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Thursday, January 21, 2010

Culm County 24, Lackawanted County 2

Okay, so Cook County, Illinois has got nothing on us.

At this point, I think we’re all in agreement on that. We do agree that Culm County is the most corrupt place this side of the nearest ACORN office, yes?

So what’s this bunk published by the Citizens’ Voice today?

Feds plan to seek indictments of Munchak, Cordaro

Federal prosecutors intend to seek indictments next month against Lackawanna County Commissioner A.J. Munchak and former Commissioner Bob Cordaro from a federal grand jury investigating public corruption, according to a letter from the U.S. Attorney's Office.

The government's plans are spelled out in a letter signed Jan. 14 by Assistant U.S. Attorney Lorna N. Graham, who said prosecutors intend to present U.S. v. Robert Cordaro and A.J. Munchak to a federal grand jury on Tuesday, Feb. 16.

What’s that? A challenge to our corruption supremacy?

We’ve had, what, 23, or was it 24 elected and appointed officials caught up in the federal corruption probe here in Luzerne County? 3 judges. A sitting president judge. A former president judge. And then the piece de resistance, a sitting county commissioner.

Pretty tough to top, wouldn’t you think?

But in Lackawanna County, it seems the Feds are starting at the top and working their way down from there. Right out of the gate, they seek to topple a sitting commissioner as well as a former commissioner?

Trying to upstage us, are they?

Since the corruption probe is now confirmed to have spread to our neighboring county to the north, we need a standardized scoring system as Culm County’s title of America’s Most Corrupt Place now seems to be in play. So no matter the rank, title or position of the indicted, we’ll award one point per indictment.

And the way I see it, we’ve got a sizeable, but nervous lead over that gangly-looking expansion team to the north, 24-2.

So at the end of the first quarter, it's Culm County 24, Lackawanted County 2.

And the battle rages on.

From a local blog:

4. Piazza is a victim of the theory that everybody under the dome is dirty or corrupt. He has done an incredible job of disseminating information to campaigns and the media. And he has not favored one group over the other. Len Piazza should not be pilloried in the community for social networking during the day when he is at work. To do so is to make a mountain out of a molehill and defame the character and work ethic of a good man.

Au contraire!

At my place of employment, he'd be written up in triplicate the first time. Terminated the second time.

I happen to work for a real company, a company that turns a huge profit, a company that measures the hours worked by the employee versus the sales generated by said employee. A company that is not real big on paying people to play.

Or, you could say, I work for a private sector Fortune 500 company. You know, the real world.

Later

3 comments:

D.B. Echo said...

Don't worry. We can get rid of them all, and then let the gas-drilling companies buy us new ones. After today's Supreme Court ruling, there's bound to be a buying frenzy.

zorcong said...

Opposing view: 'Pure science fiction'

Don’t worry. Big-spending corporations won’t dominate U.S. politics.

By Bradley A. Smith

Thursday's Supreme Court decision in Citizens United v. Federal Election Commission will lead to more corporate and union independent political spending. That was, after all, the idea, and those of us who have long argued for less regulation of campaign finance believe that that is a good thing. There are many times when citizens both deserve and ought to hear the voices of unions and corporations, directly and unfiltered.

That said, the various "doomsday" scenarios being floated by critics of the decision, claiming that corporations will dominate American politics with billions of dollars in expenditures, are pure science fiction.


First, the case does not alter the current ban in federal law, and the laws of just under half the states, that prohibit corporations and unions from contributing directly to candidates. All this means is that they can spend money to speak directly to voters.

Second, 28 states, holding 60% of the nation's population, already allow corporate and union independent expenditures in state races. Yet none of these states is swamped with corporate and union spending, or dominated by special interests in some way that other states have escaped. Indeed, these 28 states, which include such relatively strong economies as Utah and Virginia, are over-represented in the rankings by Governing magazine as among the best governed in the country. Others, such as Oregon, hardly have a reputation as hotbeds of corruption.

Today's decision is good not only for what it does, but also for what it didn't do.

Remember, the government's position in the case was that it had the power, under the Constitution, to ban the distribution of political books over Amazon's Kindle, to prohibit political movies from being shown by video-on-demand, to forbid a union from paying a writer to author a political book, and to prohibit a corporation from publishing a 500-page book with even one sentence of political advocacy.

The Supreme Court said, "No, you don't have that authority," and we are all the better for it.

Former Federal Election Commission chairman Bradley A. Smith is the Blackmore/Nault Professor of Law at Capital University Law School in Columbus, Ohio, and chairman of the Center for Competitive Politics.

zorcong said...

Democrats propose $1.9T increase in debt limit

By ANDREW TAYLOR, Associated Press Writer Andrew Taylor, Associated Press Writer – Wed Jan 20, 6:39 pm ET

WASHINGTON – Senate Democrats on Wednesday proposed allowing the federal government to borrow an additional $1.9 trillion to pay its bills, a record increase that would permit the national debt to reach $14.3 trillion.

The unpopular legislation is needed to allow the federal government to issue bonds to fund programs and prevent a first-time default on obligations. It promises to be a challenging debate for Democrats, who, as the party in power, hold the responsibility for passing the legislation.

Read it all:

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20100120/ap_on_bi_ge/us_congress_debt_limit_11