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Congratulations to Rep. John Murtha (D-PA)! He is this year's winner of the Daily Muck's coveted "Most Pork" award. Murtha has requested or co-requested a cool $150 million in earmarked funds. (The Hill)

The House Rules Committee struck down three of Rep. Allan Mollohan’s (D-WV) earmark requests after Mollohan himself asked to remove the earmarks. The lawmaker, who anticipated that Republicans would move to strike the earmarks anyway, is currently under investigation by the FBI for his close ties to nonprofit groups and the earmarks he has directed to these organizations. (The Hill)

Sen. Tom Coburn (R-OK) has requested a Pentagon investigation of 21st Century Systems, Inc., a defense contracting company, for alleged misuse of government earmarks. Coburn has set his sights on the company as part of a wider effort to crack down on earmark spending. Sen Nelson (D-NE), who sponsored the earmark, defended his request despite questions raised by the fact that the Senator's son is an employee of the firm. (The Hill)

After two years of listening to complaints that the post-Katrina "disaster trailers" contained dangerously high levels of formaldehyde, FEMA is springing into action. They have finally decided to suspend the sale and donation of these trailers while they review the reports that the trailers are causing respiratory problems for residents. It's a stunning reversal, considering that only a few weeks ago Congress saw documents showing that FEMA lawyers had discouraged the agency from looking into the problem. (USA TODAY)

Valerie Plame worked at the Central Intelligence Agency from 1985 to 2006. I am allowed to write that fact which is now both public knowledge and published in the Congressional Record. But Valerie Plame can't include it in her memoir, according to a new court ruling which says the information was classified and has never officially been acknowledged by the CIA. (NY Times)

Six years ago the Army knew that their promotion exams were vulnerable to cheating. Last year that vulnerability was confirmed when the Army discovered that soldiers were downloading copies of exams off the internet. And yet, the Army has only just moved to close the site most visited for "exam assistance." Don't worry about our soldiers, though: already, three copycat sites have popped up to replace the closing of shamschool.com. (Boston Globe)

"I am hoping that Kyl would not bring it up in an open hearing." Those are the words of an assistant to the Attorney General after Sen. Kyl (R-AZ) privately said he opposed the firing of Arizona U.S. Attorney Paul Charlton. Kyl has since publicly voiced his disappointment that Charlton was fired. Via Think Progress. (Arizona Central)

The District of Columbia has agreed to pay $1 million for improperly rounding up 120 protesters who were demonstrating against the Iraq War, the IMF and the World Bank. (Associated Press)


5 Comments

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user-pic

Okay...the law doesn't work. Ethics regulations don't work. How about letting these clowns geththeir earmarks with a caveat. Every time they put an earmark into legislation, that also are required to put an earmark with a tag in their ear. I'll bet thie vanity will do what nothing else will.

These guys just passed a watered down bill keeping earmarks AFTER the woed on the collapsed bridge came out. Didn't even slow them down. Of course, we can't have a little thing like innocent deaths stop important things like curruption, can we...

user-pic

Okay...the law doesn't work. Ethics regulations don't work. How about letting these clowns get their earmarks with a caveat. Every time they put an earmark into legislation, they also are required to put an earmark with a tag in their ear. I'll bet thie vanity will do what nothing else will.

These guys just passed a watered down bill keeping earmarks AFTER the word on the collapsed bridge came out. Didn't even slow them down. Of course, we can't have a little thing like innocent deaths stop important things like curruption, can we...

user-pic

Re. C. W. Bill Young (R-FL) took second place in the "Most Pork" contest as having been responsible for $144 million in earmarks.

Why aren't more questions being raised about Young's family?

On 9/10/04, Young's daughter-in-law, Cynthia "Cindy" Young, contributed $500 to Rep. Andrews (D-NJ- as an exec of defense contractor, Galaxy Scientific, according to FEC records.

The problem is that Young had already registered Grimes & Young, a lobbying firm based in Media PA, in June 2004. I think she was also a partner in a related lobbying firm, CC Nexus LLC, registered in October 2002.

Cecilia Grimes is the other partner in Grimes & Young and CC Nexus LLC. In fact, I suspect that the "CC" stands for Cynthia and Cecilia.

Grimes also contributed to Rep. Andrews as an exec of Galaxy Scientific on 9/10/04 as did other GS execs. GS execs were also big contributors to Curt Weldon.

Ceclia Grimes is a fortyish, attractive blonde who was a real estate agent before she became a defense contractor exec and lobbyist. She reportedly met Curt Weldon when she coached one of his kids and then again when he bought his house in 2000. But Grimes was politically active in that she was appointed to a PA state board for a three-year term in 1997, according to her online resume.

It seems highly inappropiate for Young's daughter-in-law to be a lobbyist and a defense contractor at the same time yet no one in the media including TPM MR has raised the issue.

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Can we just get rid of the friggin' earmarks and go back to some form of accountability?

I swear the bean counters have so mucked up budget processes that no one really knows how much anything costs any more or where the money comes from. And not just in Washington, everywhere. No one wants to pay taxes so we get saddled with "fees." America has become so cheap--and that's not a compliment.

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I just reviewed the 990s filed by the Canaan Valley Institute mentioned in The Hill article about Rep. Allan Mollohan.

Whew! Lots of room for fat in those numbers. I am especially curious about "Other Receivables" jumping from $117k in 2004 to $674k in 2005. No disclosure is made about the nature of the receivable in the 990.

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