Murtha Moved Earmark Between Brothers’ Clients & Hoyer To Be Forced to Disclose PMA Probe
Uh Oh! Could this be the moment of reckoning for the Democrats? Jack Murtha and Steny Hoyer may both be in the lime light in the coming days.
The Democrat Culture of Corruption Continues:
First, it was discovered that Murtha moved an earmark over $8 million between his brothers’ clients. Nepotism and corruption much? That’s sure to stimulate the economy and doesn’t remind me at all of what dictators did when given money. No dictator I read about would ever take money and give it to his family members or their businesses to line their pockets rather than provide for the betterment of his/her constituents/sarc.
In early 2005, Rep. John Murtha (D-Pa.) apparently added language to a tsunami relief bill shifting $8.2 million from a former client of his brother’s lobbying firm to a new client of the same firm.
That earmark is now tangled up in a federal indictment alleging that some of the money was skimmed by contractors and a Defense Department employee for their personal use.
Murtha’s spokesman said that no one in his office has any recollection of the transaction, and the House Appropriations Committee was unable to provide any information about how the language appeared in the tsunami relief bill.
Of course they knew nothing about it – seems like this is the norm coming from Washington, D.C. these days – I don’t think they know much of anything, in fact scratch that, they don’t know anything.
But sources familiar with the appropriations process agreed it was impossible that a provision removing earmarks from one company in Murtha’s district and transferring the money to another company in his district could have been added to the bill without Murtha’s involvement, since he was at the time the ranking member on the subcommittee with jurisdiction over the language.
The provision appears in the House committee report of a March 2005 bill providing billions of dollars worth of military spending and aid to the Asian countries that were devastated by the December 2004 tsunami that killed more than 250,000 people.
The bill included a “technical corrections” section, which transferred $8.2 million to “other procurement, Air Force” for a project called the “mobile common data link gateway.” This project — later called the “ground mobile gateway” — was an effort to build a unified battlefield communications platform for the Air Force by a Pennsylvania company called Coherent Systems.
Read roll call for the fully story and timeline of this corruption…
Steny Hoyer (D-MD) is also being pressured into complying with the federal probe into PMA and their long ties with top/senior Democrat officials. One of which was the aforementioned Murtha who probably has the most ties – I think this may be Murtha’s last stand!
House Majority Leader Steny Hoyer (D-Md.) plans to offer as early as Wednesday afternoon a privileged resolution to force the ethics committee to disclose whether it is investigating senior Democratic appropriators’ ties to the PMA Group, Democratic sources say.
Hoyer’s move follows eight attempts by Republican anti-earmark crusader Rep. Jeff Flake (Ariz.) to jump-start a probe — and aims to pre-empt Flake’s ninth stab at the issue, which was due for a vote on Thursday. It marks a sharp break from Democratic leaders’ previous approach to the burgeoning controversy involving the now-defunct lobbying firm, which amounted to them trying to keep their ranks in line opposing the Flake resolutions.
In late winter, when Flake began his assault, Hoyer argued in leadership meetings that Democrats should embrace the resolution to neutralize it.
But Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) pushed back, contending that such a move would open lawmakers up to ethics witch-hunts down the line. Since then, Democrats have slowly peeled off to support Flake: While only 17 broke ranks on his first attempt, 29 supported his latest, offered just before the Memorial Day recess.
The move comes just after Rep. Peter Visclosky (D-Ind.) acknowledged his offices and some staff had been subpoenaed as part of a federal probe into PMA. Other Democratic appropriators, including Rep. John Murtha (D-Pa.), have long ties to PMA and its clients.
Hoyer squared off against Murtha in 2006 for the Majority Leader post, beating him by an overwhelming margin.
Jeff Flake has been proposing an ethics panel for a couple of years and has been blocked by the Democrat majority in the House and it’s understandable as to why – they are guilty! Most of the ethics violations are within the Democrat Party, that’s not to say that some Republicans may be found guilty of some violations, but as of now the culture of corruption lies within the majority party.
Date Night – Important During Times of Economic Turmoil
Does anybody recall Laura and George darting off on date nights once a month during his Bush’s presidency, let alone the first few months? I didn’t think so… If this was a Republican flying around on the taxpayer’s money they would surely be reprimanded by the media until the rest of the gullible masses began to agree (just like the media did with GW).
The Obama’s are the epitome of hypocritical elitists. They obviously have no regard for those who are struggling just to make ends meet if they feel that flying to NYC, which cost the taxpayers somewhere between a total of (my guesstimate range) $24,000 – $68,000, for dinner and a show on Broadway, is acceptable. (Just so you understand where the costs come from – AF1 costs about $68K to operate for an hour, the Obama’s excuse was using Marine 1 for part of the time before switching to use AF1 to land at Kennedy, but all the secret service, body guard protection, and entourage is quite costly as well):
Times Square was even more frenetic than usual, as throngs of pedestrians — certainly including many tourists — lined several blocks waiting to catch a glimpse of Mr. and Mrs. Obama. The presidential date night began with a late-afternoon flight from Andrews Air Force Base, with Mr. Obama wearing a dark blue suit (no tie), and Mrs. Obama a black cocktail dress and a sleek updo, holding a turquoise clutch.
They landed at Kennedy International Airport at 4:45 p.m. and after taking a quick helicopter ride to Lower Manhattan, the presidential motorcade snaked its way up to Blue Hill, a restaurant off Washington Square Park that specializes in cuisine from the Hudson Valley. (It sounded like the choice of Mrs. Obama, who favors local food.)
Hours before the show began, the Secret Service cordoned off the entire block of 44th Street between Avenue of the Americas and Broadway, where the Belasco is located.
You could just as well have a nice date night at home renting a movie and having a couple glasses of wine.
It just irks me that here is a man and woman who campaigned about being more like the average American, understanding the strife of oppressed communities, but when elected become the jet-setting duo who have no respect for the current economic turmoil, unemployment rates, or the looming national bankruptcy our country may be facing.
Word has it that they went to see ‘Wicked’ in honor of Michelle MaBelle’s personality and of the couple taunting the lowly classes who have to work to survive.
Meanwhile, Prince Harry, who obviously is not American, makes more of an effort to visit the regular folks and pay his respects to those who lost their lives in 9/11. Prince Harry visited Ground Zero this weekend and laid a wreath at the site in memoriam for the British men and women who lost their lives that day. He also visited a school in Harlem, the Fire Station in NYC that has the most fatalities, etc. But BO finds it more important to go to a Broadway show. Prince Harry, who has served overseas surely knows the cost and sacrifice of one’s own life for the many who will be saved from terrorism…
Prince – can we please elect you?
National Sales Tax Anyone?
Sounds like our very own EU VAT coming to the U. S. of A. How lucky we are that the usual common sense of Congress and the President is kicking in! When the economy is recessed and there is the possibility it could get worse with an impending bond implosion or inflation in the coming months, why not raise taxes on everyone?
I know that liberals see this as a great idea. They can raise taxes on all those evil fat-cats, actually wind up hurting the middle and lower class, all to pay for their own fiscally irresponsible habits.
As lawmakers toy with the idea of an across-the-board sales tax on just about everything, tax reform advocates are starting to drum up opposition with the same fervor they employed during last month’s anti-tax tea parties.
The idea of a national sales tax was once unlikely. But now that the federal government is doling out billions in stimulus spending and bailouts, and looking for billions more for health care reform, the prospect could be gaining some traction.
The frenzy over the idea kicked up after a Washington Post article Wednesday reported that Congress is starting to pay closer attention to this largely academic proposal and that the Obama administration, though shushing speculation, is soliciting advise from supporters of the idea.
“It should certainly raise alarm bells that they think they can inject it into the debate,” said Phil Kerpen, policy director at Americans for Prosperity.
The value-added tax, or VAT, as it is called, amounts to a tax-on-everything — or TOE, for the acronym-inclined. It’s a tax on goods that’s applied in pieces throughout the chain of production and distribution and results in an increase in the cost of virtually everything you buy.
The fact that the United States has dug its own hole regarding our debt where Bush and Obama combined can be blamed for a lot of it (I should also state that the liberal congress who has been there since the end of 2006 is also a huge culprit when it comes to voting on and setting budgets). The National Debt is around $11.3T and growing at a steady pace, while the GDP is somewhere between $13 & $14T, seeing negative growth and possible stagnation in the out years. This spells disaster for anyone in financial analysis, who understands debt ratios.
Inflation at this point is inevitable and that will mean higher prices for every American. Each individual household is also responsible for $668,621 based on the latest article out of USA Today. This obligation includes the total federal debt obligations per household as well as the average debt obligation for an American household at a personal level. My question is this: With median household income below $60K in the U.S. (if debt was all your income was used on – no taxes, no food, gas, clothes, shelter etc.), – do you think Americans would be able to pay that off in their lifetime? Buhbye American Dream…
The sad fact is that Americans became spoiled – the government was not a good role model, and the sense of saving and living within one’s means quickly flew out the window.
What USA Today, because it’s biased, fails to do is disclose the fact that 2008 alone cannot be blamed for the debt obligations of American citizens tied to the government like serfs. The Stimulus package, the omnibus package and the budget of Barack H. Obama has increased deficit spending unlike anything this country has seen and his debt obligation alone is more than all presidents in history combined. His out year budgets are also something to shriek at – he did not have to spend this much money, although the liberal propagandists will spin it and continue to say it was a crisis and he had to do what was necessary because he inherited this mess – I call Shenanigans! Use Reagan’s model to dig out of a recession/depression – not FDR’s fallacious one, in which he hurt rather than helped.
It should be no surprise to anyone that in order to balance the budget and pay off this debt, taxes have to be raised. Taxes have to increase to sustain the ever increasing size of government and due to the large drop in tax revenue for 2008 filing it really was an inevitable idea of the beltway gang.
Raising taxes while people are already hurting will make things much worse. This proposal of a sales tax, much like the EU VAT, will be dreadful on our economy and on average regular “Joe’s.”
Rasmussen just conducted a poll asking Americans what they thought about a national sales tax at this point in time. A whopping 68% of respondents were against the tax and only 18% approved. If the White House is really using polling data to govern it may want to take a look at this one!
If the U.S. VAT passes I’ll be happy to point out to the young college-aged waiters that they no longer get tips – just like Europe! 
You voted for it!
