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CORRUPTION UPDATES 47 April 2nd to the 10th, 2007: The CORRUPTION UPDATES reviews corruption in the news. News Stories from California, the Nation and the World are abstracted below, and followed by commentary and references. |
CORRUPTION UPDATES 47
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1) THE ABSTRACT PRINTED BELOW WAS ORIGINALLY PUBLISHED IN THE: BEE, 4-2-07:
Loosen strings on campaign cash, some urge
By Judy Lin - Bee Capitol Bureau
Published 12:00 am PDT Monday, April 2, 2007
http://www.sacbee.com/111/v-print/story/147979.html
In keeping with Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger's call to take special-interest money out of Sacramento, one lawmaker put forth a bill this year to ban fundraising in the last 30 days of the Legislature's two-year session -- when favors tend to fly fastest.
The bill died in committee last week.
"I didn't have a lot of confidence it would make it though," said Assemblywoman Shirley Horton, R-San Diego, who wrote Assembly Bill 517. "But we have to make it better."
Politicians rarely support legislation that would restrict their ability to raise campaign cash. In fact, several proposals have been introduced this year to loosen campaign financing rules and require officeholders to reveal less about their personal investments.
Some contend the only way to get special-interest money out of politics is to remove it. Literally.
Assemblywoman Loni Hancock, D-Berkeley, revived for a third time the California Clean Money and Fair Elections Act, which promises public financing to candidates running for state office. Previous efforts to move the ballot measure out of the Legislature failed.
THE COMMITTEE SAYS:
Bee Misses the Point: Arnie and Dems Represent Special Interest Money in Sacramento:
They will not Change
Clean Money Preserves, intact, Political Bribery by Creating DUAL Election Funding Systems
Clean Money is not quite a Fake Reform, but it is close. It is a Reform that leaves corruption, bribery, and influence peddling intact, while offering a small opportunity for the voters to put up a candidate.
This is not a threat to the Corporate Democracy. It is a wise move for the Corporate Democrats to make. It will do nothing to threaten their relationships with the Corporations, while improving their image with the voters. Two birds, one stone.
Clean Money will leave the parties in the grip of the Special Interests, offering our political elite a choice of how they present themselves to the public while not challenging their monopoly on politics.
We advise supporting any Real Reform, despite its limitations, while keeping the goal of Real democracy in sight.
Clean Money is only a baby step away from our totality of corruption, and does nothing to threaten the grip special interests have on the throat of our government.
And do notice that the Dems killed the bill to postpone the auction of law and policy during the end of the legislative session. They don't want to bite the hand that feeds them.
Also See:
Corruption
Updates 12, 4th article on the Page, “How to
Corrupt Democracy: The Insurance Industry and the Governor”
Corruption Updates 12, 6th article on the Page, “Prop. 89, A Brief Analysis”
Search the Corruption Database under
Arnie
Reform
Fake Reform
2) THE ABSTRACT PRINTED BELOW WAS ORIGINALLY PUBLISHED IN THE :
Washington Post, 4-10-07:
Six U.S. Attorneys Given 2nd Posting in Washington
By Dan Eggen
Washington Post
Staff Writer
Tuesday, April 10, 2007; A03
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/04/09/AR2007040901227_pf.html
A half-dozen sitting U.S. attorneys also serve as aides to Attorney General Alberto R. Gonzales or are assigned other Washington postings, performing tasks that take them away from regular duties in their districts for months or even years at a time, according to officials and department records.
Gonzales has US Attorneys in Babylonian Captivity
Apparently Gonzales is running US Attorney Offices around the country by keeping the Attorneys in his Washington office.
There are three types of serving US Attorneys today. The first group includes “loyal Bushies,” who will play ball. They will kill corruption investigations against Bush allies, and pursue Bush enemies with the power of the Law.
The second group, also appointed by Bush, Dares to Be Independent Prosecutors. The bodies of the Fired US Attorneys have just been thrown onto their front lawns. A simple warning message sent by the Administration: Fuck with US and Die.
Bush, Cheney, and Rumsfield used the “Fuck with Us and Die” strategy in the Pentagon to quash solid military advice. They used it on the CIA to produce trash intelligence. Most of Bush's appointees don't need this lesson; they serve greed and power before all else. Bush is their guide. Not duty, and certainly not our Constitution.
The third group we just learned about. This group resides in the pocket of the Attorney General, where they have put their dirty duty to greed, power, and party before their duty to Country and Constitution. Hell, they put loyalty before their duty to do their jobs.
Law, our Lawmakers, and our Judiciary are illegitimate tools of powerful special interests and the politicians who represent them. This must change now.
There
is only one peaceful cure for the disease of Corruption that has
killed our democracy: We must choke it off at it's source. The
feeding tube of special interest bribery must be pulled from the
mouths of our corrupted political elite. Every elected official
must depend on the money of their local voters, not the special
interests, to run for office.
Also See:
Corruption Updates 31, 1st article on page, ”GONZALES ATTACKS CONSTITUTION, JUDICIARY, AND HUMAN RIGHTS SIMULTANOUSLY”
Corruption Updates 46, 8th article on the page, "Prosecutor Posts Go To Bush Insiders:Bush packing US Attorney posts with biased insiders"
Read more articles About Abuse of the US Attorney
Search the Corruption Database under
Gonzales
US Attorney
3) THE ABSTRACT PRINTED BELOW WAS ORIGINALLY PUBLISHED IN THE : BEE, 4-3-07:
State officials' free junket to Japan with execs raises brows
By Shane Goldmacher - Bee Capitol Bureau
Published 12:00
am PDT Tuesday, April 3, 2007
http://www.sacbee.com/111/v-print/story/148328.html
Two powerful state regulators and a trio of influential California lawmakers are in Japan this week, traveling with top corporate players in the industries they are tasked with overseeing.
The California Foundation on the Environment and the Economy, a San Francisco-based nonprofit not required by law to disclose its donors, is paying for the trip.
The group's board of directors is populated by the top executives at the biggest energy and telecom companies in the state -- among them AT&T, Verizon, PG&E, Chevron, Sempra Energy, Southern California Edison and BHP Billiton
Along on the Asia trip -- whose participants departed Thursday -- are Timothy Simon and Rachelle Chong, two of the governor's appointees to the Public Utilities Commission, the powerful state board that regulates California's multibillion-dollar telecommunications and energy industries.
Also participating are Sen. Christine Kehoe of San Diego and Assemblyman Lloyd Levine of Van Nuys, both Democrats, who chair the legislative committees that oversee energy and telecommunications policy in California.
"What makes this trip so particularly egregious is that the corporations are focusing on the exact levers of power in hosting this junket for the state's top utility cops," said Doug Heller of the Foundation for Taxpayer and Consumer Rights, a consumer-advocacy group. "If you had to identify the people with the most responsibility over utility issues in the state, they've brought the two in the Legislature and 40 percent of the Public Utilities Commission."
"It's an educational trip run by a nonprofit organization, and we don't see a problem with that," said Aaron McLear, a spokesman for Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger.
One of the corporate executives traveling this week in Japan is Kenneth McNeely, the president of AT&T California.
Last year, McNeely helped secure major legislation allowing phone companies access to the state's cable TV and Internet market. AT&T spent $23.6 million in lobbying for the bill, which was jointly written by Levine and Assembly Speaker Fabian Núñez, and signed into law by Schwarzenegger.
On Friday, the Public Utilities Commission announced that it had approved a video franchise agreement to allow AT&T access to California's lucrative broadband market.
McNeely, who was traveling with PUC members Chong and Simon in Japan when the deal was announced, issued a laudatory statement, which Heller jested was made "over sake shots with the regulators, no doubt."
The list of executives on the trip also includes Thomas Giles, chief executive officer, and Hiroki Haba, senior vice president for planning, of Sound Energy Solutions.
Mitsubishi-owned Sound Energy Solutions has joined forces with ConocoPhillips in hopes of establishing a liquefied natural gas, or LNG, terminal at the port of Long Beach.
Susan Jordan of the California Coastal Protection Network...
Jordan, the lone nonprofit representative on a 2004 excursion to Australia and South Korea, said she doesn't oppose the trips because they can be educational for lawmakers. But she said the list of participants skews too heavily toward industry.
For Simon, the Japan trip offers a more personal opportunity: the chance to safeguard his job.
Named to the PUC in February, Simon has come under fire for mismanaging his personal finances, including filing for bankruptcy, according to published reports. He must be confirmed to his post by the Senate within a year.
Another key lawmaker on the trip is Padilla, who sits on the powerful Senate Rules Committee, the first stop for every appointee in the confirmation process. Simon needs only one Democratic vote -- and two Republicans -- to get through the panel.
THE COMMITTEE SAYS:
CORPORATIONS PAYOFF POLITICIANS WITH JAPAN JUNKET:
Corporations Hoping to buy further Profits and Influence from Politicians with luxury trip to Japan
This Junketeering represents a high water mark of public arrogance and political corruption by powerful Oil, Energy, and Telecom corporations, through their paid political lackeys.
After spending $23.6 Million to bribe the last legislature, ATT is finishing paying off last year's bribery debt, and setting the table, a luxury table of sushi in Japan's finest restaurants, for this year's legislative goals. A luxury vacation is a good way to begin this year's cycle of political bribes.
This junket shamelessly demonstrates how "our" representatives are openly purchased with exactly the same methods Abramoff used to buy Delay and Ney, among others.
The legislators and regulators who participated in this vacation must recuse themselves from deciding on any political issues involving The California Foundation on the Environment and the Economy This includes any legislation affecting AT&T, Verizon, PG&E, Chevron, Sempra Energy, Southern California Edison and BHP Billiton.
Furthermore, we must require every politician who has accepted special interest bribes ("contributions") to recuse themselves from deciding any issues affecting the special interest who bribed them. Only then can we be assured of some small degree of legislative independence.
Ms. Jordan, of the California Coastal Protection Network cannot seem to understand that as long as politics and policy are decided by money and bribery, the coast, the environment, worker rights, education, health, and all the small money causes, lose.
Ms. Jordan is apparently cool with that, as long as they invite her along for a luxury vacation, I mean a "fact finding trip," and she can collect her paycheck. (A six-figure income? I emailed them asking how much the leadership "earns" but received no reply.)
Also See:
Corruption Updates 22, 6th article on the page, "MONEY WINS IN ALMOST EVERY POLITICAL RACE: POLITICAL VICTORY GOES TO THE BIGGEST SPENDER. BIG SPENDERS CLEAN UP. DEMOCRACY A JOKE. BIG SURPRISE
Articles
about how BIG MONEY RUNS POLITICS
Check out articles about Big Oil
Read more articles about Arnie
Search the Corruption Database under
Big Money Politics
4) THE ABSTRACT PRINTED BELOW WAS ORIGINALLY PUBLISHED IN THE : LA Times, 4-5-07:
Spring Break: Some California leaders play, while others pay the tab
Tax-exempt groups whose donors include big corporations with business before the state pick up the tab for lavish overseas travel.
By Peter Nicholas
Times Staff
Writer
http://www.latimes.com/news/politics/la-me-energy5apr05,1,2064179,print.story?coll=la-headlines-politics
April 5, 2007
SACRAMENTO
— Anyone trying to find high-ranking state officials this week
might check posh overseas tourist spots — where many are
traveling for free.
About 16 Schwarzenegger administration
officials, regulators and state lawmakers are
spending spring break on fact-finding missions and conferences in
Europe and
Japan. The excursions were paid for by tax-exempt groups whose
donors include corporations with business before the state,
according to itineraries and guest rosters compiled by trip
sponsors.
Among the participants are companies regulated
by state government.
The entourage stayed at the Four
Seasons Tokyo at Chinzan-so, described by Frommer's travel guide
as sporting a "gorgeous glass-enclosed indoor pool surrounded
by greenery…. "
On the other side of the globe,
about 10 senior Schwarzenegger administration officials, a
legislator and state board members with oversight over the
environment are completing a weeklong trip to Brussels, Bonn and London.
The nonprofit California Climate Action Registry is paying for the visit,
according to some participants. The registry receives donations
from utility companies PG&E and Southern California Edison,
along with the energy company BP, among others. Traveling
with the state officials were executives from Chevron, PG&E
and other corporations.
"They are often extremely
luxurious trips, where, we fear, a lot more lobbying and
schmoozing goes on than actual work," said Mindy Spatt, a
spokeswoman for The Utility Reform Network, a San Francisco consumer group.
Under state law,
businesses are not permitted to pay for travel by state officials. But officials are allowed to accept travel underwritten by
tax-exempt groups such as the ones that provided the trips to
Tokyo and Europe.
That's
a loophole in the law, some watchdog groups said.
"It's
money being funneled by a private company through" a nonprofit, said Robert M. Stern, president of the Los Angeles-based Center
for Governmental Studies and a co-author of the state's 1974
Political Reform Act. "The company gets to go on the trip
and have access to the officials."
The trip arranged by
the Climate Action Registry carried a busy schedule. Guests
moved from Belgium to Germany and on to Britain for
meetings on global climate change.
State government
participants included PUC Commissioner John Bohn and Linda
Adams, the governor's Environmental Protection Agency secretary.
THE COMMITTEE SAYS:
LA TIMES Kicks RepubliCrats Junketeering in Ass
Only by looking at both of the stories above, about Junketeering, can you see how the energy and telecom industries have thoroughly bribed our political and regulatory leadership.
Jobs
in industry will be forthcoming for these pliant tools of the special interests. As soon as they finish serving industry from inside the Government, they will serve industry as official employees.
Also See:
Articles
about how BIG MONEY RUNS POLITICS
Check out articles about Big Oil
Read more articles about Arnie
Search the Corruption Database
5) THE ABSTRACT PRINTED BELOW WAS ORIGINALLY PUBLISHED IN THE : Washington Post, 4-5-07:
Gonzales Prepares to Fight for His Job in Testimony
By Dan Eggen and Paul Kane
Washington Post
Staff Writers
Thursday, April 5, 2007; A01
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/04/04/AR2007040402614_pf.html
Attorney General Alberto R. Gonzales has retreated from public view this week in an intensive effort to save his job, spending hours practicing testimony and phoning lawmakers for support in preparation for pivotal appearances in the Senate this month, according to administration officials.
Gonzales is seeking to convince skeptical lawmakers that he can be trusted to command the Justice Department after the prosecutor firings, which he initially described as an "overblown personnel matter." Subsequent documents and testimony from his former chief of staff have shown that Gonzales was regularly briefed on the process, revelations that have led to calls for his resignation.
Top Democrats have also accused department officials of misleading Congress in previous testimony, leading Justice lawyers to insist on limiting contact between key players to avoid allegations of obstructing a congressional investigation, officials said.
As a result, Gonzales and senior Justice lawyers have so far received little assistance from the White House and cannot consult with some of his closest aides, including Deputy Attorney General Paul J. McNulty, officials said.
Several central players in the prosecutor saga are out of the Justice Department building altogether. They include Gonzales's former chief of staff, D. Kyle Sampson, who resigned last month, and senior counselor Monica M. Goodling, who is on indefinite leave and who yesterday reiterated her refusal to answer questions from Congress. Michael J. Elston, McNulty's chief of staff, also began a scheduled personal leave this week after submitting to six hours of congressional interviews last Friday, officials said.
Gonzales is getting little support from Republicans in Congress, according to several GOP aides.
Top Democrats have focused in recent days on escalating their demands for testimony from Goodling, Gonzales's senior counselor and White House liaison. She has told Congress that she will assert her Fifth Amendment right against self-incrimination in refusing to answer questions about the firings.
Leahy and Rep. John Conyers Jr. (D-Mich.), chairman of the House Judiciary Committee, have questioned whether Goodling is attempting to hide criminal activity by refusing to answer questions.
THE COMMITTEE SAYS:
Will Gonzales's Open Lies to Congress and America Stand?
Is there anybody in this Administration who is not a confirmed, proven Liar? A long term plan to manipulate US Attorneys, by beginning partisan investigations against political enemies, and ending, or limiting, the scope of corruption prosecutions against political friends, has emerged from the emails and testimony of Justice Officials.
This information proves that Gonzales and his staff lied openly, and intentionally to Congress and the American people, in a pathetic attempt to cover their corrupt manipulations of our justice system.
Gonzales must be removed from any office of public trust. Bush must be impeached, and subsequently charged for his domestic and international crimes. This is our only path towards reestablishing our credibility with the world, and our domestic Constitutional legitimacy.
The crimes of this Administration must be stopped now. The bribery and corruption which is the source of these crimes must be ended immediately. Our initiative is an excellent first attack on political corruption.
Join the Committee to end political bribery and help us restore our democratic rights in California.
Corruption Updates 34, 2nd article on page, “SCARY NEO-CON POLITICAL OPERATIVE REPLACES US ATTORNEY IN ARKANSAS”
Corruption Updates 37, 5th article on page, “Fired U.S. attorneys testify before Congress”
Corruption Updates 37, 6th article on page, “Republicans could face new ethics probes”
Corruption Updates 37, 7th article on page, “Keating case prompted intervention rules
Corruption Updates 38, 1st article on page, “Fired U.S. attorney's testimony raises broader concerns”
Corruption Updates 38, 5th article on page, “LA TIMES OFFERS BUSH POLITICAL COVER FOR FIRING PROSECUTOR OF DUKE CUNNINGHAM”
Corruption Updates 39, 3rd article on page, “Rove's role in firings is focus”
Corruption Updates 39, 4th article on page, “Fed Attny Firing Report:TRIBUNE CO HAS MADE LATIMES A TOOL”
Corruption Updates 39, 5th article on page, “GOP official urged Rove to fire prosecutor”
Corruption Updates 39, 6th article on page, “House panel expands inquiry into prosecutor firings”
Corruption Updates 39, 7th article on page, “Gonzales is urged to quit 'for the nation' ”
Corruption Updates 43, 8th article on the page, "Gonzales's Senior Counselor Refuses to Testify"
Corruption Updates 43, 4th article on the page, "Gonzales Met With Top Aides On Firings"
Corruption Updates 43, 10th article on the page, "Ex-Prosecutor Says He Faced Partisan Questions Before Firing"
Read more articles About Abuse of the US Attorney
Search the Corruption Database under
Gonzales
Goodling
US Attorney
Unconstitutional Presidential Power
6) THE ABSTRACT PRINTED BELOW WAS ORIGINALLY PUBLISHED IN THE : Washington Post, 4-4-07:
House Democrats Seek to Question Gonzales Aide About Fired Prosecutors
By Dan Eggen
Washington Post
Staff Writer
Wednesday, April 4, 2007; A03
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/04/03/AR2007040301750_pf.html
House Democrats requested yesterday an interview of an aide to Attorney General Alberto R. Gonzales, arguing that she must tell Congress which questions she is refusing to answer in asserting her Fifth Amendment right against self-incrimination.
The request for a voluntary interview with Monica M. Goodling, Gonzales's senior counselor, signals that Democrats intend to challenge her refusal to testify about the Justice Department's firing of eight U.S. attorneys.
THE COMMITTEE SAYS:
Why is the Attorney General's Counsel Taking the Fifth?
Because the top leaders of the Justice Department and the White House conspired to eliminate non-partisan US Attorneys, and conspired to lie to Congress about it.
Goodling, judging by her hiding her crimes behind the 5th, was a major participant in both manipulations US Attorneys for political gain, and worked to create the false testimony presented to Congress to cover it up. Now She's running scared.
She made a dumb move by preemptively taking the Fifth. Congress can, and should, compel her to testify by granting her immunity. If she still resists, Jail her like Judith Miller.
Granting immunity to the right player may blow the lid off the US Attorney scandal by linking these crimes directly to the office of the President.
It would be ironic if Bush goes down for domestic political corruption after committing numerous war crimes, and crimes against humanity.
But maybe things will work out: Bush's crimes are being pursued in Italy and Germany. The best case scenario would be for Bush to do extended time in German and Italian prisons for kidnapping, then we can extradite him to serve a long sentence here for kidnapping and torture.
In Gitmo.
Also See:
Corruption Updates 43, 4th article on the page, "Gonzales
Met With Top Aides On Firings"
List of links to articles on US Attorney
Search the Corruption Database under
US Attorney
Gonzales
Goodling
7) THE ABSTRACT PRINTED BELOW WAS ORIGINALLY PUBLISHED IN THE : LA Times, 4-5-07:
With Senate on break, Bush makes recess appointments
The three, including a contentious regulatory director, most likely would not have been approved by lawmakers.
By Joel Havemann
Times Staff
Writer
http://www.latimes.com/news/politics/la-na-recess5apr05,0,7477186,print.story?coll=la-home-headlines
April
5, 2007
WASHINGTON — President Bush on Wednesday
appointed as his top regulatory official a conservative academic who
has written that markets do a better job of regulating than the
government does and that it is more cost-effective for people who
are sensitive to pollution to stay indoors on smoggy days than for
government to order polluters to clean up their emissions.
As
director of the Office of Information and Regulatory Affairs at the
White House Office of Management and Budget, Susan E. Dudley will
have an opportunity to change or block all regulations proposed by
government agencies.
In a flurry of nominations and appointments, Bush also named a researcher at the Cato Institute, a libertarian think tank in Washington, as deputy director of the Social Security Administration. Andrew G. Biggs has been an outspoken proponent of converting Social Security benefits into self-directed retirement accounts,...
And as ambassador to Belgium he installed Sam Fox, a St. Louis businessman and GOP fundraiser who contributed $50,000 to the Swift Boat veterans' controversial campaign...
Although
Dudley's new job is more obscure than those to which Biggs and Fox
were appointed, it also is potentially the most powerful. The budget
office's regulatory shop acts as a funnel for all regulations
emanating throughout the government.
In congressional
testimony, Dudley has favored dispensing with costly air pollution
controls and initiating a pollution warning system "so that
sensitive individuals can take appropriate 'exposure avoidance'
behavior" — mostly by remaining inside.
She
opposed stricter limits on arsenic in drinking water, in part
because she argued that the Environmental Protection Agency's
calculations of the costs and benefits overvalued some lives,
particularly those of older people with a small life
expectancy.
She has argued that air bags should not be
required by government regulation but requested by automobile
consumers who are willing to pay extra for them.
Rick
Melberth, director of regulatory policy for the watchdog group OMB
Watch, called Dudley a "terrible pick." He described her
as "an anti-regulatory extremist" who believed that the
proper regulatory lever was the free market, "and if the market
doesn't protect you, too bad."
THE COMMITTEE SAYS:
Another set of traitors to Constitution Elevated to Positions of Responsibility
The Constitution gives the people, through their representatives, the right and power to regulate market The Constitution does not give the markets the right to regulate the people. This simple inversion provides the basic plan of corporate fascism.
Ms. Dudley believes that profits are more important than the health and welfare of our people. Even more disturbing is her belief that markets should regulate the people, rather than our forefather's Constitutional plan for the people to regulate markets.
This woman is not qualified for citizenship, let alone a leadership position in our government. According to Dudley, our democracy is secondary to the market. It gets even better.
Bush appointed Andrew G. Biggs, an avowed enemy of Social Security as deputy director of the Social Security Administration. If Bush could, he would appoint the Devil to run Heaven.
The pattern of Bush Administration appointments is clear: Bush appoints representatives who are bent on destroying the regulatory framework they are charged with administering.
The appointment of Sam Fox as ambassador to Belgium is a classic case of a corrupt political payback: Fox "contributed" fifty grand to a Republican Shadow party, and that qualifies him for the Ambassadorship.
Yep, the Dems and Repugs have constantly proven that giving money to the right people qualifies you for anything, or any job you want.
Search the Corruption Database under
Jobs
8) THE ABSTRACT PRINTED BELOW WAS ORIGINALLY PUBLISHED IN THE : Washington Post, 4-5-07:
Waxman Seeks RNC E-Mail on Use of Federal Resources
By R. Jeffrey Smith
Washington Post
Staff Writer
Thursday, April 5, 2007; A06
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/04/04/AR2007040402404_pf.html
House Oversight and Government Reform Committee Chairman Henry A. Waxman (D-Calif.) told the Republican National Committee yesterday to turn over copies of any electronic messages from White House officials that relate to the use of federal resources or agencies for partisan Republican purposes.
Waxman's broadly worded request came a week after he asked the RNC and the Bush-Cheney '04 campaign to retain copies of e-mails being sent by White House officials via Republican Party e-mail accounts, a practice that surfaced in the course of the Democrats' probe into the administration's decision to fire eight U.S. attorneys.
Several deputies to senior White House adviser Karl Rove used such e-mail accounts to discuss the firings, and Waxman said that made the messages official government documents subject to his committee's jurisdiction.
Waxman's letter said he is particularly seeking documents relevant to his investigation of possible misconduct at the General Services Administration, where one of Rove's deputies briefed several dozen senior political appointees in January about key congressional seats that the party hopes to win or retain in the 2008 elections.
After the presentation, GSA officials told congressional investigators, GSA Administrator Lurita A. Doan asked how the agency's resources could be used to help "our candidates" in the election. Doan has said she does not recall the episode, which is now being investigated by the Office of Special Counsel, an independent agency that enforces prohibitions on improper political conduct by government employees.
THE COMMITTEE SAYS:
Waxman Tightening Noose of Oversight around Administration's Corrupt Neck
What honest person could dislike Waxman? He has doggedly pursued Administration liars to seek the truth behind their seemingly endless corruptions.
Also See:
Corruption Updates 2, 9th article on page, “Bush GSA Appointee Tries to Avoid Prison: Another Link in Abramoff Web of Corruption”
Corruption Updates 33, 8th article on the page, "House
Panel Opens Investigation of GSA Chief's Deal With Friend"
Search the Corruption Database under
Doan
GSA
US Attorney
9) THE ABSTRACT PRINTED BELOW WAS ORIGINALLY PUBLISHED IN THE : LA Times, 4-6-07:
Earth faces a grim future if global warming isn't slowed, U.N. report says
By Alan Zarembo and Thomas H. Maugh II
Times Staff Writers
http://www.latimes.com/news/science/la-ex-warming6apr06,0,5140882,print.story?coll=la-home-headlines
10:56
AM PDT, April 6, 2007
A new global warming report issued
today by the United Nations paints a near-apocalyptic vision of the
Earth's future if temperatures continue to rise unabated: more than
a billion people in desperate need of water, extreme food shortages
in Africa and elsewhere, a blighted landscape ravaged by fires and
floods, and millions of species sentenced to extinction.
The
report is the second issued this year by the group. The first,
released in January, characterized global warming as a runaway train
that is irreversible but that can be moderated by societal changes.
The new report is far more controversial, however, because it cites specific effects of the warming. Scientists and politicians wrangled well into the night Thursday as representatives of some of the world's largest greenhouse gas emitters attempted to tone down the report and scientists fought for their predictions.
In the end, the report survived relatively unscathed, but timelines for future events were largely deleted and the degree of confidence in the projections was scaled back compared to earlier drafts.
North
America can expect more hurricanes, floods, droughts, heat waves and
wildfires, the report said, and the coasts will be flooded by rising
sea levels. Crop production will increase initially as the growing
season gets longer, but climbing temperatures and water shortages
will ultimately lead to sharp reductions.
Africa will suffer
the most extreme effects, with a quarter of a billion people losing
most of their water supplies. Food production will fall by half in
many countries and governments will have to spend 10% of their
budgets or more to adapt to climate changes, the report said.
Asia
will suffer from unprecedented flooding as the rising temperatures
melt Himalayan glaciers and rock avalanches will wipe out many
villages. The same will happen in the European Alps and the South
American Andes.
Rising temperatures and drying soil will
replace the moist rain forest of the eastern Amazon with drier
savannah, eliminating much of the habitat that now supports the
greatest diversity of species in the world.
At least 30% of
the world's species will disappear if temperatures rise 3.6 degrees
above the average levels of the 1980s and 1990s, the report
said.
But Jim Connaughton, chairman of the White House
Council on Environmental Quality, said the report would not stampede
the administration into taking part in the U.N.'s Kyoto Protocol...
"Each
nation sort of defines their regulatory objectives in different ways
to achieve the greenhouse reduction outcome that they seek," he
said in a briefing.
THE COMMITTEE
SAYS:
Climate Change has already happened Glad the Scientists Took their Heads out of their Asses, opened the Window, and Looked outside
Those of you who know me, and have talked to me for the last decade, are not surprised.
Six years ago I predicted the rate of global climate change would break all the climatologists' models, regaling scientists to the role of merely reporting. rather than predicting, climate change.
This prediction has proven itself.
Hear that chainsaw in the distance? That's the sound of nature coming to return all the favors we have bestowed on it.
Also
See:
Corruption Updates 39, 10th article on the page, "Top Scientists Warn of Water Shortages and Disease Linked to Global Warming"
Read more about political Censorship of Science
Search the Corruption Database under
Environment
Censorship
10) THE ABSTRACT PRINTED BELOW WAS ORIGINALLY PUBLISHED IN THE : LA Times, 4-6-07:
Permanent drought predicted for Southwest
Study says global warming threatens to create a Dust Bowl-like period. Water politics could also get heated.
By Alan Zarembo and Bettina
Boxall
Times Staff Writers
http://www.latimes.com/news/politics/la-sci-swdrought6apr06,0,2673661,print.story
April
6, 2007
The driest periods of the last century — the
Dust Bowl of the 1930s and the droughts of the 1950s — may
become the norm in the Southwest United States within
decades because of global warming, according to a study released
Thursday.
The research suggests that the transformation may
already be underway. Much of the region has been in a severe drought
since 2000, which the study's analysis of computer climate models
shows as the beginning of a long dry period.
The study,
published online in the journal Science, predicted a permanent
drought by 2050 throughout the Southwest — one of the
fastest-growing regions in the nation.
The data tell "a
story which is pretty darn scary and very strong," said
Jonathan Overpeck, a climate researcher at the University of
Arizona who was not involved in
the study.
The latest study investigated the possibility of a
broader, global climatic mechanism that could cause drought.
Specifically, they looked at the Hadley cell, one of the planet's
most powerful atmospheric circulation patterns, driving weather in
the tropics and subtropics.
Within the cell, air rises at the
equator, moves toward the poles and descends over the
subtropics.
Increasing levels of greenhouse gases, the
researchers said, warms the atmosphere, which expands the poleward
reach of the Hadley cell.
Climate Already Changed, People and Scientists Too Stupid to SEE IT
For about 10 years I have been telling my buddies that the heat of summer was not retreating southward during winter. This has been increasing each year, diminishing the polar chilling, changing the timing of the onset and end of the seasons. Most important in my view is the radical changes in the direction of the winter winds.
Winter Winds in the Bay Area have traditionally come from the NW. For the past 8 years the Winter winds have been shifting, coming from the West and the South West. These winds are dry in mid-winter, and keep the wet Northern Storms at bay. Then, in Spring, these Southern Winds have brought tropical-style downpours, barely offsetting our drying Winters.
This year the freakish Southern Spring storms did not come and bail us out.
Every Winter has become drier and warmer for the past 10 years. Fall now regularly extends into December, and spring trys to start in February. For the majority of you who are from someplace else, this is very abnormal weather.
Watching the Sierra Bears in November and December is sad. Instead of enjoying a cold sleep, they are hungrily patrolling dead, dry meadows that have no berries, grubs, or food to sustain them until the uncertain advent of Winter snows and hibernation.
Watching the lowland trees this winter was disturbing: deciduous trees were dropping leaves all winter long. There was no "fall" to speak of, as in a tempature fall triggering a massive leave drop.
I suspect that the increasing incidents of mountain lion attacks reflects the lions response to decreasing late-fall food supplies. In any case, these seasonal changes have had a cascading effect in ecosystems. Budding times in Spring are off, affecting birth and survival rates of all interrelated species. Increasing Summer temperatures are killing off high altitude plants. Lack of Winter snowfall is drying out the land early in the Spring, affecting budding timing and density. And the cycles of life continue to decline in the thrall of our ignorance.
Expect large declines in crop productions, if not outright crop failures, across the United States, and the world this year.
The Climatoligists will catch up with the changes, but it will be too late to preserve our predictable seasons. We do not need science to tell us we have severely damaged our climate, we needed wisdom.
Wisdom would have prevented us from blinding ourselves to the early warnings of nature, and the subsequent warnings of science. Wisdom would have prevented us from overburdening our land with people, our water with dams, and our skies with endlessly expanding pollution. The oceans contain a thin shadow of the life they held in 1600. And we desperately need wisdom now that our science cannot keep up with the damage our industrial-strength ignorance is perpetuating.
We seem to have traded, or maybe sold, our wisdom for luxury, prestige, greed and power.
It was a bad trade. The latter commodities are short-lived, unless balanced with wisdom. But Wisdom is not a market commodity, so it has little contemporary value, and was let go of cheaply.
I have a wise plan: Let's double California's population by 2050. Let's give everybody in the state a driver's licence and a car or two. That should fix things right up. I'm glad we have such wise leaders, who represent our best interests so well.
Also See:
Corruption Updates 47, 9th article on the page, "Earth Faces a Grim Future: UN Report" Climate Change has already happened:Glad the Scientists Took their Heads out of their Asses, opened the Window, and Looked outside
Corruption Updates 36 , 6th article on the page, "China to pass U.S. as world's top generator of greenhouse gases"
Search the Corruption Database under
Environment
11) THE ABSTRACT PRINTED BELOW WAS ORIGINALLY PUBLISHED IN THE : BEE, 4-6-07:
State appeals prison ruling
Governor fights to move inmates out of state and uphold his emergency powers.
By Andy Furillo - Bee Capitol Bureau
Published 12:00 am
PDT Friday, April 6, 2007
http://www.sacbee.com/111/v-print/story/150411.html
The Schwarzenegger administration sought Thursday to block a court ruling that the governor's program transferring inmates out of state is "unlawful."
In the meantime, the administration is taking the ruling by Sacramento Superior Court Judge Gail Ohanesian to the state's 3rd District Court of Appeal.
In a statement, Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger said his office is prepared to "fight to preserve our emergency efforts to address the prison overcrowding crisis."
He said the out-of-state transfers, in which hundreds of prisoners already have been moved to private prisons in Arizona and Tennessee, are "imperative to relieve the pressure on our overburdened prison system and improve safety for correctional officers, staff and inmates."
Her ruling also said the governor overstepped his authority by issuing an emergency proclamation on the prison overcrowding because the issue remains within the state's ability to control. Moreover, the judge's ruling said, no local authorities asked the state for assistance.
THE COMMITTEE SAYS:
Arnie's Only Solution to Prison Crisis:
Outsource it
The prisons, schools, and hospitals are shot. What are our Corporate hack politicians going to do about it? Nothing, unless you consider paying out the nose for private prisons, schools and hospitals, something.
As Bush as used the War to enrich Big Oil, Haliburton, Boeing, and a slew of his biggest bribers, Arnie is using our state's prison breakdown to enrich private business.
Also See:
Corruption Updates 16 , 5th article on the page, "CALIFORNIA PRISONS INHUMANE"
Corruption Updates 34, 3rd article on the page, "State prisons in 'tailspin,' panel says
Search the Corruption Database under
Prisons (14 Abstracts)
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