I’m here to talk about OUR GUYS between now and election day. Egregious gamesmanship, lies, and slimeball marketing tactics from the republicans notwithstanding, what can they offer in the way of conversation that is as important as the news that if we elect Obama,
we will be on a tack toward peace
health care concerns will be addressed, problems perhaps solved
a fair tax policy will give those of us who need it the most more money in our paychecks
a woman’s right to address her own reproductive health issues without government interference will be protected by judicial appointments over the next four years
retirement pensions and social security benefits will hold their value
Barack Obama and Joe Biden are prepared to take the reins and lead with integrity. We owe it to them to elect Democratic majorities in the House and in the Senate to empower their leadership.
Since the Republican convention, America has been on a political porn kick, focusing on what the TV comics call the GILF and the dirty old man who selected her, attending to non-issues related to the non-entities who are running against Senator Obama and Senator Biden. Just as the idiocy and the dissolution of the last eight years was predictable to anybody who took a close look at Cheney and Bush, the next four years can be predicted by taking a close look at the candidates, their preparation, their ethics, and their values. The foul stench of dishonesty that comes from the Republican candidates is easy enough to identify, but it behooves us to ignore it and trust the electorate to know when they’re being conned. It is time to pay attention to hwat we hope to gain, not what we stand to lose.
Today Barack Obama, campaigning in New Hampshire, “…focused on his tax plan, which offers sizable breaks to middle-income families, while raising taxes on families earning more than $250,000. He said McCain has been “simply dishonest” about that plan, asserting repeatedly that an Obama administration would raise everyone’s taxes.
‘I will make a firm pledge: Under my plan, no family making less than $250,000 will see any form of tax increase, not your income tax, not your payroll tax,’ Obama said.
He slammed McCain’s proposal to tax the value of employer-based health-care plans as income and use that to help finance tax credits to buy health insurance. The senator from Illinois called that ‘a $3.6 trillion tax increase’ on working families.”
As a Navy pilot, John “Crash” McCain lost five planes (the last one in a combat zone over North Vietnam). Rather than take the millions and millions of dollars worth of damage out of his paycheck, the Navy let him keep flying. Some think that because his father was an admiral, “Crash” got some special treatment.
“Crash” McCain was a central figure in the Savings and Loan crisis in the eighties. McCain was rebuked by the Senate ethics committee for his poor judgment in the Keating Five scandal. George Bush’s brother Neil was also involved. The young princes of GOP politics helped cost the American taxpayers over $124 billion by the time it was all added up.
Lincoln Savings and Loan
The Lincoln Savings led to the Keating Five political scandal, in which five U.S. senators were implicated in an influence-peddling scheme. It was named for Charles Keating, who headed Lincoln Savings and made $300,000 as political contributions to them in the 1980s. Three of those senators – Alan Cranston(D-CA), Don Riegle(D-MI), and Dennis DeConcini(D-AZ) – found their political careers cut short as a result. Two others – John Glenn(D-OH) and John McCain(R-AZ) – were rebuked by the Senate Ethics Committee for exercising “poor judgment” for intervening with the federal regulators on behalf of Keating.
Silverado Savings and Loan
Silverado Savings and Loan collapsed in 1988, costing taxpayers $1.6 billion. Neil Bush, son of then Vice President of the United States George H. W. Bush, was Director of Silverado at the time. Neil Bush was accused of giving himself a loan from Silverado, but he denied all wrongdoing.
The US Office of Thrift Supervision investigated Silverado’s failure and determined that Neil Bush had engaged in numerous “breaches of his fiduciary duties involving multiple conflicts of interest.” Although Bush was not indicted on criminal charges, a civil action was brought against him and the other Silverado directors by the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation; it was eventually settled out of court, with Bush paying $50,000 as part of the settlement, as reported in the Washington Post [11].
As a director of a failing thrift, Bush voted to approve $100 million in what were ultimately bad loans to two of his business partners. And in voting for the loans, he failed to inform fellow board members at Silverado Savings & Loan that the loan applicants were his business partners.[citation needed]
Silverado’s collapse cost taxpayers $1.3 billion.
Neil Bush paid a $50,000 fine and was banned from banking activities for his role in taking down Silverado, which cost taxpayers $1.3 billion. A Resolution Trust Corporation Suit against Bush and other officers of Silverado was settled in 1991 for $26.5 million.
Why are these facts insufficient to run “Crash” McCain out of public life? Is it a mob thing? Imagine if similar facts could be used to Barack Obama’s detriment. How much would the Republican attack machine pay to get the story told?
And what about that lobbyist, Vicki Iseman? Politics do make strange bedfellows. (She could do a lot better than “Crash” McCain, I think).
[tags]Crash McCain, Taxpayers pay for lapses in judgment, war hero or lamer, you decide[/tags]
