” he pleaded. The new policies, he said, make it “very easy to hide failure, and hide incompetence.” Cooper also let loose this zinger: “Transparency is apparently not a priority with [Coast Guard Commandant] Thad Allen these days.” Ouch (full video and transcript below the fold – h/t Ron Robinson ). This is but the latest in a string of incidents that seem to have much of the country — and if Cooper is any indicator, at least a few journalists — questioning the sincerity of candidate Obama’s pledges of transparency, openness, and respect for the press. But these new regulations on press coverage of the spill have not garnered as much attention as perhaps they should — certainly not as much as similar moves during the Bush administration’s response to Hurricane Katrina (a fact that Cooper notes). Shortly after the Hurricane hit, according to the Washington Post , “FEMA refused to take reporters and photographers along on boats seeking victims in flooded areas, saying they would take up valuable space needed in the recovery effort and asked them not to take pictures of the dead.” The Post touted claims that the FEMA policy was “in line with the Bush administration’s ban on images of flag-draped U.S. military coffins returning from the Iraq war” — clearly drawing a comparison to other Bush policies rife with accusations of politically-motivated censorship. So far, the Post is silent on the criminalization — a much stronger statement of administration policy than the refusal to allow embedded reporters on rescue efforts — of media coverage in the Gulf. With a scant few exceptions, the legacy media are silent on the issue. But for his part, and to his credit, Cooper issued a heartfelt call for more press transparency: …the Coast Guard today announced new rules keeping photographers and reporters and anyone else from coming within 65 feet of any response vessel or booms out on the water or on beaches — 65 feet. Now, in order to get closer, you have to get direct permission from the Coast Guard captain of the Port of New Orleans. You have to call up the guy. What this means is that oil-soaked birds on islands surrounded by boom, you can’t get close enough to take that picture. Shots of oil on beaches with booms, stay 65 feet away. Pictures of oil-soaked booms uselessly laying in the water because they haven’t been collected like they should, you can’t get close enough to see that. And, believe me, that is out there. But you only know that if you get close to it, and now you can’t without permission. Violators could face a fine of $40,000 and Class D felony charges. What’s even more extraordinary is that the Coast Guard tried to make the exclusion zone 300 feet, before scaling it back to 65 feet. Here is how Admiral Allen defends it. (BEGIN VIDEO CLIP) ALLEN: Well, it’s not unusual at all for the Coast Guard to establish either safety or security zones around any number of facilities or activities for public safety or for the safety of the equipment itself. We would do this for marine events, fireworks demonstrations, cruise ships going in and out of port. (END VIDEO CLIP) COOPER: So, this is the exact same logic that federal wildlife officials used to prevent CNN on two occasions from getting pictures of oiled birds that have been collected, pictures like — like the — well, that we’re about to show you which are obviously deeply disturbing, pictures of oiled gulls that we just happened to catch. Suddenly, we were told after — after that day we couldn’t catch it anymore. So, keeping prying eyes out of marshes, away from booms, off the beaches is now government policy. When asked why now, after all this time, Thad Allen said he had gotten some complaints from local officials worried people might get hurt. Now, we don’t know who these officials are. We would like to. But transparency is apparently not a high priority with Thad Allen either these days. Maybe he is accurate and some officials are concerned. And that’s their right. But we’ve heard far more from local officials about not being able to get a straight story from the government or BP. I have met countless local officials desperate for pictures to be taken and stories written about what is happening in their communities. We’re not the enemy here. Those of us down here trying to accurately show what’s happening, we are not the enemy. I have not heard about any journalist who has disrupted relief efforts. No journalist wants to be seen as having slowed down the cleanup or made things worse. If a Coast Guard official asked me to move, I would move. But to create a blanket rule that everyone has to stay 65 feet away boom and boats, that doesn’t sound like transparency. Frankly, it’s a lot like in Katrina when they tried to make it impossible to see recovery efforts of people who died in their homes. If we can’t show what is happening, warts and all, no one will see what’s happening. And that makes it very easy to hide failure and hide incompetence and makes it very hard to highlight the hard work of cleanup crews and the Coast Guard. We are not the enemy here. We found out today two public broadcasting journalists reporting on health issues say they have been blocked again and again from visiting a federal mobile medical unit in Venice, a trailer where cleanup workers are being treated. It’s known locally as the BP compound. And these two reporters say everyone they have talked to, from BP to the Coast Guard, to Health and Human Services in Washington has been giving them the runaround. We’re not talking about a CIA station here. We’re talking about a medical trailer that falls under the authority of, guess who, Thad Allen, the same Thad Allen who promised transparency all those weeks ago. We are not the enemy here.

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Most Transparent Administration Ever Makes Effective Reporting from Gulf a Felony

On PBS, Oliver Stone Loved Hugo Chavez Calling Dubya the ‘Devil’: ‘It’s True’

Here’s another slightly dated example of leftist America-bashing on the taxpayer-funded airwaves over the patriotic holiday weekend. PBS talk-show host Tavis Smiley interviewed leftist director Oliver Stone on July 2 about his Hugo Chavez-smooching documentary South of the Border. Stone denounced Hillary Clinton as “an agent of the old empire game,” and when Smiley nudged Stone about Chavez’s remarks, Stone insisted he loved it when Chavez called Bush the Devil: “I think that’s a great comment. I think it’s true….He is the devil. He was.” Smiley didn’t simply celebrate Stone (as he did, with say, Van Jones, boldly professing he would take a bullet for Jones ), but he was gentle in bringing up some hard questions. He suggested he didn’t really want to dwell on the Bush-as-Satan stuff: SMILEY: If I’d wanted to, I could have done this. I didn’t want to waste our time doing it, but because the stuff is so easily found all over the internet – you know where I’m going with this. You know, on the regular, there are statements made by Chavez that cause people in this country to shudder, all kinds of things, about everything that Chavez – as you know, he’s not shy about speaking his mind. So he has made all kinds of comments about all kinds of things. None of those statements give you reason to believe that he’s gone a bit off the range? STONE: No, no. Listen, I was with him not too long ago. I was with him in 2007 and 2009. I mean, he’s under attack, but he’s a free man and I think sometimes he speaks without perhaps – he’s a big bear of a man. He’s gruff, you know, and he sometimes speaks off the cuff. He is a popular leader, but he serves the people. He’s not corrupt in any way. I find him a free soul. SMILEY: Off the cuff remarks, off the wall remarks, two different things. You think they’re off the cuff, not off the wall? STONE: Well, I don’t know which ones you’re referring to. I mean, if he’s calling Bush – “the Devil was here yesterday” – you know, I think that’s a great comment. I think it’s true. I mean, at that point, Bush was going to war in Iraq against the wishes of the majority of the United Nations. By the way, as somebody has pointed out, Chavez at the U.N. that day got the most longest applause of anybody there at the entire sessions. It’s quite something. So North America has made a big issue of everything he says, but, you know, Bush is the one who started the war. The coup d’etat of 2002, you know, was initiated by the Venezuelan oligarchy and supported and abetted by the U.S. and we make that very clear in the film. SMILEY: I’ll recall that comment about Bush as long as I live. As you may have heard – STONE: – Well, he is the devil. He was. Smiley deserves some credit for questioning around the edges about Chavez’s dictatorial tendencies, even as Stone denied it all as ridiculous. When Smiley asked whether Obama was different than Bush, he complained it was “Bush lite,” and knocked Hillary Clinton: You know, Hillary was down there a few weeks ago and there she was trying to separate Ecuador from Venezuela. She’s an agent of the old empire game. It’s a dead end for us. We keep overreaching. We want to control anybody who steps out of line, which is a regional power…. We are saying – basically, you know what it is? The pact for the New American Century, remember from the 1990s, when Bush and Rumsfeld, Cheney and Wolfowitz, wrote that pact about the American unilateral control of the world. We will brook the appearance. We will not allow for the emergence or any military or economic rival. I went into that in the W film I did on Bush. This is our policy and, whatever Obama says, this is what he’s pursuing in Afghanistan. There’s been no real change in that policy. We have our empire; we are number one. We are the world’s policemen and we will not brook an interference in that. The tone is lighter; the words are lighter, but it’s a soft power. It’s not strictly anti-American to knock President Bush or Hillary Clinton, but Stone had a more generic critique of “our empire,” and overall American arrogance in global affairs: STONE: The U.S. has knocked off so many reformers over the last hundred years, but they’ve all emerged independently. Except for Castro, they all went down, every single one from Guatemala, Panama, Brazil, Chile, constantly. This is the first time we have not been able to do anything. Hopefully, this is going to stay stable, but right now we’re fighting actively to get rid of them. SMILEY: You’re not naive, obviously. You like shaking things up, don’t you? STONE: No, I like – SMILEY: Yeah, you do. Come on. STONE: If I were, I’d be more political. I’d be more overt. SMILEY: This isn’t political and overt? STONE: Well, I like making movies. I love feature movies, as you know, but documentaries are fresh and they keep me humble and they keep me in the field. If I can contribute a little light to the worldwide cause and alert people in our country as to what our empire is really doing , I think I’d be doing some good in my life.

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On PBS, Oliver Stone Loved Hugo Chavez Calling Dubya the ‘Devil’: ‘It’s True’

Randi Rhodes: Conservatives Hate Cops, Fire Fighters, Teachers, and First Responders

On Tuesday’s Randi Rhodes radio show, Rhodes was complaining that the stimulus money is running out, leading to layoffs of public employees. She lamented that Colorado Springs is going without street lighting and selling police helicopters, and starving the public sector is what conservatives want, because they hate public servants.  And this is exactly why the conservatives keep harping on spending, spending, spending as the problem: because they know spending, spending, spending is the solution, and they don’t want this solved! They don’t want this solved because they hate government! They hate teachers. They hate police officers. They hate first responders. They hate firemen. They hate EMT workers. They want it all to be privatized! That’s when you gonna get the haves having police protection and excellent schools and the have-nots having no police protection and no schools! And therein is the dreamworld for them. This is nirvana for them! She said 32 states don’t have the money for unemployment benefits , and that isn’t because they’ve overreached, but because they’re underpaid by the taxpayer. She’s talk radio’s answer to John Kenneth Galbraith. The fantasies about the conservative anarchists continued:  They’re firing every city and state worker. And that is what they’ve had in mind all along. Because then, remember when they were wildfires in California, and I had people screaming at me ‘Well, if I have more money, I should be able to hire a private fire-fighting company that has a gel that we don’t make available to the city firefighters.’ This was their argument. This was exactly what they were saying all along. If you have the money, you can save your house by buying a private firefighting company. If you don’t have the money, too bad for you, stand outside and watch your house burn down. Same thing with your kids, and their education. Same thing with EMTs coming to your house. If you can afford to have an ambulance come and get you, a private company, good! You’ll get to the hospital on time. If not, get in your car and drive yourself.  Oh you can’t? You passed out? Too bad for you. Shoulda had the money. That’s the world that they are building. How government is starving to death with Obama, Pelosi & Reid in charge is a bit puzzling, but liberals on the radio are imagining it any way. 

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Randi Rhodes: Conservatives Hate Cops, Fire Fighters, Teachers, and First Responders

Canadian Coal Mining Interest Holds Glacier Park Hostage For US Taxpayer Money

Flathead River course, flowing south out of Canada, through the US Glacier National Park area. Image credit: Wikipedia A joint U.S.-Canada effort is underway to halt ongoing exploration for gold, coal, oil and gas in much of the upper Flathead River Basin, covering 9,000 square miles and straddling the US/Canadian border. There’s a parallel effort to buy out existing leases. As reported in the Missoulian, Montana’s Governor is working hard to protect the pristine source waters of… Read the full story on TreeHugger

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Canadian Coal Mining Interest Holds Glacier Park Hostage For US Taxpayer Money

Sting and Soros Hook Up For A Duet Of Pro-drug Stupidity

Editor’s Note : The following was originally posted at Andrew Breitbart’s Big Hollywood . Seeing that George Soros and Sting  are working together to “end the drug war” puts me in mind of a story an Army buddy who works in the DEA told me about busting in the door of a drug house only to find three occupants – the oldest four years old, having been left in charge while his “parents” went out to score meth.  Yeah, drug use is a victimless crime – if you ignore the victims. Apparently not content to subsidize the whining of the nonentities at Media Matters, Soros is taking a break from his adventures in currency manipulation and general scuzziness to enlist entertainment celebrities like Sting in his newest quest.  The Drug Policy Alliance  is the result, a group whose members, as its founder puts it, “come from across the drug use spectrum.”  Yes, the junkies, stoners, hopheads, dope fiends, pill-poppers, and Lindsay Lohan are unanimous:  Drug laws are bad, and it’s probably BusHitler’s fault. The threshold problem with comments by Sting such as, “The war on drugs represents an extraordinary violation of human rights,” is that Sting presumably not only believes this piffle, but further believes that he can put down his bass and offer meaningful input into the discussion.  This assumption of competence is a common delusion among celebrities, and here it has more potential for damage than most mindless celebribabble. Now, Sting is not alone – no one in that clip says anything worthwhile.  One woman, who is bald for no apparent reason, states that “The War on Drugs is a war on people of color,” as if Americans decided they would outlaw crack because they fear that black people might enjoy themselves.  Montel Williams shows up to explain that drug laws prevent him from making choices about his own body, but the awful tie and ridiculous earring he chose to wear make a powerful argument against allowing him to make any kind of choices at all. Tony Papa also appears.  He went to jail for 12 years for being part of a drug deal – oh, I mean committing “a nonviolent drug offense” – and became an artist on the taxpayer’s dime.  While most of us will likely ask “Why only 12?,” naturally Papa is worshipped by trendy leftist celebrities .  Some Hollywood half-wit even scooped up the rights to his inspiring story.  So, to repeat, Tony Papa joined a drug conspiracy, got arrested, went to jail, leveraged that into becoming a hip artist and the subject of a movie, and yet he is somehow the real victim. Of course, there’s also the perennial “America imprisons more people than anywhere else in the world!” meme.  In fact, the only drug incarceration problem in America is that too few drug dealers are incarcerated.  Sting suffers from the same delusion that afflicts many of his celebrity pals.  He seems to think that if the kind of people who deal drugs didn’t have drugs to deal, they would naturally flock to the world of hard work and responsibility.  Oh, if only drugs weren’t illegal, the drug dealing scumbags who infest our ghettos, barrios and college sociology departments would morph into clean-shaved, untatted workerbees eagerly embracing the world of 9-5 employment.  Yeah, it was outlawing meth and crack that turned the scumbags into scumbags.  At one point, the clip promises “new solutions” to the drug problem.  Then Sting pops back up, smug and self-satisfied, to announce that drug laws violate his individual sovereignty.  Uh, typically, when you say you are going to provide new solutions you might consider, you know, providing some new solutions instead of some new cliché. I certainly enjoy Sting and his pals’ new-found appreciation of my personal autonomy and “sovereignty over my body.”  I assume they’ll be standing by me when I reject the government’s interference in my health care decisions.  Unlikely.  If you think consistency is one of their strong points, perhaps you’ve been smoking the same stuff as them. Now, Sting was always annoying but here he is reaching new heights of crappiness and pomposity in direct proportion to his declining relevance.  It’s always a pleasure to hear some Brit mega-millionaire who glides around his English manor practicing tantric sex sound off on American domestic policy.  Please Sting, save us!  Unleash the full intellectual firepower you’ve amassed writing forgettable smooth jazz/rock fusion tunes for people who buy their music at Starbucks.  Just because you’ve been waited on hand and foot for three decades by a coterie of professional sycophants telling you you’re wiser than Buddha and smarter than Einstein doesn’t mean it’s true.  There may be a case for looking at our drug laws, but these nimrods don’t make it.  The most compelling points are made by the conservatives at National Review and the libertarians at Reason .  Sure, pot smokers steal your snacks, listen to Phish and sound-off with long, disjointed monologues about the miracle of hemp, but I have a hard time getting too bent out of shape by them.  Many celebrities are among them , but Sting and Soros aren’t just talking about causal stoners.  They think we ought to go open season on meth, crack and whatever else these degenerate half-wits today are ingesting.  No thanks – I’d prefer not to live with the mess you’re rich enough to ignore. The fact is that His Stingness knows nothing – or cares nothing – about the unspeakable devastation drugs cause, particularly within the inner cities.  Instead of standing behind the one truly effective response to urban drug terror – throwing the bastards in a cell and dropping the key down the Guatemalan sinkhole – His Majesty Sting decrees that drug dealing scumbags should run free, then retreats back behind his gates and armed guards to further hone his delayed orgasm skills. Well, Sting, let’s discuss your really keen points about why poison ought to be legal.  But let’s expand the scope of our discussion to include some other celebrities who might be able to provide us with some valuable insights.  Let’s invite Michael Jackson , Heath Ledger , Brad Renfro , DJ AM , and Brittany Murphy to weigh in with their points of view.  Oh wait, they’re all dead.  So are just a few others . Like a Sean Penn who can’t help but fly into some hellhole, figuratively fellate the local anti-American strongman then jet back to Santa Monica in time for dinner at Pizzeria Mozza, Sting wanders out of his fairy-tale life for a few minutes to tell the benighted peons in the real world how they need to live their lives before retiring back inside his palace behind three layers of security.  The violence, the abuse, the wasted potential brought on by drugs mean nothing to him; what is important is his own act of scolding his lessers for failing to conform to his personal vision. That’s Sting’s high – lording over others as if he was something more than a glorified cruise ship bassist who got lucky and didn’t have to spend his career cranking out covers of Billy Joel’s “Uptown Girl” for Corona-swilling passengers during runs between San Diego and Puerto Vallarta on the S.S. Living Hell .  And like so many in the entertainment world, he’s guilty beyond a reasonable doubt of possession of stupid ideas – with intent to distribute.

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Sting and Soros Hook Up For A Duet Of Pro-drug Stupidity

This Goldman House: Bonus Season Means It’s Time to Add a New Floor to Your Townhouse

It’s bonus season, so we’re trying to keep up with how Goldman Sachs employees are spending their taxpayer-financed windfalls. Today’s entries: A $6 million penthouse condo, and adding a new floor to the upper-east-side historical landmark in which you live. Every Goldman Sachs employee knows that right about now is when the bonuses arrive, and even though this year’s take will be heavily weighted toward restricted stock, some Goldmanites are already putting your tax dollars to good use! Take Goldman managing director Henry Cornell, who serves as the chief operating officer of the merchant banking division —he’s adding a new floor to his upper-east-side townhouse (that’s a lovely side view from the plans above). In Decemeber, Cornell filed his plans to add new windows to his E. 80th St. townhouse, which he purchased in 2000 for $11.5 million, with New York’s Department of Finance. To judge by the permits Cornell has sought from the Buildings Department, it’s going to be an extensive renovation. This permit , issued just three weeks ago, calls for the “demolition of 4th floor to accomodate [sic] new 5th floor” and “excavation of cellar and crawl space for ne [sic] sub cellar.” It’s a pity that Cornell wants to “demolish” his own fourth floor, seeing as how his house was designated a historical landmark by the Landmarks Preservation Committee in 1967 due to its ” elegant simplicity…fine proportions, and attractive relationship of the windows to the house as a whole .” [pdf] We don’t know how much this will cost, of course, but we doubt Cornell will spare any expense. He’s also busy launching the Henry Cornell Winery in Santa Rosa, Calif., which he plans to build on land he’s purchased several parcels at a time over the past decade for a total of $8 million. In November, Cornell filed plans with the state of California [pdf] to turn the land into a winery with an 8,000 square-foot cave as a cellar. (So we’d imagine that new “sub cellar” in the Manhattan townhouse may be to accommodate his wine collection.) Cornell’s neighbors have objected to his plans , though, claiming that a new winery (does Northern California need another one?) will disrupt animal habitats and foul up a local creek. Anyway, that’s what Henry Cornell is spending his bonus on: A new floor, a wine cellar, and a California winery. Your living the dream, Henry. Congratulations! Cornell’s colleague Jonathan Fine, a managing director who works on Goldman’s investment-grade syndicate desk, whatever that is, is blowing his bonus on a $6 million Greenwich St. condo in Manhattan , which he and his wife purchased in December. It’s a penthouse unit with four bedrooms, 2-and-a-half bathrooms, and an 1,100 square-foot private roof deck. We initially weren’t quite sure that the “Jonathan Howard Fine” who purchased the condo was the same one who works at Goldman, so we called to make sure. His colleague on the syndicate desk who answered the phone said Fine had called in sick that day, so we called his listed home number. A woman answered, and we heard hammering in the background—still moving in perhaps? Anyway, when we asked her if she’d just purchased the Greenwich St. condo, she referred the question to an unnamed man standing nearby. When we asked her if that was the Jonathan Fine who worked for Goldman Sachs, she said, “I’m not going to answer any of your questions.” About 20 minutes later, we got a call from a Goldman Sachs flack wondering what all the fuss was about. If you know how Cornell and Fine’s colleagues are spending their hard-earned (by taxpayers!) bonuses, do let us know .

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This Goldman House: Bonus Season Means It’s Time to Add a New Floor to Your Townhouse

Taxpayer Revolt Over Michael Jackson Memorial

Filed under: Michael Jackson An alleged do-gooder has filed a creditor’s claim against the Michael Jackson estate, on behalf of the City of Angels.Jose Freddie Vallejos claims it was illegal for Los Angeles city fathers to underwrite the Michael Jackson memorial last July to the … Permalink

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Taxpayer Revolt Over Michael Jackson Memorial

IRS hires "hundreds" for new wealth unit

WASHINGTON (Reuters) – A new Internal Revenue Service unit set up to catch rich tax cheats hiding their wealth in complex business entities is rapidly taking shape with the hiring of hundreds of employees. The IRS high wealth unit, part of a broader effort to combat international tax evasion, is focusing on “the entire web of business entities controlled by a high wealth individual,” IRS Commissioner Doug Shulman told a tax conference this week. Another IRS official told Reuters “hundreds” of people have already been hired to staff the new unit, including some from within the agency.

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IRS hires "hundreds" for new wealth unit

Sarah Palin’s book goes rogue on facts

Sarah Palin's new book reprises familiar claims from the 2008 presidential campaign that haven't become any truer over time.

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Sarah Palin’s book goes rogue on facts

Obama Administration denies Goldman Sachs $3 billion tax break

The Treasury Department told Goldman Sachs last week that it could not use Fannie Mae's tax credits to reduce its own tax liability. An official with the Obama administration explained that the proposal “would result in a loss of aggregate tax revenues that would be greater than the savings.” This is the right decision.

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Obama Administration denies Goldman Sachs $3 billion tax break