Governor William J. Le Petomane:
"We've gotta protect our phoney baloney jobs, gentlemen!"
Blazing Saddles, 1974
Are 'low income' and 'low income housing' synonymous with corruption? Are low income or no income people so ignorant that government officials and
employees can defraud government instead of building low income housing in ghetto neighborhoods or subsidizing the housing? What prompts appointees
and employees of HUD to steal from government? What are HUD's account controls that enable stealing for years without discovery?
Anyone who believes this country is free is an idiot!
A high-ranking public housing official charged with providing government-subsidized homes to the poor stole
hundreds of thousands of dollars from the agency and used it to buy furniture, alcohol, clothes, makeup and other personal items. The crooked public
official scammed the government for years undetected which may seem unbelievable though not when it comes to the agency she worked for, a bastion
of corruption known as Housing and Urban Development (HUD).
This is an agency that�s been embroiled in a multitude of serious scandals�under both Democrat and Republican
administrations�over the years. One veteran employee at a state branch stealing a few hundred thousand bucks to go on a marathon shopping spree is
no biggie.
Problems go back to the Ronald Reagan administration, when an influence-peddling scandal led to the conviction
of 16 people, including top aides to then HUD Secretary Samuel Pierce. Bill Clinton�s housing secretary, Henry Cisneros, pleaded guilty to lying to the FBI
about payments to his former mistress. George W. Bush�s HUD secretary, Alphonso Jackson, was ousted after the feds launched an investigation into his
plots to enrich himself and his friends by giving them lucrative government contracts. Barack Obama�s second HUD secretary, Julian Castro, misspent the
agency�s federal funds as mayor of San Antonio.
Fraud and corruption has also been pervasive among HUD employees and field directors. A few years ago, an
employee got busted for racking up nearly $12,000 on his agency credit card by charging personal items such as groceries, lodging, television cable,
transportation and even prescription medications. A federal audit determined that the agency knew about the spending spree but didn�t bother taking
action, reprimanding the employee or reporting the wrongdoing.
HUD�s inspector general has also testified before Congress about the severe mismanagement at offshoots
functioning independently�yet federally funded�in states across the country that have fleeced taxpayers out of hundreds of millions of dollars.
He testified that his office discovered more than $200 million in questionable spending at local public housing agencies (PHAs) since 2012. PHAs are
created by states, operate at the city or county level and administer the federal program known as Section 8 to provide low-income people with
affordable housing. Many of these local public housing agencies are run by people with �troubled backgrounds� that somehow manage to remain in
high-ranking positions at the agencies, the watchdog told lawmakers back in 2014.
Years later, an executive director at one of those branches in Michigan gets busted for embezzling $336,000.
Her name is Lorena Loren and for years she served as the executive director of the St. Clair Housing Commission, which administers a local Section 8
housing program in southeast Michigan. Section 8 is the federal government�s major program for assisting very low-income families, the elderly and the
disabled to afford decent, safe and sanitary housing in the private market. The program is administered locally by Public Housing Agencies (PHA) like
the St. Clair Housing Commission so the cash comes from the feds though there appears to be no oversight. The idea is to subsidize housing
costs, via vouchers, so the poor can live in privately owned, single-family homes, townhouses or apartments they otherwise couldn�t afford.
For eight years Loren used government credit cards as her personal piggy bank, buying items for herself and
relatives, according to a federal charging document obtained by a Detroit, Michigan newspaper. She racked up around $135,000 in purchases from online
retailer Amazon, $14,364 at big-box store Sam�s Club and $16,460 at various Walmart stores. The purchases included food, medicine, appliances, furniture,
clothing and booze. The disgraced housing director also used $24,600 in agency funds to pay for her son�s rental unit, falsified documents�including lease
agreements to use housing voucher cash to rent a home for her son�and deposited federal rental subsidy funds into family members� bank accounts.
Loren has been charged with conspiracy to commit federal program fraud and faces up to five years in prison.
[Editor's Note: Simple controls like Credit Limits on government credit cards, and either a
Bank Accountant or independent Government Accountant/Inspector to halt or prohibit various illegal transactions. Also, cards with automatic, built-in
decline-payment based on criteria setup by government accounting. Citizens, today, when purchasing items may get a call from a bank official confirming
that the purchase is good. These bank officials should call government accountants instead of the card user in the case of a government credit card.
There should be NO cash or checks for any HUD transaction—only credit or debit cards with built-in
decline-payment facilities. If these people can't be trusted to perform their duties honestly, then terminate their employment. The key factor here is
an immediate detection of fraudulent transactions before the loss is too great.
]
Clearly, this is part of a much broader epidemic at HUD. A Michigan-area newspaper editorial blasts the agency
for failing to protect taxpayer dollars and low-income families that need help. The piece cites other recent cases in which public employees stole from
HUD�s Section 8 program, including a 52-person ring in Ohio and schemes in Texas, Louisiana, Arkansas, Colorado and Massachusetts. �It should be more
difficult for housing commission directors to write checks to themselves,� the editorial states. �And the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development
should be keeping closer watch over its Section 8 voucher program.� Hopefully President Trump�s new HUD secretary, Ben Carson, will clean some house
at the fraud-infested agency. We don�t� need a newspaper editorial to tell us that �HUD clearly has a gap in its fiduciary responsibility.�
A new Congress has been seated, and it brings the prospect of perhaps, maybe, potentially, in a possible way doing something about the runaway federal deficits. And in other news, several New York area bridges are for sale, which you can acquire at a bargain price.
Excessive Spending Destroys!
Feds Have a Spending Problem — DO NOT RAISE THE CEILING!
Feds Have a Sewage Problem!
Joseph Story, Supreme Court Justice ... when the court wasn't part of the L-E-J Cabal
Joseph Story (1779�1845) was born during the American Revolution, and came of age in the early years of the new United States of America. He was a scholar of the U.S. Constitution, and, eventually helped found the Harvard Law School.
In 1811, Story was appointed to the Supreme Court by President James Madison � who knew a few things about the U.S. Constitution, in that he helped write it. Story was a contemporary of another famous member of the Supreme Court, Chief Justice John Marshall (1755�1835).
"The right of the citizens to keep and bear arms has justly been considered, as the palladium of the liberties of a republic; since it offers a strong moral check against the usurpation and arbitrary power of rulers; and will generally, even if these are successful in the first instance, enable the people to resist and triumph over them."
See the following links for more related articles:
[Editor's Note: what I have dubbed the "Legislative-Executive-Judicial Cabal" which the American People have caused by ignoring the generational transition from our Constitutional Republic to what now is, in effect, an "elected" dictatorship. Never mind who is elected. Never mind which bogus party is in power. The superficial, theatrically staged, choreographed appearance of debate, disagreement, and stalled legislation always resolves into more government and less FREEDOM. We the People still lose more freedom after every "emergency" or unnoticeably when CON-gress passes another general, open-ended law that enables the Executive (dictator) and its unaccountable agencies to formulate more freedom-restricting regulations (200 pages a day get posted to the Federal Register). The "Dictator's" agencies (police force) continue to pile-up more weapons to squelch uprising(s) when the People finally realize and understand their tyrannical government.
Currently, CONgress is just a group of socialists, progressives, and faux-conservatives (career politicians) that, on a daily basis, ignores the Constitution, many of their own past statutes, and cedes their responsibilities to the president ("elected" dictator). A comparison to the history of Rome becomes more and more credible with the Executive and its "featherbedded" lackeys gaining more power while CONgress sits back all fat-dumb-and-happy.
CONgress has made recent efforts to expose State Dept. failures in Benghazi (inept political leader), Fast-and-Furious gun-running (criminal AG), IRS 1st amendment violations, gov't union Veterans Administration fraud, and whining about Obama(Reid)-killer-Care, but these efforts are mostly politics as usual. Most "citizens" will forget about these infringements from our unaccountable, uncontrollable Executive branch with its tyrannical agencies staffed by socialist unions that extort "juicy" contracts from the "elected" dictatorship.
Most positions in the federal government whether elected, appointed, or hired are nominal, make-work jobs (confidentially) designed merely to grow government, bilk money from private businesses and citizens, and eventually fully transform America into a totalitarian state. When this happens, CONgress will have destroyed the economy and the country by their negligence and counter-liberty policies, and it will be almost impossible to Restore America. The 'Restore America' list is only a beginning too.]
"The accumulation of all powers, legislative, executive, and judiciary, in the same hands, whether of one, a few, or many, and whether hereditary, self-appointed or elective, may justly be pronounced the very definition of tyranny."
James Madison, Federalist Paper 47, Friday, February 1, 1788
Anyone who believes this country is free is an idiot!
"Extortion and thuggery are good things when they're called law!"
Larken Rose
[Editor's Note: a Constitutional Convention is required to reverse the damage to freedom and liberty since 1900. This Article V was ratified by the participants at America's founding Constitutional Convention as an alternate path for repairing damage to freedom and liberty, a path for the People to restore damage caused by our failed representatives in the Legislative, Executive, and Judicial branches of a government designed to represent the wishes of We the People.
The States must "demand" a Convention and explicitly specify an agenda of:
laws to be repealed or modified,
Amendments to existing constitutional clauses that define the co-equal branches to further specify and define, and
new Amendments or statutes to be eventually ratified by States.
These Amendments should further specify and clarify the powers of the Legislature and Executive Branches. A good example is the definition of a "Bill".
A Bill should contain ONLY verbiage in regards to the topic of the future law. NO earmarks and NO unrelated sections or attacments.
Many past Bills sent to a president for signature contained unrelated but essential funding sections that rendered the Bill veto-proof when it warranted a veto.
CON-gress can override a veto if the Bill is deemed absolutely necessary by CON-gress.
If the Bill requires SPECIFICALLY related amendments, the CON-gress can "debate" (with its usual theater) and vote any new amendments.
The original text of the Constitution contains some very GENERAL clauses enabling both CON-gress and Executive branches to write laws and
regulations with their particular nuances expanding powers beyond intent. "Intent" may be gleaned from a complete understanding of
Federalist Papers.
An example of further specification and clarity for CON-gress should be a clear, very specific definition of the boundaries for the interstate Commerce Clause.
To restore freedom, liberty, and individuality - minimally these must be repealed:
Currently, even with computer-searching systems, the list of antiquated and/or obsolete statutes (and related regulations) is unwieldy.
These statutes must be invalidated unless there remains an applicable reason for retaining the law(s).
Aside from invalidating statutes, there are many regulations that are biased in favor of large enterprises (who buy support from bureaucrats)
at the expense of the competition, effectively repressing the Free Market. Any regulations not related to public safety that gives a financial advantage
to some companies over their smaller rivals must be rescinded to enable all companies with good consumer products to excel without burdensome regulations.
Additionally, the Convention should adopt for ratification at least these new Amendments or statute modifications:
clearly define and limit the role of government in regards to the term "general welfare",
Term Limits for CON-gress (12 years) including a 6 month limit on time residing in DC,
strict Prohibition of Lobbying (with a comprehensive definition of "lobbying"), and
a Balanced Budget Amendment to stop wreckless spending. During a CON-gressionally declared "war" (only after USA is attacked or attack is proven "imminent"),
deficit spending is permissible.
Restore America to its roots, i.e. Defense, State, Treasury, and Justice. Some Agencies are required like CIA and NSA, both respectively focused on defense against real foreign aggressors and not fictitious paranoid delusions of war mongers. Other agencies help where certain interstate communications are necessary. Most agencies like Agriculture, Education, DEA, IRS (eliminated with 16th Amendment) and many other listed here should be eliminated.
Restore the world Gold Standard with five contentious steps, and
Replace the IMF, World Bank, and Export-Import Bank with facilities that reflect the new Gold Standard, and
After decentralizing and economizing, if tax revenue is needed to fund all or part of the federal government, then implement the Fair Tax.
Regarding a Constitutional Convention itself, some of the available literature warns the reader about a possible "unstructured" and "mismanaged"
Convention that might propose and adopt amendments that could damage the Republic.
Possible, however, it is difficult to envisage how much more damage could done over what the L-E-J Cabal has already done.
If the Convention's agenda and rules of order strictly prohibit violation of the rules and enable a vote on unlisted Amendments AFTER all others are adopted,
then the Convention will be properly structured and managed. ]
John Adams said, �Without [term limits] every man in power becomes a ravenous beast of prey�. That being said, here are some of the reasons we believe our country needs Term Limits.
Term Limits can help break the cycle of corruption in Congress. Case studies show that the longer an individual stays in office, the more likely they are to stop serving the public and begin serving their own interests.
Term Limits will encourage regular citizens to run for office. Presently, there is a 94% re-election rate in the House and 83% in the Senate. Because of name recognition, and usually the advantage of money, it can be easy to stay in office. Without legitimate competition, what is the incentive for a member of Congress to serve the public? Furthermore, it is almost a lost cause for the average citizen to try to campaign against current members of Congress.
Term Limits will break the power special interest groups have in Congress.
Term Limits will force politicians to think about the impact of their legislation because they will be returning to their communities shortly to live under the laws they enacted.
Term Limits will bring diversity of people and fresh ideas to Congress.
[Editor's Note: If you want to get rich, i.e. advance from a low paying government bureaucrat job on the local or state level, THEN GET ELECTED TO THE US CONGRESS (House or Senate). Once you're elected, it's easy to steal from your campaign contributions or the Congressional budget allocated to your seat and staff. You can go on a government-funded junket with 'lavishly' paid expenses. The list of ways to steal from the government while in office is inexhaustible. There are only a few Congressmen who left Congress just wealthy instead of a multi-millionaire. Of course, there are several who arrived in Congress as multi-millionaires and don't need to steal from the government.]
CONVENTION of STATES (CoS)
CONVENTION of STATES
BECOME a MEMBER-PARTICIPANT of CONVENTION of STATES here.
Get into the Action; Get information. Join here.
The CONgress (by
Article V of the Constitution) has proposed and
States have ratified many new amendments to the Constitution, some that increase their power over us citizens. CONgress can propose amendments, and the
alternative method to CONgressional proposals can come from States via
Article V. When "We the People" — meaning
a very large majority — are opposed to Acts of CONgress like the INCOME TAX or ENDLESS WARS or the FEDERAL RESERVE, Acts that restrict and regulate our
LIBERTY, Acts that are a waste of money, Acts that have caused unrecoverable indebtedness, then through local representaatives of our States WE can propose
Amendments to be ratified by States just like CONgress.
STATES and the PEOPLE of America are very angry at the federal goverment's violation of its
constitutionally-defined boundaries. States created the federal government in 1787 with LIMITED powers defined in the Constitution. All powers not
given by States to the feds remain with the States by Article X. The feds have through deceit, distortion, and falsification rearranged the entire contractual agreement
between States and the federal government. The feds have become a very powerful, all consuming force in American government. The time has come for States to rein in the federal government,
to take power back, to limit the federal government's power, and to add some detailed restriction to the definition of CONgress, the Executive, and the Judiciary.
In 1787 a central government was (is) necessary only to provide for the common defense and ensure equality
under the law for all Citizens, to provide a final arbiter for the resolution of unsolvable problems among States and People. Most laws and regulations that the federal
government has wreaked on the States and the People are unconstitutional. States are independent, sovereign countries who realized the need for a limited and defined
central government to prevent wasteful duplication of effort. The federal government, in 2017, is OUT OF CONTROL, infringing and interfering with State sovereignty and their
separate economies. A problem arose in 2012 with Arizona's attempt to secure their border with Mexico. An article is
here. States can prevent infringements
by the federal government with an Aricle V Convention of States to not only reverse past federal government "power grabs" but prevent future federal government
violations of their Constitutionally-defined boundaries.
A new, well-organized group of volunteers in all 50 states have gathered to restore America to
its roots by limiting all 3 branches of the federal government with a
Convention of States (CoS) organization (alternate site,
CoS Action). This is a Convention of States to AMEND the Constitution — NOT rewrite it!
Recently, CoS held an Article V, Convention
simulation with appointed volunteers from all 50 States. The simulated Convention demonstrated how a well-organized CoS can vote for proposed amendments
to the Consitution that are popular enough to be ratified by the necessary 3/4ths of States (38). Obviously, only proposed Amendments that are likely to pass
both Houses of the legislatures of thirty-eight (38) States, that is, the required 3/4ths of States to ratify an Amendment to the Constitution should be proposed.
See the Final Report here.
The purpose in a Convention of States, simulated or real, is to PROPOSE AMENDMENTS that give power back to the People. The proposed amendments must reflect the
thinking, objectives — the goals of people of States — who want to restore our Constitutional Republic to one that represents the people.
ARTICLE V Convention of States—Restore the Appropriate Balance!
ARTICLE V Convention of States—Restore the Appropriate Balance!
ARTICLE V Convention of States—Restore the Appropriate Balance!
A real CoS, requires that 2/3rds of States (34) send an "application" to CONgress requesting that
CONgress schedule a CoS. State Legislatures are composed of an Assembly and Senate. Each "house" must pass a bill separately and send the resolution to their
Governor. Then the State sends an "application" to the CONgress. When the federal CONgress receives applications from 34 States, the CONgress is required to set a date for
the Convention of States. CONgress is NOT involved otherwise. The States have the Convention, propose amendments, and dispatch the precisely worded amendments to
their respectives assemblies and senates for ratification. CONgress only schedules the Convention.
