The General Services Administration’s inspector general on April 2 revealed that a 2010 Las Vegas junket, featuring a mind reader and a clown cost taxpayers more than $823,000.
Why did these guys need to hire a clown? Don’t we have enough of them on our payroll already?
“It’s ironic that the demands in the presidential campaign for Mitt Romney’s tax returns are unrelenting, but when it comes time to release the schedules, travel and entertainment expenses for senior appointees there’s a denial of access,” said Paul Light, a New York University professor who studies the federal bureaucracy.
Nineteen of 20 cabinet-level agencies disobeyed the law requiring the disclosure of public information. In all, just eight of the 57 federal agencies failed to meet Bloomberg News Services’s request for documents within the 20-day window required by the Act. No fines!
Just continuous stonewalling!
“When it comes to implementation of Obama’s wonderful transparency policy goals, especially FOIA policy in particular, there has been far more ‘talk the talk’ rather than ‘walk the walk,’” said Daniel Metcalfe, director of the Department of Justice.
During the first year of the administration, cabinet agencies employed exemptions 466,402 times, a 50 percent jump from the last year of the presidency of George W. Bush. Transparency ?
Are you worried about what Mitt Romney does with his own money? Taxpayers paid $27.8 million for more than 200 overnight gatherings attended by at least 50 GSA employees over the five-year period, according to the records.
Maybe we should worry about how our money is spent. Well that’s $2 million per minute. No need to hire clowns, we have plenty of them.
The records of Secretary of the Treasury Timothy Geithner, (a tax cheat who does not pay his “fair share”) and Secretary of Labor Hilda Solis, (a tax cheat who doesn’t pay her fair share) former Secretary of Commerce and Acting Secretary Gary Locke and Rebecca Blank, U.S. Trade Representative Ron Kirk and Jacob Lew, the former director of the Office and Management and Budget, who is now White House Chief of Staff, failed to release documents to Bloomberg News within the 20-day deadline.
Transparency ?
Stephen Hess, a presidential historian at the Washington-based Brookings Institution, called the survey results of Obama’s transparency record “grim” assessment.
“The sad part is that Obama people led us to believe it would be different,” he said.
Well it is. They are Democrats.
The travel and entertainment expenses generated by other Obama officials, Transportation Secretary Ray LaHood, Energy Secretary Steven Chu, Environmental Protection Agency Administrator Lisa Jackson, and Homeland Security chief Janet Napolitano, remain undisclosed and out of Compliance with the Freedom of Information act.
Where’s the “Justice “ department lawsuit?
Maybe we should be more worried about what this administration is doing with our money than Mr Romney is doing with his own. Meanwhile the General Services Administration continues to “send in the clowns” with lavish awards banquets!
Roberta Merrill
Clearville, Pa.
Opinion
Government waste of our money a bigger problem
- Opinion
-
-
High priority
Maryland school officials on Tuesday put an exclamation point on the need to take student-athlete concussions more seriously.
-
Why are there no answers to these questions?
We currently have the most corrupt administration in the history of the country. Every day more and more lies come from the Obama administration.
-
Roaming dogs prove menace to some residents of LaVale
I am writing to inform your readers and the animal control staff of Allegany about a problem that is dragging on and unresolved, yet.
-
These types should look to the Boy Scouts for an example
Consider these headlines:
NRA will “Never Surrender.”
The Tea Party will “Never Surrender.”
The No Tax Group will “Never surrender.”
Neocons will “Never Surrender.”
Far Left Liberals will “Never Surrender.” -
Housing project will have bad effect on property in this area
I am writing to you to voice my opposition to a low income housing project that has been proposed for construction on a tract of land on Pine Swamp Road in Mineral County, W.Va. I am a registered voter and resident of Mineral County and live in the New Creek/Pine Swamp area.
-
Why have the media been silent all this time?
When I read the Cumberland Times-News Editorial this morning, Friday, May 17, entitled, “Outrageous,” I laughed like a kid at a birthday party!
-
What are chances this much money will be spent on road?
I was intrigued by cost data summarized in reporter Kathy Mellott’s recent article, “Completing southern link of U.S. Route 219 said to be best use of highway funds,” which appeared in the Cumberland Times-News on Tuesday May 14 (Page 1A).
-
School board should be doing better job with less money
The Allegany County Teachers Association (ACTA) board of directors recently submitted a letter to the editor asking the Allegany County commissioners to fully fund the Board of Education’s budget request for the upcoming fiscal year (“Commissioners should fund school board request,” April 29 Times-News).
-
Better ‘Click It’
If you notice more police on the highway this week, it’s for a couple of reasons.
-
Were they really good old days? You decide
When a fellow gets old, it’s not unusual for his mind to wander back to the days of his youth. He may forget where he laid his glasses five minutes ago, yet he can remember events that took place a half a century ago. This is one of the interesting things of old age.
- More Opinion Headlines
-
