"Landmark" Ethics Panel is Pure Congress

House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) and Minority Leader John Boehner (R-Ohio) on Thursday announced joint appointments to a landmark ethics review board that for the first time will allow private citizens to review allegations against members.

The only landmark in the new House ethics panel is the makeup, “Private citizens” means ex-members of Congress and paid government staffers. The fox once again monitors the hen house in Washington, D.C.

They have the gall to imply an average citizen is monitoring Congressional behavior. Nothing could be further from the truth. The Hill reported:

“…four out of six members of the board for the newly created Office of Congressional Ethics (OCE) will be former members of Congress, including former CIA Director Porter Goss (R-Fla.), who will serve as co-chairman.

The other board members include Rep. David Skaggs (D-Colo.), who will serve as chairman of the board, former Rep. Yvonne Brathwaite Burke (D-Calif.), former Rep. Karan English (D-Ariz.), former House Chief Administrative Officer Jay Eagen and Allison Hayward, the former chief of staff to Bradley Smith, a Republican-appointed former chairman of the Federal Election Commission.

Two additional former members will serve as alternate appointees to the board: former federal judge and ex-Rep. Abner Mikva (D-Ill.) and former Rep. Bill Frenzel (R-Minn.).

If anyone believes an "average citizen" is monitoring Congressional ethics, they're sadly mistaken.

Obama's "Audacity of Pandering" Hits America's 51st State

Presidential hopeful Barack Obama's "audacity of pandering" continues, this time internationally. Barrack capitulated to big telecom before his Middle East trip, just in time for AT&T to sponsor the Democratic National Convention.

Having failed as an impartial arbiter for the average American citizen, Obama disappointed people in the Middle Eastern region. To be a leader of the "free world", does one have to oppress its own citizens and write off millions of Middle Eastern people? It makes sense in a "free to impose our will" world.

Partial Truth Out on Pete Peterson

TruthOut ran a piece on Blackstone Group co-founder, Pete Peterson, and his new foundation, aptly named the Peter G. Peterson Foundation. It cited the organization's main purpose, "to cut back spending on Social Security, Medicare, and Medicaid." Finding the piece unsatisfying, I dug for more.

It turns out Pete had a banner 2007, at least financially. He and his partner, Steven Schwarzman grossed $4.5 billion, between selling a stake of their firm to China and taking part of it public. Uncle Sam's preferred tax status for private equity underwriters (PEU's) enabled the pair to avoid up to $855 million in taxes. How might that money have helped to shore up Social Security, Medicare and Medicaid?

In my research, I found Pete isn't working alone on these critical issues. CQ Politics reported Mr. Peterson is encouraging Blue Dog Democrats to work with their Republican counterparts in the House of Representatives. The article stated:

Watch for the House’s most fiscally conservative Democrats and Republicans to start meeting regularly, in the same room at the same time. The GOP Tuesday Group and the Democratic “Blue Dogs” have long shared the goal of reducing the federal deficit.

The two caucuses met together in the past week along with Pete Peterson, creator and benefactor of the Peter G. Peterson Foundation, a nonprofit dedicated to deficit reduction, and David Walker, who earlier this year left the top position at the Government Accountability Office to run the foundation.

As I finished the piece, another Blue Dog appeared on my television screen, Senator Evan Bayh of Indiana. Evan is sponsored by another PEU, The Carlyle Group. They fell from his #3 lifetime donor to # 7 in the last election cycle, but still ponied up $75,000. MSNBC's Andrea Mitchell, live from Barack Obama's visit to Iraq, tried to get Evan to say something other than "Aw, shucks" in reference to his potential Vice Presidential status.

Watching Evan schmooze, my stomach turned. The Bayh family made millions from flipping WellPoint stock options the last few years. Susan Bayh serves on the board of the huge health insurer, sharing the table with President Bush's Uncle Bucky and ex-White House economic czar Al Hubbard. Yes, that's the same Al Hubbard who recently accused the American people of ordering medical caviar.

The fix is in folks. Businesses want to give you responsibility for your health care coverage. In a deja vu of 1980's retirement benefits (which produced IRA's and 401k's), the average citizen will soon fund their health care coverage. It will look like Al Hubbard's caviar, costing a fortune and barely covering the smallest portion of the plate.

Guess who Pete Peterson wants to design this new health care system? American CEO's! Of course, their executive compensation package will include prime coverage while everyone else's deteriorates? Just think, they can get a huge multi-million dollar bonus for dropping health care coverage for their employees.

"Let them eat cake." Just like the PEU boys' preferred tax rates, they get the benefits, you get the pain. Recall, someone had to pass legislation and then choose not to change it. A used condom is coming if people don't wake up. Pete's yearnings aren't for the post World War periods, they're for the Guilded Age.

Two Weeks to Choose: Cooperation or Confrontation?

To whom did the Bush administration offer a choice of cooperation or confrontation, with an expected two week answer? Was it:

a. Congress
b. Methodist Ministers opposed to the Bush Library at SMU
c. Physicians who accept Medicare and face a 10% fee reduction
d. Banks at risk of failure due to nonperforming loans and asset write downs
e. Karl Rove in regard to his Congressional subpoena
f. Iran in regard to its nuclear enrichment program

The correct answer is f, Iran. George Bush likes drawing lines in the sand and daring his enemies to step over them. When they do, our Commander in Chief becomes engorged with rage, sending in the enforcers, in this case the U.S. military or that of our 51st state, Israel. Either country's military might can penetrate Iran's air defenses.

Two weeks warning, Iran. Then George W. takes his Waragra.

Presidential Campaigns Get High from Bundlers

"Hey Barry, who's your source for the juice, and I don't mean OJ? I'm getting low and need a new stash, preferably with some glucosamine cutter. It's hell getting old."

Both Barack Obama and John McCain continue to rake in the cash, the political heroin needed to make a successful Presidential run. And who might their dealers be? Who is packaging numerous $2,300 donations into a hit big enough to send the campaign machine's gears racing? Those folks are known as bundlers. Our two red and blue political junkies are slow on the uptake in revealing their dealers.

Bush Signs Retroactive Immunity

President George W. Bush signed a bill providing immunity several years after potential lawbreaking behavior. The Senate decided to give likely miscreants a free pass for actions considered understandable in light of world events. Of course, the President's benefactors were corporations, not individual citizens.

What happened to his "zero tolerance" for those who violate our social contract? That applies to people in drastic need of food, water, and shoes after a deadly hurricane, but not to telecommunications companies spying on the American people.

Harry Reid placed a bad bill up for consideration, Barack Obama joined numerous Democrats in voting "yes" on telecom immunity. It's a sad day indeed, when Congress and the White House give a free pass long after the fact. The American people deserve answers, but are hung out to dry once again.

Grim Reapers Pursue Osama bin Laden

Two harvesters of death have al Qaeda leader, Osama bin Laden, squarely in their sights. The Grim Reaper awaits nearby as the terrorist leader suffers from terminal kidney disease, at least the CIA believes such according to Sify News. The other death dealing hunter, President George W. Bush, has an intense push to capture bin Laden before his term ends in January 2009.

Ex-White House Homeland Security Advisers, Frances Townsend, implied finding Osama was top priority in a Fox News piece. The Indian newspaper article had more wise words from Fran.

“I've read all the same conflicting reports that people have talked to you about. I never found one set of reporting more persuasive than another.”

At least Fran is as open and transparent as ever. The question remains which reaper will find bin Laden first.

5-1-11:  The U.S. military killed Osama bin Laden and took custody of his body.  The raid took place in Pakistan