Monday, July 25, 2011

The "tax man" are tax cheaters

As the debt ceiling manipulations continues to occupy the news and we all hope the republicans will stand their ground and call Obama's bluff other fleeting government absurdity has gone largely unnoticed.


It seems that certain employees of none other than the IRS have been caught CHEATING on their taxes.


No PLEASE PLEASE say it's not SO this is like Timmy Geithner claiming he failed to pay his taxes because he did not understand turbo tax.


It seems federal investigators have found over 100 IRS employees that fraudulently claimed a first time homebuyer tax credit from the 2008 and 2009 stimulus packages.


The oh so successful government programs like "cash for clunkers" or tax credits for energy efficient appliance purchases, which do nothing but waste tax payer money and promote fraud as in this case.


The inspector general of the Treasury Department for tax administration found 128 IRS employees who claimed the credit but who also made other claims that showed they either were not first time buyers or bought their houses outside the eligibility period.


Now $8,000 credit is a lot of money and of course with all such government goody give aways there are always unintended consequences for trying to buy peoples favor.


But fear not the IRS employes represent a small part of the total fraud generated by this program which could reach more than a half-billion dollars according to the inspector general.


At least one IRS employee facing charges of making a false claim while acting as an officer of the federal government is looking at a felony punishable by up to 5 years in prison.


There are several others who have been charged or convicted but due to taxpayer confidentiality rules there are no details on active investigations or closed cases or how many IRS employees face legal problems.


The House Ways and Means Committee will be holding hearings as they are responsible for IRS oversight and hopefully will ask the IRS some very tough questions on how this happened.


In 2009, as part of the now failed stimulus package, Obama raised the credit limit to $8,000  eliminating the payback requirement and extending the eligibility period.


The government issued $27 billion in credits to some 3.9 million taxpayers in 2009 and 2010.


Surprisingly at the start of the program the IRS required no documentation from those applying for the credit and Congress supposedly did not give the agency the tools to track fraud which seems like an excuse to me and the usual big government response to their ineptness at running any program correctly.


At least $513 million in bogus claims were paid out.


13,448 taxpayers who claimed the credit on a house they said they had not bought yet , but promised to buy in the future.


Nearly 50,00 taxpayers claimed the credit although they had owned their home for up to three years prior  to the eligibility period.


More than 1,000 prisoners applied and received the credit despite being incarcerated at the time.


Thousands of taxpayers who claimed the credit for a home for which someone else also claimed the credit.


This whole program is emblematic of the Obama administration who tries to fix a problem while buying favor from voters only to exacerbate the problem i.e. the housing market is still messed up precisely because of this program - the market needs to find it's bottom so it can rebuild, but as long as Obama and his minions keep tweaking it to the tune of over 30 BILLION in this case the housing market will NOT RECOVER.


Oh and there is more outrageousness on the part of our government.


Currently some 638 workers  on Capitol Hill owe the IRS $9.3 million in back taxes. 


Currently 41  people inside Obama's very own White House owe the government they're allegedly running a total of $831,055 in back taxes.


In the House of Representatives, 421 people owe a total $6,524,892


In the Senate, 217 owe $2,774,836. 


In the Treasury, 1,204 owe $7,670,814. 


At the Labor Department463 owe $7,481,463


81 workers for the Federal Reserve System's board of governors owe $1,076,733.


Within the Department of Homeland Security, there are 4,856 people who owe the tax agency a total of $37,012,174.


At least  276,300 current and retired federal employees owed $3,042,200,000 in 2008.


That is over 3 BILLION with a "B" dollars.


This is a total outrage these people should be FIRED IMMEDIATELY and those who are retired should have their pension checks WITHHELD until they pay up.


It is no wonder the sick bloated federal government has a spending problem.


Thanks to Stephen Dinan of the Washington Times for reporting part of this story.





Friday, July 15, 2011

more hilarity and hypocrisy from progressives

The last two weeks have been filled with the Casey Anthony debacle and of course the DEBT CEILING talks as both sides show their their metal.


The democrats do not want the talks to succeed they want to use this issue to beat republicans over the heads before the election and demagogue their usual issues.


Obama is trying to maneuver republicans into a position were they will be on the hook for the economy through not raising the debt ceiling but of course he has put forth NO PLAN or even a viable budget himself just like he voted "present" constantly when in the Illinois senate he will never commit or take responsibility for any thing he is just looking for the political advantage.


After all Obama can not run on his record he can only try and deflect by attacking his opponent.


I just hope republicans will stick to their convictions and not cave in to Obama.


Let him continue to lie and look like a desperate failing president.


Two stories of note last week and one this week struck me as the usual unmitigated gaul and hypocrisy from progressives and the left.


First was the spreading scandal among teachers and administrators starting in Atlanta and spreading to some nine other states and counting.


It is easy to see how the testing in the No Child Left Behind Act causes teachers to teach our kids how to pass the test and little else because scores are inevitably tied to funding.


Now it seems scores are also tied to some teachers getting incentive bonuses with sums approaching 25k.


With these kinds of sums involved it seems some teachers have been CHEATING.


Please please say it is not SO.
The pedagogues of learning CHEATING.
And cheating for MONEY no less.


Considering the collectivist propaganda and indoctrination be it socialists or communists in our schools today from the universities on down how shocking that these purveyors of social justice are money grubbing and willing to be dishonest for the all mighty buck.


Seems that helping the students went so far as to change answers on test before they were submitted.


I am surprised they did not just hand out the answers before hand.


With the unions especially the various teachers unions screaming that they are under attack one would think they would be smart enough not to get in to this situation but it is not surprising too that those who scream the loudest are the most corrupt trying to deflect though their screaming.


How is it possible to have a culture of CHEATING in the very institutions that are suppose to teach learning and life skills?


These teachers and administrators should be fired!!!


Where is the main stream media on this?
This is just outrageous another huge hypocrisy by the left.
More reason to push for vouchers and charter schools.
The Department of Education needs to go as well as the teacher unions - let the FREE MARKET RULE.


Similarly the president has harped on raising taxes on the wealthy with his class warfare demagoguery.


When he started down that road it was to raise taxes by eliminating  deductions on CORPORATE JETS.


Ever body agrees even the president (at least he indicated that while extending Bush's tax cuts) that raising taxes now is a bad idea.
But NO.


Over and OVER and OVER bad republicans do not want to tax millionaires and billionaires on their private jets blah blah blah.


Millionaires and Billionaires AFTER ALL NEED TO PAY THEIR FAIR SHARE.
What a farce.


Firstly part of his own oh so successful stimulus plan gave the aircraft manufactures and suppliers funds and incentives.
Now he  deems them evil right up  there with the wall street fat cats and fat cat bankers.
All of whom use private aircraft - NO.


The real HYPOCRISY is the amount of air time Obama has with Air Force One. 


He has flown around more than other presidents and of course he has a talent like all bureaucrats to mix his agenda so the tax payers end up with the bill even though he is fund raising or taking a vacation.




Back in 2009 for the G20 meeting more than 500 officials and staff accompanied the president on his tour that week – along with a mass of high-tech security equipment, including the $300,000 presidential limousine, known as The Beast. Fitted with night-vision camera, reinforced steel plating, tear- gas cannon and oxygen tanks, the vehicle is the ultimate in heavy armoured transport.
He has the nerve to bitch out the rich - this is a typical progressive move "do as I say not as I do" - he can rationalize his over usage as a necessity after all he is smarter and knows all the answers.
He travels like a KING.
Obama used Air Force One 172 times in 2010, almost every other day, at a cost to us taxpayers of $181,757 per hour. He has expended more than $100 million in tax dollars flitting about in Air Force One, rarely on urgent national business, and another $100 million in tax dollars transporting his extensive entourage here and there.
His vacation to Hawaii to visit his chums cost us $1.75 million, while we taxpayers are expected to tighten our belts and enjoy “homecations.’’
Mrs. Obama, their children and countless “aides’’ were off to Africa for sightseeing and even a safari under the guise of showing interest in children of Africa
PLEASE my head may explode and my eyes BLEED.
He just has to be kidding - I am SO TRIED of his deceit, lies, and distortions.
This week even better we find out that the sob story he whined through out the campaign of 2008 about his mother's health insurance is another fabrication and lie.
New York Times reporter Janny Scott’s “A Singular Woman: The Untold Story of Barack Obama’s Mother” tells another story of her health insurance situation at the time.
The president claimed she was being denied coverage by the "BIG BAD INSURANCE COMPANY" because of pre-existing conditions blah, blah, blah.
Obama said, “For my mother to die of cancer at the age of 53 and have to spend the last months of her life in the hospital room arguing with insurance companies because they’re saying that this may be a pre-existing condition and they don’t have to pay her treatment, there’s something fundamentally wrong about that.”
When confronted his mouth pieces denied any ambiguity saying that the president was drawing from memories from over 15 years before but did not deny anything.
The facts do not change the broad strokes of Obama’s story of his mother’s last days was the claim.
He LIED - He used his DEAD MOTHER to score political points about his POLITICAL POSITION.
He has NO SHAME.
As a progressive ideologue the "ends always justify the means" mentality allows him to be the 
LIAR - IN - CHIEF.
I realize these are not earth shattering problems but ARE indicative of the slime oozing from our over bloated government and especially from the white house.
Progressivism is the disease the country is suffering from they have brought only divisiveness through political correctness and suffering through their pathological altruism.


VOTE in 2012 
The "ONE" is DONE
The "O" has got to GO