The Better Government Association (http://www.bettergov.org/), a beleaguered Chicago-based watchdog group that has its work cut out for it, recently released its “Hall of Shame” report that details the nearly 150 county officials that have gone to jail for corruption in Barack Obama’s home county of Cook. And that doesn’t even include the over 100 Chicago officials, a city also situated in Cook County, that has also gone to jail over the last few decades.
Because of the high amount of corruption and the large and ever growing roster of jailed county officials, in its press release, the BGA bitingly asks, “[I]s it any surprise this multi-billion dollar labyrinth of governmental entities is referred to disparagingly as ‘Crook County?’”
The scams took place over the past four decades in the courts; the offices of the Assessor, Sheriff and Treasurer; and the President’s Office of Employment and Training. They involve bribes, payoffs, rip-offs, padded contracts, ghost payrollers and the wholesale subversion of the judicial system. The perpetrators include elected officials at the highest and lowest levels of city, county and state government; judges, lawyers and lobbyists.
Sadly, the BGA finds that the corruption in Cook County government is widespread and “not confined to a single unit of government.” This corruption was found in such departments as the Cook County Board President’s office, the employment offices, the highway department, the sheriff’s offices, the assessor and the treasurer’s offices as well as the Clerk of the Circuit Court. In fact, the BGA found that corruption is endemic throughout the government and no one ever seems to be held accountable.
The report details Operation Greylord that was carried on between 1980 and 1992 that ended up convicting 15 judges, 47 lawyers and 24 police officers and court personnel before it was done.
Also discussed was the corruption plagued reign of Cook County Sheriff James O’Grady whose corruption was so wide-spread that the investigation reached from the Sheriff’s Dept. to the city and county clerk’s offices, the County Treasurer’s Office and the Board of Tax Appeals. During this investigation it came to light that county police officials were shielding a mob-run bookmaking operation, were as much as selling passing grades on the sheriff’s exam, and was rife with bribe-taking, theft and graft.
And as late as 2009 the BGA reveals the sordid tale of the looting of County funds from a program called POET, the Cook County Board President’s Office of Employment Training, where millions of taxpayer’s dollars went missing through embezzlement by County officials.
And these are just a small serving of the scandals, graft, theft and corruption that is contained in the BGA’s report. And remember, this report is only about the county government in which the City of Chicago sits. Obama’s hometown of Chicago has even more corruption and even more jailed officials to talk about. That tale, the BGA informs us, will be told later this year.
So, when someone wants to know from what sort of place that Barack Obama and most of his closest advisors come, you have but to offer them the “Hall of Shame” report from the Better Government Association of Chicago. That should answer all their questions.
A Canadian columnist has his door practically beaten down by Toronto’s stormtrooping police because he had a 30-year-old bird rifle that he forgot to re-register. America THIS is coming to YOUR door if the left gets its way in banning guns.
(I know that William Already posted about this one… but excuse me while I rant…) Get ready folks because this is the world of terrorist coddling that Barack Obama is setting up for us from now on. A left-wing, multicultural-loving, half-wit federal judge has sided with those who would kill us all by throwing out most of the evidence as well as the confession of a terrorist ensconced in Guantanamo Bay.
U.S. District Judge Thomas Hogan said in a ruling that the government failed to prove that the statements made by Musa’ab Omar Al Madhwani were made free of coercion. I suppose this wonderful judge asked the terrorist if he was coerced and the terrorist unsurprisingly said, “uh, yeah, dat’s what happened. Dey que-orced me!”
Fortunately, this lame, idiot judge decided in his infinite “wisdom” that we should still hold the terrorist because other things he told authorities at other times was deemed important and accurate. So it could have been worse. At least this time, a hack judge didn’t let a killer free to roam about the United States at will… oh, but it’s coming.
This is what Obama has set up, America. He has set up a situation where terrorists will be loosed on an unsuspecting American public because some soft-in-the-head judge feels sorry for them.
I’ve got another warning for you, America. Once these terrorists are loosed on us by these bleeding heart judges some of them WILL be staying in the U.S. for one reason or another. These killer’s and their enablers in the ACLU and the Democrat Party WILL find reasons for them to have to stay in our country. They will be moving in next door to you free to carry out whatever plot they want.
And there will be no army, no police force, and no toothless “court” that will save you from them, either. Only one tiny little law stands between you and Obama’s terrorists: The Second Amendment.
In another example of why unions are antithetical to good government, a pliant, left-wing judge in California has ruled that the Schwarzenegger Administration cannot furlough state workers that belong to three powerful public employees unions.
Governor Schwarzenegger has been battling to cut his over spent state budget for several years now and one of the solutions to the problem that he lit upon was the idea that he might furlough his workforce. He would give these workers a few days a month off without pay and this would save the taxpayer’s millions. It is a good idea and one that real-world businesses are forced to employ all the time when things get tough.
But here come the state unions to prevent this simple cost saving measure even though it is common as dirt in the real-world sector.
What we see here is these union thugs actually preventing the proper and necessary measures to reign in state spending. And what is the state spending? OUR TAXES! So, what we have are unions making sure that wild, unproductive, and wasteful spending of our taxes continues and they are using the force of left-wing, compliant courts to do it.
Unions are essentially stealing our taxes.
Yep, proves once again that unions are a danger to good government.
United Press International is reporting that abortion rates rose five percent in Illinois in 2008. Illinois doctors performed 47,717 abortions, the most in five years.
The state Department of Public Health reported 47,717 abortions in 2008, the latest year for which it has figures. In 1998, there were 49,403.
There is a law on the books that could bring this number down, of course, but extreme leftists and infanticide fans in the state have stalled its implementation over and over again. A Parental Notification Law for teens 17 and under was passed in 1995 and the left has been fighting it in court ever since. So far, every attempt they’ve made to have it declared unconstitutional has failed, yet each year they continue to find pliant, anti-constitutional judges to once again declare it “on hold” until its legal status can be “reviewed” and determined.
Unfortunately, last year was no exception to this rule of extra legal judge’s actions and hours after the law was again cleared for implementation, a Cook County Circuit Court judge halted the law. Left-wing, anti-constitutional Judge Daniel Riley bowed to the pleas of the un-American ACLU and put a hold on the law.
Sadly, one of the reasons our abortion rate is so high is because some of the surrounding states do have parental notification laws so teens from those states cross state lines to kill their babies in Illinois in order to take advantage of the lax laws here.
So, once again a new year dawns but the same old question remains. Will Illinois infanticide fans finally give up their bloodlust and allow this perfectly proper and constitutional law to go into effect?
Let us hope that 2010 sees this small victory for life to at last prevail.
United Press International is 