A Bailout Conflict of Interest?

Is it a conflict of interest for the institution that is now the primary owner of General Motors to be the same institution that has the power to determine whether the automobiles of its competition are safe? When the Secretary of Transportation tells a House committee that owners of recalled Toyotas shouldn't be driving them and perhaps unnecessarily scares people off from buying them in the future, is there a conflict of interest due to the business that will likely send GM's way?'

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Health Care Reform Bill Process is 'Corruption' Says Senator

"This process is not legislation. This process is corruption," said Sen. Tom Coburn, R-Okla., referring to the last-minute flurry of dealmaking that enabled Majority Leader Harry Reid, D-Nev., and the White House to lock in the 60 votes needed to approve the legislation.

Democratic Sen. Sheldon Whitehouse of Rhode Island responded in near-Biblical terms. In a speech on the Senate floor, he said Republicans are embarked on a "no-holds barred mission of propaganda, obstruction and fear. ... There will be a reckoning. There will come a day of judgment about who was telling the truth".'

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Close Friend of Agriculture Chief Now a Monsanto Lobbyist

Jerry Crawford, an Iowa lawyer and lobbyist with deep ties to Agriculture Secretary Tom Vilsack, recently registered as the Washington representative for Monsanto, a biotechnology and agrichemical giant that embodies the "special interests" President Obama planned to drive from the temple of federal government.

The Des Moines Register calls Crawford a "well-connected, high-profile Des Moines lawyer" and "Democratic power broker."

Examine his record, and you see what the paper means. Crawford was once chairman of the Iowa Democratic Party. He was the Iowa chairman for the presidential campaigns of Michael Dukakis, Bill Clinton, Al Gore and John Kerry. In 2008, he was Hillary Clinton's Midwest campaign chairman.

Of greater significance today, he is also a "longtime Vilsack friend and adviser," a "Vilsack ally," a "top Vilsack insider," and "a guru for and a big friend of Gov. Tom Vilsack," according to the Register.'

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Putin's Russia -- Illuminati Controlled & Corrupt

People in the West see Putin and Russia through the rose colored glasses [provided by the mass media.] Well, the reality is not rose colored at all.

After gangsterism and anarchy of Eltsin's reign, people wanted "a strong hand". And here comes Putin. In the first place everybody was suspicious. Within half-year he rose from a little-known bureaucrat to Prime Minister and President. He was appointed by Eltsin himself.

Who is Putin? He is a former KGB officer. Was born in S-Pete in a simple family of workers. His mother was Jewish. When he came to power he said: "We have to clean the mess". KGB was given a new name of FSB (transliteration from Russian). FSB stands for Federal Security Service. That's a key word in Russia. Its key meaning is corruption. Because the FSB rules.'

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The Only Political Party in America: 'The Corporate Party' (Part One)

A growing number of Americans and researchers suggest that many corporations in the U.S. contribute to both Democrats and Republicans, so that no matter who wins the election, corporations can still exert their influence in Washington. But, does this line of thought have any merit? As they say, let's simply "follow the money".'

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Another Mega-thief Walks Free in the US

While the US criminal justice system is notoriously punitive and heavy-handed when it comes to crimes of theft and trespass, its collective heart melts when it comes up against a mega-criminal.

Witness the ability of self-confessed fraud, thief, and confidence trickster Marc S. Dreier, who pled guilty on Monday in a New York court to selling $400 million worth of fake promissory notes and running an illegal Ponzi scheme, yet managed to walk free from the courthouse.

This echoes another US court's compassion toward Mr. Bernard Madoff, who was allowed bail, despite being charged with the biggest fraud in the history of mankind, near $50 billion, and who, while under 'house arrest' in his mansion apartment in New York, was busy dispensing his private possessions to relatives to avoid being forced to provide even meager restitution to his countless creditors.

Not so lucky was Mr. Jerry Williams, 27, who in 1995 was sentenced to 25 years to life for stealing a slice of pizza. Admittedly, it could have been his third offense, which put him at the wrong end of California's "three strikes" law, but in all likelihood, all that Mr. Williams ever stole in his life would not amount to Harvard Law School graduate Marc Dreier's gasoline costs for his Aston Martin and Mercedes.

Welcome to the US of A.

Press TV

What Links Expenses and Torture: New Labour's Total Immorality.

It is good that details of MPs expenses have got out. I am sad if they were sold rather than leaked in the public interest, but they should have been available, unredacted, anyway.

Having said that, the Telegraph has made a massive pig's ear of its big scoop. It majors on Gordon Brown paying his cleaner through his brother. That sounds to me unwise of Brown, but really not a huge front page story. I am not convinced Gordon Brown fiddled anything.

On the other hand, Hazel Blears changing her official second home designation three times in a year, in order to get the taxpayer to pay for furnishing all her homes, is simply crooked. As are Hoon's multiple home arrangements. Jack Straw only paid back his "accidental" excessive claims for mortgage and council tax after the Freedom of Information Act ruling that expenses would be published. The Telegraph throws away the really crooked transactions in the odd phrase.

Straw's expenses are particularly interesting. He has lived in a series of London government mansions ever since 1997. The taxpayer pays for his Blackburn flat, but his real home is his £1million plus Cotswolds property. Just where Straw gets all his money is an interesting question. Some real investigative journalism into Straw's relationship with his bagman, Lord Taylor of Blackburn, and the peddling of influence for the defence industry, would be more interesting than anything the Telegraph reports today.
http://www.craigmurray.org.uk/archives/2007/08/more_lord_scumb.html
http://www.craigmurray.org.uk/archives/2007/08/theres_good_mon.html
http://www.craigmurray.org.uk/archives/2009/01/jack_straws_cor.html

But I am struck by the continued government mantra of "It was all within the rules", which Harriet Harman is being trotted round the television studios to spout this morning. Harriet has the job because she hasn't made dodgy claims. She is old money. Her family don't even notice the odd £100,000.

But this idea that it is OK to stretch the rules to the limit - with no worry whether it is right or wrong - is not a minor point. It is done for advantage, so it is immoral, not amoral.

It is an issue which has been heavily on my mind since I gave evidence on ministerial complicity in torture to the Parliamentary Joint Committee on Human Rights last week. Nobody except me and possibly Cranley Onslow showed any horror at torture. There was instead a discussion on the finest details of whether there was any possible way this may be declared legal, "within the rules".
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LF9spgagSHI

Even on an issue like torture, right and wrong seems to have disappeared completely from our national political discourse. Is it any wonder they are fiddling their expenses?

Craig Murray

Sen Harman interviewed over Corruption

Jewish Correspondent Andrea Mitchell, wife of Jewish former Federal Reserve chairman Alan Greenspan, interviews Jewish Rep. Harman on her involvement with the Jewish lobby, and an alleged Jewish spy.

Security Firm Lands MoD Job Three months After John Reid Joins as a Consultant

Former Defence Secretary John Reid faced fierce criticism yesterday as it emerged the world's largest security firm had won a huge contract from the Ministry of Defence weeks after taking him on as a consultant.
Mr Reid - who ran the MoD until May 2006 before resigning from the Cabinet while Home Secretary in June 2007 - was hired by G4S three months ago for £50,000 a year to offer 'strategic advice'.
This week, it was awarded a four-year contract to supply private security guards for around 200 MoD and military sites across Britain in a deal thought to be worth tens of millions of pounds.

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Irish Police Protest And Call The Government A Criminal Accessory

Last week (Feb 25th) the Gardai, Irish Police force, protested by the thousands and We The People Of Eire interviewed the Garda Representative Association.

In this video you can hear Deputy General Secretary of the Garda Representative Association, Mr. John Healy say the government has “sat around while our banks have been raid by private individuals for their personal profit” where “43 billion has been made in the last three years of the Celtic Tiger while 1% of the population has profited.

They paid no taxes, bankers that have switch their accounts from account to account. And individuals who have directly and openly manipulated share value. In any other country that would be illegal, but for the members of Garda Siochana the only thing that’s legal in this country is picking their [Garda] pockets.”