Tag: corruption

House Dem Stacey Plaskett took campaign money from Jeffery Epstein AFTER his conviction of soliciting prostitution of a minor

Stacey Plaskett, the Democratic congressional delegate representing the US Virgin Islands, won her election in 2014. She may owe her victory in part to Jeffery Epstein’s donations, which were found to have come in after his conviction of solicitation of prostitution of a minor in 2008.

Emails obtained by the Washington Free Beacon show that Plaskett, in communications with Epstein’s previous assistant, Lesley Groff, seeking support from Epstein. “If you would share this invitation with Jeffrey I’d be much appreciative. I would be grateful for his support and the support of those that he may direct to assist me,” Plaskett wrote in the July 12, 2018 email.

The amount of money that Epstein gave to Plaskett, according to the email, was $5,400. Half was to go to her primary and half to the general election. 

On June 8, Plaskett conceded that it was a “bad fundraising decision” on the show, Analyze This, on WTJX-FM in the Virgin Islands. 

However, the real start to the connection with Epstein started in 2014 with the Virgin Islands governor’s wife, Cecile de Jongh. 

De Jongh was the First Lady of the Virgin Islands at the time, but also served as Epstein’s office manager. It appears that the idea to help Plaskett may have come originally from de Jongh. She insisted, back in 2014, that Epstein needed to help Paskett.

De Jongh wrote to Epstein in 2014, “Your help is needed. We are trying to get Stacey Plaskett elected to Congress. Shawn Malone (current senate president) is running against her in the Democratic primary in August.”

“Shawn is the one that came after you in the senate hearing last week. He is nasty and needs to be defeated and we would have a friend in Stacey,” the 2014 email continued. 

DeJongh then inquired to Epstein, because of the legal limit of $2,600 in individual campaign donations, “Do you think any of your friends would give to her campaign,” asking for $75,000 in total donations.

The emails were revealed as part of court documents in the lawsuit the Virgin Islands filed against JP Morgan.

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Legacy Newspapers Bury Hunter Biden Bombshell On Page 15

The Friday print editions of The New York Times and The Washington Post relegated their reporting on Thursday’s explosive Hunter Biden revelations from Internal Revenue Service (IRS) whistleblowers to the bottom of page A15 of their newspapers.

Both papers placed stories about the visit of the Indian Prime Minister, the Titan submarine, a tornado in Texas, Donald Trump and the Arab-Israeli conflict ahead of their coverage of the IRS whistleblower testimony, which alleges that Hunter Biden leveraged his father’s political influence for personal financial gain and that Department of Justice (DOJ) officials had interfered with the investigation. The whistleblower documents included text messages allegedly from Hunter Biden, in which he said President Joe Biden was “sitting here” with him while Hunter conducted business activities with a Chinese associate.

The NYT ran a story on the bottom of page A15 titled “Hunter Biden Used Father’s Name to Pressure Associate in ’17, Documents Show,” referring to Hunter’s alleged promise to a Chinese businessman to “make certain that between the man sitting next to me and every person he knows and my ability to forever hold a grudge that you will regret not following my direction,” as alleged in the testimony. The Post reported in their business section that an “IRS whistleblower says Justice Dept. slowed and stifled Hunter Biden case,” also on the bottom of page A15.

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Harvard behavior scientist who studied honesty accused of fabricating data

A prominent Harvard behavioral scientist who undertook studies about honesty is under fire for allegedly fabricating papers that she worked on, according to a report.

Harvard Business School’s Francesca Gino allegedly chalked up phony results tied to studies, including one focused on honest behavior, the New York Times reported.

She’s been placed on leave, according to her business school web page, which the Times reported showed she was still on the job as recently as mid-May.

She has published 135 articles since 2007, according to the Chronicle for Higher Education.

In a blog, called DataColada, run by three behavioral scientists, it alleged fraud in four academic papers that Gino co-authored.

They said they presented evidence of fraud to Harvard in the fall of 2021 tied to a 2012 paper and another three papers she was a part of.

The 2012 paper relied on three separate studies, including one that Gino spearheaded.

The paper claimed that people who fill out tax forms or insurance documents are more honest if they attest to the truth of their responses at the top of the page instead of the bottom, the Times reported.

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CIA’s Extraordinary Role Influencing Liberal Media Outlets Daily Kos, The Daily Beast, Rolling Stone

As a longtime investigative journalist and author, I have spent a good portion of my career researching corruption within U.S. intelligence agencies. I was nevertheless surprised to learn about the Central Intelligence Agency’s (CIA) central role in crafting the militarized governmental response to the COVID-19 pandemic, which Robert F. Kennedy, Jr. documents in the final chapters of his new runaway best-seller, “The Real Anthony Fauci.”

I’ve known Kennedy for more than two decades. I have interviewed him and collaborated with him on environmental articles and several books, including “Climate In Crisis.” I have great respect for his legal work and the accomplishments of his ongoing Waterkeeper Alliance. And I appreciate his dedication to alerting the public about alternative narratives related to the pandemic.

I am fully vaccinated and a believer in the efficacy of the vaccines. However, as a bedrock liberal with a deep reverence for the First Amendment and time-honored right to freedom of speech, I became alarmed that social media sites, including Instagram and YouTube, have banned Kennedy from pointing out flaws in the dominant narratives surrounding the COVID crisis.

In my view, Kennedy has been falsely vilified as an anti-vaccination disinformation “conspiracy theorist.” Blanket censorship by mainstream media seems to prohibit him from responding to such attacks.

And it disturbs me that once-idealistic liberal media outlets have devolved into apologists for the pharmaceutical industry (including its captured public health technocrats), as well as their stifling of any dissent. Why the vitriol against Kennedy, I wondered, from leading liberal news websites such as Daily Kos, The Daily Beast, and more recently, Rolling Stone?

A The Daily Beast headline appearing one year before the pandemic set the tone (Feb. 8, 2019): “Robert F. Kennedy, Jr. spouts his insane anti-vaxxer conspiracy theory in measles hot zone.”

Seeming to borrow a page from the CIA’s propaganda manuals, the liberal blogs have employed the signature trope of portraying opposition to official theology as the dangerous product of right-wing extremism.

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Illinois Gives $300,000 to BLM Group That Appears to Be Inactive

Despite being crime ridden, over-taxed and hemorrhaging citizens (and their tax dollars) in favor of red states, Illinois apparently has enough money to provide $300,000 to a BLM group that appears to be mostly inactive.

A recent Wirepoints analysis of Internal Revenue Service migration data shows the exodus from the state.

This comes at a time that Chicago’s public pension system is in dire straits.

According to a report from Equable Institute, Chicago’s core public pensions, which include municipal, laborers, police, fire and the Chicago Teachers’ Pension Fund, hold more debt than 44 states with a combined pension debt of nearly $48 billion.

Yet lawmakers thought this was a good time to include a $300,000 grant to Black Lives Matter Lake County, a group that critics suggest appears to be mostly inactive,  and is headed by a leader that is alleged to have had  run-ins with police.

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The Biden family’s long history of skirting the law, sweetheart deals

Hunter Biden’s slap-on-the-wrist plea deal after failing to pay taxes on millions of dollars in income, and a felony gun charge he won’t be prosecuted for, follows a long history of Biden family members running afoul of the law — and skating.

Hunter Biden, 53, could have faced felonies for both his tax charges — and a multitude of other crimes evidenced on his abandoned laptop.

Instead, he pled guilty to just two misdemeanor tax offenses, virtually guaranteeing he will not see the inside of a jail cell.

“The Biden family are beginning to make the Medicis look like small-time operators,” said George Washington University law professor Jonathan Turley.

“That fact that it took over five years to even secure a plea on a couple of small misdemeanors is a testament to a family that has leveraged Joe Biden public positions into a fortune of foreign influence peddling.”

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16 Bombshells on Hunter Biden From The IRS Whistleblowers

Two IRS whistleblowers leveled serious allegations about Hunter Biden and the government’s investigation of the troubled first son, according to transcripts of testimony released this week.

The whistleblowers, IRS supervisory criminal investigator Gary Shapley and a second unnamed IRS investigator, provided evidence to the House Ways and Means Committee that top Justice Department officials stonewalled an investigation into Hunter Biden’s taxes and foreign business ventures. They also call into question President Biden’s repeated denials that he has no knowledge of his son’s business dealings.

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Boeing Charges Pentagon $52,000 For Trash Can Previously Priced At $300

As Democrat and Republican members of the executive and legislative branches trip over each other trying to see who can jack up the Pentagon’s budget more, an investigation by Responsible Statecraft has uncovered some glaring examples of Department of Defense contractors raising the price of their products by astronomical multiples. 

Boeing used to charge about $300 for trash receptacles used aboard E-3 Sentry Airborne Warning and Control System (AWACS) planes, which use the chassis of a Boeing 707 airliner. After that aircraft vanished from civilian fleets, the trash can lost its status as a “commercial” item, freeing Boeing to stick it to American taxpayers. 

How badly? “In 2020, the Pentagon paid Boeing over $200,000 for four of the trash cans, translating to roughly $51,606 per unit,” reports Responsible Statecraft’s Connor Echols. The next year brought an apparent volume discount: In 2021, the Pentagon bought 11 trash cans at “only” $36,640 each. Together, the price on the two years of purchases represented a whopping $600,000 markup over previous prices.  

Boeing isn’t the only one sticking it to taxpayers. For starters:

  • In 2022, New York-based Jamaica Bearings Company sold the Pentagon 13 radio filters. While it had previously priced them at $350 each, this time Jamaica Bearings charged $49,000 each.
  • Lockheed Martin jacked up the price of an electrical conduit for the P-3 Orion anti-submarine and maritime surveillance plane by upwards of 1400%, raking in an extra $133,000 from 2008 to 2015. 

In the wake of a May 60 Minutes investigation into defense contractor price-gouging, five senators sent a letter to Secretary of Defense Lloyd Austin asking for the Pentagon to perform its own follow-on inquiry.

“These companies have abused the trust government has placed in them, exploiting their position as sole suppliers for certain items to increase prices far above inflation or any reasonable profit margin,” wrote Senators Bernie Sanders (I-VT), Charles Grassley (R-IA), Elizabeth Warren (D-MA), Mike Braun (R-IN) and Ron Wyden (D-OR).  

Consolidation of the defense industry is one factor feeding the price-gouging. “In the 1990s, there were more than 50 ‘prime’ DoD contractors capable of competing for major contracts. Now, there are only five,” writes Echols. 

Per the latest iteration of the National Defense Authorization Act, the federal government will spend over $850 billion on “defense” in the 2023 fiscal year, roughly half of which will be devoured by contractors.

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KYRSTEN SINEMA MOVES TO SLASH PILOT TRAINING AFTER TAKING AIRLINE CASH

IN A BLISTERING attack on her Senate colleague last week, Sen. Tammy Duckworth, D-Ill., warned independent Arizona Sen. Kyrsten Sinema that a proposal to reduce the number of required in-flight training hours for pilots would result in “blood on your hands.” The attack from Duckworth was prompted by an amendment supported by Sinema and Sen. John Thune, R-S.D., that would allow pilots to meet training requirements by substituting hours spent in a flight simulator for actual flight time.

For Duckworth, who lost both of her legs to a rocket attack on the Black Hawk helicopter she was piloting in 2004 during the Iraq War, the issue is personal. “Now is not the time to put corporate profits ahead of the lives of our constituents who may want to board a commercial flight in the future,” Duckworth said. “A vote to reduce a 1,500-hour rule for pilot training will mean blood on your hands when an inevitable accident occurs as a result of an inadequately trained flight crew.”

The eleventh-hour amendment in the Senate Committee on Commerce, Science, and Transportation comes as the September 30 deadline to reauthorize the Federal Aviation Act looms.

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A Delaware city is set to give corporations the right to vote in elections

The state of Delaware is famously business-friendly. With more than 1.8 million entities registered in the First State, companies outnumber its human residents by nearly two-to-one. 

One city is now moving to raise businesses’ influence in the state even further, with a proposal to grant them the right to vote.

Seaford, a town of about 8,000 on the Nanticoke River, amended its charter in April to allow businesses — including LLCs, corporations, trusts or partnerships — the right to vote in local elections. The law would go into effect once both houses of Delaware’s state legislature approve it.

The proposal has rekindled a debate over how much power corporations should have in local government, with fierce opposition from civic interest groups who say businesses already wield too much influence over politics.

“It was very shocking to see this attempt to have artificial entities have voting rights,” said Claire Snyder-Hall, executive director of Common Cause Delaware, a watchdog group. 

“We’re seeing voter suppression all over the county, and this is the flipside,” she added. “It’s not saying the residents of Seaford can’t vote, but it’s diluting their votes by allowing nonresidents to vote.”  

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