A coordinated political attack
Filed under: Culture of Corruption, Media Bias, Our Dear Leader, Politics, Tea Party
Recently, our Dear Leader claimed that there was “Not even a smidgeon of corruption” at the IRS run by his political appointees.
Well, as we have learned, everything that BHO says has an expiration date. Sometimes that date is even before the words come out of his mouth. Remember that the left leaning Washington Post, among others, selected one of Barry’s Catch Phrases as the Lie of the Year.
So we should take his claim of no corruption with several large barges worth of salt.
Let’s review a few key facts were. The IRS conducted actual, probing audits of multiple 501(c)(4) organizations that made their list of organizations with certain key words. Some of those key words were left leaning, but of the groups actually targeted by an IRS audit, 100% were right of center “Conservative” groups.
Now let’s review what the Inspector General for the IRS had to say on the matter, “Our audit did not find evidence that the IRS used the ‘progressives’ identifier as selection criteria for potential political cases between May 2010 and May 2012.” There are a few more gems in his report to Congress:
In total, 30 percent of the organizations we identified with the words ‘progress’ or ‘progressive’ in their names were processed as potential political cases. In comparison, our audit found that 100 percent of the tax-exempt applications with ‘Tea Party,’ ‘Patriots,’ or ‘9/12’ in their names were processed as potential political cases during the timeframe of our audit.”
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“While we have multiple sources of information corroborating the use of Tea Party and other related criteria we described in our report, including employee interviews, emails and other documents, we found no indication in any of these other materials that ‘progressives’ was a term used to refer cases for scrutiny for political campaign intervention.”
Of the 296 organizations flagged with “political” keywords, only six were “progressive” groups. That is 2% of the 296 organizations selected by the IRS.
Let’s not forget Lois Lerner, the senior IRS official who pleaded the Fifth rather than answer questions from Congress.
Clearly, there is more than just “smidgeon of corruption” at the IRS under the reign of our Dear Leader. This Culture of Corruption probably runs much farther and deeper in the Obama administration than just the IRS.
Update: The IRS targeted Republican Christine O’Donnell and then leaked her tax records to the press.
IRS Scandal Has Obama Fingerprints All Over It, Experts Say.
Update: Christine O’Donnell’s IRS case reveals more than just a ‘smidgen of corruption’
Inspector General Walpin cleared of White House Smear
Filed under: Culture of Corruption, Our Dear Leader, Politics
The Obama White House, making a lie out of its promise for increased transparency, fired Inspector General Walpin back in June for doing his job and daring to investigate on of our Dear Leader’s political appointees.
The reasons given at the time were absurd and easily disputed. The reality of the situation was clear.
Team Lightbringer fired a government employee for doing his job. The findings of Walpin were embarrassing not only to our Dear Leader, but to Empress Michelle as well, since the waste and corruption found was in one of her pet projects.
Well, now a US Attorney has cleared Walpin of any complaints that he acted “improperly.”
Inspector General Walpin wants his job back, and he has filed a suit in federal court stating that he was fired improperly for investigating a political appointee of the President. Of course, following its policy of removing any trace of transparency and openness in the federal government, the Obama White House is trying to have this case dismissed.
Obama White House opening up a new front on their War with the American Press
Filed under: Culture of Corruption, Our Dear Leader, Politics
It’s time for Fox News to get over itself. Really, you just aren’t that special.
The Obama White House, in what must be part of their effort to be “the most transparent administration ever”, has now attacked the Associated Press. It seems that the AP committed the sin of noticing, and reporting, that the numbers Team Lightbringer has used for “jobs created or saved” have been inflated.
The Obama administration on Thursday slammed a report from The Associated Press alleging the government had overstated by thousands the number of jobs it has created or saved with federal contracts under President Obama’s $787 billion recovery program.
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The review found some counts were more than 10 times as high as the actual number of jobs; some jobs were credited to stimulus spending when, in fact, none were produced.Within minutes of the publication of AP’s story, the White House released a statement at 12:15 a.m. Thursday that it said was the “real facts” about how jobs were counted in the stimulus data distributed two weeks ago.
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A Colorado company said it created 4,231 jobs with the help of Obama’s economic recovery plan. The real number: fewer than 1,000.A child care center in Florida said it saved 129 jobs with the help of stimulus money. Instead, it gave pay raises to its existing employees.
Elsewhere in the U.S., some jobs credited to the stimulus program were counted two, three, four or even more times.
The discrepancy raises questions about the reliability of a key benchmark the administration uses to gauge the success of the stimulus.
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The AP’s review identified nearly 600 contracts claiming stimulus money for more than 2,700 jobs that appear to have similar duplicated counts.
What we are seeing here is the sadly typical Team Obama aversion to actual facts. They much prefer their own view of the world, where reality had best not rear it’s head.
Remember that this is the same Administration that fired Inspector Generals for doing their job, i.e. finding waste and corruption in government. We are seeing a clear pattern of abuse by the Obama White House.
Obama throws RailRoad security under the bus
Michelle Malkin has the story on how the federal Rail Transportation Anti-Terrorism Unit has been dismantled by Team Lightbringer.
Amtrak’s Office of Security Strategy and Special Operations (OSSSO) grew out of a counterterrorism and intelligence unit developed by the Bush administration in the wake of global jihadi attacks on mass transit systems. The office was staffed with Special Forces veterans, law enforcement officers, railroad specialists, other military personnel, and experts who collectively possessed hundreds of years of experience fighting on the front lines against terrorism. Each member underwent at least 800 hours of rail security-related training, including advanced marksmanship, close quarters, and protective security exercises.
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According to multiple government sources who declined to be identified for fear of retribution, OSSSO’s East Coast and West Coast teams have not worked in a counterterrorism capacity since the summer. Their long-arms were put under lock and key after the abrupt departures of Amtrak vice president for security strategy and special operations Bill Rooney and Amtrak Inspector General Fred Weiderhold.Weiderhold played an instrumental role in creating OSSSO’s predecessor at Amtrak, the Counter-Terrorism Unit (CTU). He tapped Rooney to oversee the office. But Rooney was quietly given the “thank you for your service” heave-ho in May and Weiderhold was unexpectedly “retired” a few weeks later — just as the government-subsidized rail service faced mounting complaints about its meddling in financial audits and probes.
As I reported in June, Weiderhold had blown the whistle on intrusion of Amtrak’s Law Department into his financial audits and probes. A damning, 94-page report from an outside legal firm concluded that the “independence and effectiveness” of the Amtrak inspector general’s office were “being substantially impaired” by the Law Department – which happens to be headed by Eleanor Acheson, a close pal of Vice President Biden.
She has more details on this criminally incompetent dismantling of an effective part of our National Security infrastructure by our Dear Leader and his cronies. Read the whole thing.
This appears to be part of our Dear Leader‘s ongoing war against the federal Inspector Generals.
Update on Obama’s War on Inspector Generals
Filed under: Culture of Corruption, Our Dear Leader, Politics
As I’ve wrote about before, Our Dear Leader has a disturbing pattern of firing Inspector Generals, the people who are charged with uncovering corruption and waste of tax payer money.
Byron York reports that Gerald Walpin, the AmeriCorps inspector general who dared to uncover corruption by Obama political appointees and friends of Empress Michelle, is suing the federal government for an “unlawful” firing.
The Obama administration’s case was incredibly feeble and libelous to begin with. This will be an interesting case to watch.
A pattern of abuse and denial at the Obama White House
Filed under: Culture of Corruption, Our Dear Leader, Politics
Another update in our Dear Leader‘s blatantly political firing of an Investigator General for doing his job by finding corruption by BHO’s political appointees.
First Byron York writes in the Washington Examiner about how the Obama White House Special Counsel to the President for Ethics and Government Reform refuses to answer direct questions from a Senate investigation on matter of the firing of IG Walpin.
What is the Obama administration hiding? My bet is that is the actual truth of the matter is the last thing Team Lightbringer wants to see the light of day.
Next is a Chicago Tribune story, by way of Hot Air, that points out that the Obama White House has a pattern of firing IG’s that don’t toe their strictly political line, instead of doing their job and protecting the taxpayers.
This IG, Neil Barofsky, pointed out that there were “insufficient safeguards on Porkulus spending.”
What is clear is that Barack Hussein Obama and his administration will not stand for anyone questioning their actions, especially government employees who’s job is to undercover fraud and waste and government spending. This is the “transparency” of Team Lightbringer.
Updates on Obama’s illegal IG firing
Filed under: Culture of Corruption, Our Dear Leader, Politics
As I noted before, our Dear Leader has removed a federal inspector general for daring to investigate the head of AmeriCorps, a political appointee of BHO. IG Gerald Walpin had found millions of dollars wasted or misspent, and as his job required, reported it. BHO responded by firing a competent government employee for actually doing his job.
John Elwood has more on the matter over at the Volokh Conspiracy.
The allegations of a politically motivated firing are getting all the attention, but being a Law Nerd, I wanted to focus briefly on, well, some of the nerdier aspects of the imbroglio. Some commentators have pointed to the bare statement of reasons in President Obama’s letter as (1) an indication that he is hiding something, as though he could not give good reasons for the firing; and (2) questioned whether that spare statement of reasons complied with the terms of the Inspector General Reform Act of 2008, which Senator Obama cosponsored.
During the brief time B. Hussein Obama was a senator, and actually showed up to work, he cosponsored a bill stating that a President could not fire an IG without valid cause. Which is pretty much exactly what he is doing now, in violation of the law he helped create.
Michelle Malkin has more on the amount of devalued American dollars that are being dumped in to AmeriCorps, and another on how this is just corrupt Chicago politics as usual.
Update: Ace notes that “Key Democratic Ally Claire McCaskill Admits Obama “Didn’t Follow Law” on Firing AmericaCorps IG.” Ace goes on to point out that McCaskill really isn’t bothered by our Dear Leader’s illegal actions, as long as he comes up with some flimsy fiction to cover his ass legally. Did you really expect any democrat to to hold B. Hussein Obama accountable for breaking the law he co-sponsored?
Update: Ms. Malkin is continuing to dig into this story. She points out that IG Walpin uncovered “the wasteful Teaching Fellows Program, run by the Research Foundation of the City University of New York, which is AmeriCorps’s largest and most expensive program.” The charges the corrupt Obama administration are bringing against inspector general Gerald Walpin are vapid and flimsy in the extreme. The only thing That IG Walpin was “confused” about was assuming that BHO administration wasn’t corrupt.
Update: IG Walpin speaks out on BHO’s lame excuse.
“That’s a total lie,” Walpin said of the latter charge. And he said the accusation that he was dazed and confused at one meeting out of many was not only false, but poor rationale for his ouster.
“It appears to suggest that I was removed because I was disabled — based on one occasion out of hundreds,” he said.
“I would never say President Obama doesn’t have the capacity to continue to serve because of his (statement) that there are 56 states,” Walpin said, adding that the same holds for Vice President Biden and his “many express confusions that have been highlighted by the media.” Obama mistakenly said once on the campaign trail that he had traveled to 57 states.
Walpin concluded that his firing stems from bad blood between him and the board, as well as with Sacramento Mayor Kevin Johnson — an Obama supporter whom he had investigated for alleged misuse of federal funds. He said his performance at the May meeting drew criticism because he issued two reports critical of the board. In one, he criticized the settlement reached in the Johnson case; in the other, he criticized the use of millions of dollars for a program at the City University of New York.
“The board at that meeting was clearly angry at my temerity,” he said.
Yup, that’s the bottom line here. Team Lightbringer is firing a government employee for actually doing his job. This is what you can expect for anyone who dares questions the reign of Barack I, MSM-proclaimed God Emperor of America.
Update: More details from John at Powerline.
BHO fires an IG for daring to investigate one of his political appointees
The current head of of AmeriCorps is Sacramento Mayor Kevin Johnson. An Obama supporter and former NBA basketball star appointed to the position by our Dear Leader.
Gateway Pundit notes that Obama signed legislation in April to vastly increase the size of Americorps from 70,000 to 250,000. in March the Senate voted to allow ACORN funding in this same bill.
How is that money being spent? Well, IG Gerald Walpin discovered that “millions of dollars in AmeriCorps funds that were wasted or misspent”, accord to the AP, and that Kevin Johnson was using AmeriCorps funds to have students work on “political activities, run personal errands for Johnson and even wash his car.”
The claim is that “Mr. Walpin’s allegations were meritless and clearly motivated by matters beyond an honest assessment of our program.” AmeriCorps does have repay over $400,000 it received in donations though. Whoops.
Byron York correctly identifies the bottom line in this matter.
The AmeriCorps IG accuses prominent Obama supporter of misusing AmeriCorps grant money. Prominent Obama supporter has to pay back more than $400,000 of that grant money. Obama fires AmeriCorps IG.
It’s that simple. A clear case of political corruption by a loyal supporter of our Dear Leader, and Obama responds by firing the government employee doing their job by reporting the corruption. This is what passes for “transparency” in the reign of democrat Barack Hussein Obama.
Update: Michelle Malkin has more, including the ACORN & Michelle Obama connections.