Ethics for sale...GOP style

LOL

You want to list the dems who 'forgot' to pay taxes? Starting with our Secretary of the Treasury?

You just don't like his wife is white, admit it.

quote:

The allegation comes days after Common Cause filed a letter requesting that the Justice Department investigate whether Justices Thomas and Antonin Scalia should have disqualified themselves from hearing a campaign finance case after they reportedly attended a private meeting sponsored by Charles and David Koch, billionaire philanthropists who fund conservative causes.

In the case, Citizens United vs. Federal Election Commission, the court ruled that corporate and union funds could be spent directly on election advertising.

Also, they (Common Cause) lost a case earlier, revenge?

quote:

Originally posted by b50m:

quote:

The allegation comes days after Common Cause filed a letter requesting that the Justice Department investigate whether Justices Thomas and Antonin Scalia should have disqualified themselves from hearing a campaign finance case after they reportedly attended a private meeting sponsored by Charles and David Koch, billionaire philanthropists who fund conservative causes.

In the case, Citizens United vs. Federal Election Commission, the court ruled that corporate and union funds could be spent directly on election advertising.

Also, they (Common Cause) lost a case earlier, revenge?

Why are you making partisan arguments when Thomas must be presumed to be non-partisan.

Thomas is also going to face an investigation over his attendance at fund-raising events for Koch-brother run organizations, an act that is a clear violation of judicial ethics were Thomas merely a judge on any federal court but the the Supreme Court.

I would rather him run around squeezing interns in his Long Dong Silver costume than be a shill for special interests.

Any body check to see if the Mrs files her taxes separately?

quote:

Originally posted by b50m:
Any body check to see if the Mrs files her taxes separately?

OMG. IT IS NOT A QUESTION OF TAXES....

Thomas repeatedly lied about his wife having income from a potential source of influence to the judge...that is a crime...its not an issue of him just paying the required taxes after the fact. I give people too much credit for understanding how their government works. I give up.

If it's not a matter of taxes, then what? Influence? Right wing think tank? What if she joined Code Pink? How about the Democratic Coffee party? She is his wife, not the justice herself. She said in an interview a few years ago:

THOMAS: Well, I appreciate that. You know, there have been conflicts ever since Clarence became a justice, you know, 19 years ago. And I've been in this field for 30 years working in the policy arena, so it's not so new. I'm not litigating. I'm not in the courtroom. So there are clear rules. And I abide by them, and I watch for them, and I watch for conflicts. So there's a lot of judicial wives and husbands out there causing trouble. I'm just one of many.

quote:

Originally posted by JuanHunt:

quote:

Originally posted by b50m:

quote:

The allegation comes days after Common Cause filed a letter requesting that the Justice Department investigate whether Justices Thomas and Antonin Scalia should have disqualified themselves from hearing a campaign finance case after they reportedly attended a private meeting sponsored by Charles and David Koch, billionaire philanthropists who fund conservative causes.

In the case, Citizens United vs. Federal Election Commission, the court ruled that corporate and union funds could be spent directly on election advertising.

Also, they (Common Cause) lost a case earlier, revenge?

Why are you making partisan arguments when Thomas must be presumed to be non-partisan.

Perhaps because you didn't presume non-partisanship when titling this thread, "Ethics for sale...GOP style"?

quote:

Perhaps because you didn't presume non-partisanship when titling this thread, "Ethics for sale...GOP style"?

Excellent moe.

Also if supreme court justices are assumed non-partisan, why do conservative presidents appoint conservatives and liberal presidents liberals? Why the need to have confirmation hearings?

quote:

Originally posted by b50m:
If it's not a matter of taxes, then what? Influence? Right wing think tank? What if she joined Code Pink? How about the Democratic Coffee party? She is his wife, not the justice herself. She said in an interview a few years ago:

THOMAS: Well, I appreciate that. You know, there have been conflicts ever since Clarence became a justice, you know, 19 years ago. And I've been in this field for 30 years working in the policy arena, so it's not so new. I'm not litigating. I'm not in the courtroom. So there are clear rules. And I abide by them, and I watch for them, and I watch for conflicts. So there's a lot of judicial wives and husbands out there causing trouble. I'm just one of many.

So you are okay with a Sitting Supreme Court Justice lying on the disclosure forms for multiple years ?

"Without disclosure, the public and litigants appearing before the court do not have adequate information to assess potential conflicts of interest, and disclosure is needed to promote the public's interest in open, honest and accountable government," Common Cause President Bob Edgar wrote in a letter to the Judicial Conference of the United States."

Oh boo hoo.

Did Rangel pay off Ethics Committee members?

CBS goes after Charlie Rangel in a big way this morning by probing the embattled House Ways and Means chair over his connections to the very people evaluating his ethics. The House committee is currently investigating Rangel for a series of false disclosures and tax evasions, but Rangel acts as though he has nothing to fear. What does he know that we don’t? CBS follows the money:
CBS 2 HD has learned of more alleged back-door dealings and political power peddling by Democratic Rep. Charles Rangel.
The reigning member of Congress’ top tax committee is apparently “wrangling” other politicos to get him out of his own financial and tax troubles. …
CBS 2 HD has discovered that since ethics probes began last year the 79-year-old congressman has given campaign donations to 119 members of Congress, including three of the five Democrats on the House Ethics Committee who are charged with investigating him.
Charlie’s “angels” on the committee include Congressmen Ben Chandler of Kentucky, G.K. Butterfield of North Carolina and Peter Welch of Vermont. All have received donations from Rangel.
Only Welch had the brains to realize how bad this looks. He returned Rangel’s money — almost twenty thousand dollars.
This demonstrates the problems of having the House (and Senate) holding its members accountable for their actions. In theory, it works great. However, in practice, elected officials on Capitol Hill do plenty of backscratching, and Rangel gets a lot of contributions in defense of a safe seat. That makes him powerful on the Hill, as he can dole out cash to allies and deny it to foes. In this particular instance, Rangel is using it to corrupt an Ethics Committee investigation, which would be the height of irony everywhere else but Capitol Hill.
Nancy Pelosi has assured Rangel that he can keep his powerful chair on Ways and Means while Charlie’s Dirty Angels probes his ethics. Once again, Pelosi delivers a culture of corruption rather than cleaning up Congress. (via Michelle)
Update: The Washington Post editorial board has heard enough, even before this report:
FOR POLITICIANS with major bad news to release or to make public, there’s no time like the dead of August to do it. The thinking goes that the public won’t remember a thing come September. We hope Rep. Charles B. Rangel (D-N.Y.) will have no such luck. His belated revelation of previously unreported income, property and bank accounts demands that he step aside as chairman of the House Ways and Means Committee. …
Much is expected of elected officials. Much more is expected and demanded of those entrusted with chairmanships and the power that comes with them, especially when it involves the nation’s purse strings. From all that we’ve seen thus far, Mr. Rangel has violated that trust continually and seemingly without care.

quote:

Originally posted by lcbell:

So you are okay with a Sitting Supreme Court Justice lying on the disclosure forms for multiple years ?

I am cautious of a one sided story. Juan purposely attacked the GOP, then claims that 'party' doesn't matter.
If the justice forgot to file her part, then he can do like all the others 'who forgot' and pay up.
There are many though out the government.

quote:

I am cautious of a one sided story. Juan purposely attacked the GOP, then claims that 'party' doesn't matter.
If the justice forgot to file her part, then he can do like all the others 'who forgot' and pay up.
There are many though out the government.

Juan always claims he's not involved with any party. But he eats, sleeps, breathes, walks, the demo line. I just can't figure out why he'd want to throw "pebbles" when the demos are in glass houses and we'd be within our rights to throw boulders at them.

I enjoy watching conservatives make hypocrites out of themselves. The Dems embrace their moral shortcomings and use them to their advantage, while the conservatives try to deny that they are lacking a moral grounding, only to be proven wrong almost daily.

Thomas violated his responsibilities to judicial ethics by allowing his wifes acceptance of $700,000 dollars for a no work job at a leading conservative special interest group to be excluded from his financial disclosure filing.

quote:

Originally posted by b50m:

quote:

Originally posted by lcbell:

So you are okay with a Sitting Supreme Court Justice lying on the disclosure forms for multiple years ?

I am cautious of a one sided story. Juan purposely attacked the GOP, then claims that 'party' doesn't matter.
If the justice forgot to file her part, then he can do like all the others 'who forgot' and pay up.
There are many though out the government.

"forgot" for several YEARS. These are Financial disclosure forms not taxes , so nothing to pay up ( unless they neglected to pay their taxes as well). Seems like a rather glaring failure.

'Forgot' for five.

Rangel 'forgot' he owned apartments and villas.
And he 'forgot' to file for 10 years.

"Respondent failed to report numerous items required to be reported... from 1998 through 2008."

quote:

Originally posted by b50m:
'Forgot' for five.

Rangel 'forgot' he owned apartments and villas.
And he 'forgot' to file for 10 years.

"Respondent failed to report numerous items required to be reported... from 1998 through 2008."

So how does Rangel's action make Thomas's failure okay ? Either it is right or its wrong. or are you saying that since a Democrat broke the law it's okay for a Republican to do the same ?

quote:

So how does Rangel's action make Thomas's failure okay ? Either it is right or its wrong. or are you saying that since a Democrat broke the law it's okay for a Republican to do the same ?

No, I'm saying you think it's fine when a demo does it but you get your undies in a wad if you think a Rep did it. Did she pay her taxes? Read the article again. If you're going to overlook what Rangel did, why even comment on Thomas?

quote:

Originally posted by Jennifer:

quote:

So how does Rangel's action make Thomas's failure okay ? Either it is right or its wrong. or are you saying that since a Democrat broke the law it's okay for a Republican to do the same ?

No, I'm saying you think it's fine when a demo does it but you get your undies in a wad if you think a Rep did it. Did she pay her taxes? Read the article again. If you're going to overlook what Rangel did, why even comment on Thomas?

I'm glad to know that you know what I think . Since this thread was about a Sitting Supreme Court Justice, that was what I commented on. Those particular actions.

Since you didn't comment on Duke Cunningham Does that mean you think accepting bribes by a Republican is okay ? If you're going to overlook what HE did why bring up Rangel ?

quote:

I'm glad to know that you know what I think . Since this thread was about a Sitting Supreme Court Justice, that was what I commented on. Those particular actions.

Since you didn't comment on Duke Cunningham Does that mean you think accepting bribes by a Republican is okay ? If you're going to overlook what HE did why bring up Rangel ?

A leftie started the thread. You jumped in. So apparently you don't care what dems do. Did you condemn Rangel? I'd bet no. My point, which I think you got, is that you have no right to comment unless YOU'RE ready to condemn it all. So roll those eyes. Like I said, people in glass houses shouldn't throw rocks. Libs are the "do as I say not as I do" party. Hypocrites.

quote:

Originally posted by Jennifer:

quote:

I'm glad to know that you know what I think . Since this thread was about a Sitting Supreme Court Justice, that was what I commented on. Those particular actions.

Since you didn't comment on Duke Cunningham Does that mean you think accepting bribes by a Republican is okay ? If you're going to overlook what HE did why bring up Rangel ?

A leftie started the thread. You jumped in. So apparently you don't care what dems do. Did you condemn Rangel? I'd bet no. My point, which I think you got, is that you have no right to comment unless YOU'RE ready to condemn it all. So roll those eyes. Like I said, people in glass houses shouldn't throw rocks. Libs are the "do as I say not as I do" party. Hypocrites.

You certainly make a lot of assumptions about what people think and seem rather quick to decry one side of being Hypocrites. Perhaps you shouldn't be so quick to throw rocks.

Getting back to the actual subject matter of the thread Do YOU think it is okay for a sitting US Supreme Court Justice to fail to properly fill out the Financial Disclosure Forms for several years ?

quote:

Originally posted by lcbell:

quote:

Originally posted by b50m:
'Forgot' for five.

Rangel 'forgot' he owned apartments and villas.
And he 'forgot' to file for 10 years.

"Respondent failed to report numerous items required to be reported... from 1998 through 2008."

So how does Rangel's action make Thomas's failure okay ? Either it is right or its wrong. or are you saying that since a Democrat broke the law it's okay for a Republican to do the same ?

I never said it was OK. I said if he owed something, pay up.

What would surprise me would be any member of any of the three branches of government who was HONEST!

Those on here defending Thomas need to come to terms with reality. If you read the article in the post that started this string, you should have taken special notice of THIS:

"Between 2003 and 2007, Virginia Thomas, a longtime conservative activist, earned $686,589 from the Heritage Foundation, according to a Common Cause review of the foundation's IRS records. Thomas failed to note the income in his Supreme Court financial disclosure forms for those years, instead checking a box labeled 'none' where 'spousal noninvestment income' would be disclosed."

and THIS:

"In his 2009 disclosure, Justice Thomas also reported spousal income as "none." Common Cause contends that Liberty Central paid Virginia Thomas an unknown salary that year.

Federal judges are bound by law to disclose the source of spousal income , according to Stephen Gillers, a professor at NYU School of Law. Thomas' omission — which could be interpreted as a violation of that law — could lead to some form of penalty, Gillers said.

"It wasn't a miscalculation; he simply omitted his wife's source of income for six years, which is a rather dramatic omission," Gillers said. "It could not have been an oversight."

In all years in which Thomas was obliged to correctly report the "spousal noninvestment income, en entered the word "none." Get it! The correct answer, in each year's report, would have been something over $100,000 on average. He was called upon by the form not only to state whether his spouse had "noninvestment income," but to enter the amount of that income. Instead, he LIED and said that she had "none." That was no "oversight." That was a purposeful misrepresentation of very significant fact. That was a lie. He lied each of the several times he entered the false information in his disclosure form.

Now trot out all the names you want to of any other judges, politicians or other elected or appointed officials of federal, state, or local governments who might have misrepresented facts about their income and its sources or the income of family members and its sources, or---for that matter--anything at all that you might dig up about any kind of legally suspect thing anyone, anywhere else, of whatever party or of no party, might have done or said illegally. Yes, trot it all out in all the detail you wish. But it will not change or diminish the fact that Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas lied multiple times in the disclosure forms that he submitted.

Saw it, read it, got it.

Don't care.

Rangle, don't care.

William Jefferson, don't care.

Tom Delay, don't care.

Slick Willie, don't care.

Don Seigelman, don't care.

Scooter Libby, don't care.

Half of all elected officials have maxed out credit cards, over drawn loans, owe back taxes, cheat on their spouse, have speeding tickets, have DUI's, stole something, etc...

When you find me an honest person in politics, let me know, then I will care.

Thomas is not a politician, his responsibilities are far greater, thus subject to more scrutiny, and less than zero tolerance for impropriety. All of which makes his involvement in Koch brothers fund-raising events even more distasteful.

One article said he 'dropped by'. It never said he made a contribution or in any way participated.

Like the Obama-Ayes thing. Guilt by association.
Should all justices sit in their living room when not on the bench?

I don't know the rules for a disclosure statement, so I don't know what this has to do with anything.

I'm sure that some legal eagle will make it all better.


Tell me Juan, if he dropped by a party at George Soros house, would you mind?



Here is site to look at all the forms filed by the justices.. Enjoy.
http://moneyline.cq.com/flatfi...e/scotus/scotus.html

No one drops by a political fundraising event. In Palm Springs. For two days.

Doesnt matter now. Thomas and Scalia have impugned their reputations, so hangin with Koch, Soros et al wont be a problem in the future.

From the very liberal Huff Post.

On Tuesday evening, the New York Times reported that an upcoming meeting in Palm Springs of "a secretive network of Republican donors" that was being organized by Koch Industries, "the longtime underwriter of libertarian causes." Buried in the third to last graph was a note that previous guests at such meetings included Supreme Court Justices Antonin Scalia and Clarence Thomas, two of the more conservative members of the bench.

It's not rare for a Justice to attend a seminar sponsored by a group with judicial or political interests. Members of the court, for instances, often speak at academic institutions or think tanks. Virtually all companies, meanwhile, are affected by the judicial branch. So long as Scalia and Thomas did not participate in overt partisan activities, there would be no apparent conflict of interest.
"There is nothing to prevent Supreme Court justices from hanging out with people who have political philosophies," said Steven Lubet, a professor of law at Northwestern University who teaches courses on Legal Ethics.

41 Obama White House aides owe the IRS $831,000 in back taxes -- and they're not alone



Over the years a lot of suspicion has built up across the country about Washington and its population of opportunistic transients coming to see themselves as a special kind of person, somehow above average working Americans who don't labor down in that monument-strewn former swamp.

Well, finally, an end to all those undocumented doubts. Thanks to some diligent digging by the Washington Post, those suspicions can at last be put to rest.

They're correct. Accurate. Dead-on. Laser-guided. On target. Bingo-bango. As clear as it's always seemed to those Americans who don't feel special entitlements and do meet their government obligations.

We now know that federal employees across the nation owe fully $1 billion in back taxes to the Internal Revenue Service.

As in, 1,000 times one million dollars. All this political jabber about giving middle-class ...

... Americans a tax cut. Thousands of feds have been giving themselves one all along -- unofficially. And these tax scofflaws include more than three dozen folks who work for the president with that newly decorated Oval Office.
The Post's T.W. Farnum did some research and found that out of the total sum, just 638 workers on Capitol Hill owe the IRS $9.3 million in back taxes. As in, overdue. The IRS gets stiffed by the legislative body that controls its budget. How Washington works.

Now, back taxes have been a problem for the Obama-Biden administration. You may recall early on that Tom Daschle was the president's top pick to run the Health and Human Services Department. But it turned out the former Democratic senator, who was un-elected from South Dakota in 2004, owed something like $120,000 to the IRS for things from his subsequent benefactor that he just forgot to pay taxes on. You know how that is. $120G's here or there. So he dropped out.

And then we learned this guy Timothy Geithner owed something like $42,000 in back taxes and penalties to the IRS, which is one of the agencies that he'd be in charge of as secretary of the Treasury. The fine fellow who's supposed to know about handling everyone else's money. In the end this was excused by Washington's bipartisan CYA culture as one of those inadvertent accidental oversights that somehow never seem to happen on the side of paying too much taxes.

And under Geithner's expert guidance the U.S. economy has been, well, wow! Just look at it.

Privacy laws prevent release of individual tax delinquents' names. But we do know that as of the end of 2009, 41 people inside Obama's very own White House owe the government they're allegedly running a total of $831,055 in back taxes. That would cover a lot of special chocolate desserts in the White House Mess.

http://latimesblogs.latimes.co...gress-taxes-irs.html



In the House of Representatives, 421 people owe a total $6,524,892. In the Senate, 217 owe $2,774,836. In the IRS' parent department, Treasury, 1,204 owe $7,670,814. At the Labor Department, where Secretary Hilda Solis' husband had some back-tax problems before her confirmation, 463 owe $7,481,463. Eighty-one workers for the Federal Reserve System's board of governors owe $1,076,733.

Over at the Justice Department, which is so busy enforcing other laws and suing Arizona, 1,971 employees still owe $14,350,152 in overdue taxes.

Then, we come to the Department of Homeland Security, which is run by Janet Napolitano, the former governor of Arizona who preferred to call terrorist acts "man-caused disasters." Homeland Security is keeping all of us safe by ensuring that a brave Dutch tourist is aboard every inbound international flight to thwart any would-be bomber with explosives in his underpants.

Within that department, there reside 4,856 people who owe the tax agency a whopping total of $37,012,174.

quote:

Originally posted by Jennifer:

quote:

I'm glad to know that you know what I think . Since this thread was about a Sitting Supreme Court Justice, that was what I commented on. Those particular actions.

Since you didn't comment on Duke Cunningham Does that mean you think accepting bribes by a Republican is okay ? If you're going to overlook what HE did why bring up Rangel ?

A leftie started the thread. You jumped in. So apparently you don't care what dems do. Did you condemn Rangel? I'd bet no. My point, which I think you got, is that you have no right to comment unless YOU'RE ready to condemn it all. So roll those eyes. Like I said, people in glass houses shouldn't throw rocks. Libs are the "do as I say not as I do" party. Hypocrites.

Jennifer,
How can you be so smart on the Religion forum and so dumb on this one? Makes no sense.