Category Archives: government fraud spending collusion

VA Paid out $142 Million in Bonuses in 2014

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VA gave 156,000 employees $142 million in bonuses in 2014

WashingtonExaminer: The Department of Veterans Affairs VA shelled out more than $142 million in performance bonuses in 2014, the same year that the VA’s healthcare scandal exploded and revealed the VA was systematically denying veterans access to health care.

The average individual payout was over $900 for the thousands of employees. A total of 156,000 VA workers qualified for bonuses as a result of being rated them “fully successful” or higher at carrying out their responsibilities last year, including officials at delay-prone hospitals. But those ratings were later found to be inflated, as the vast majority of workers were getting rated highly enough to get a bonus.

More than 325 were compensated with $5,000 to $13,000 in year-end bonuses, according to data given to the Washington Examiner by the House Committee on Veterans’ Affairs.

Before he resigned, VA Secretary Eric Shinseki said he’d stop bonuses at the troubled agency. But in the summer of 2014, Congress approved legislation allowing the agency to hand out up to $360 million in bonuses each year.

House Veterans’ Affairs Committee Chairman Jeff Miller, R-Fla., said the bonus awards are part of a “disturbing trend” of rewarding workers even when they haven’t earned it.

“VA loves to tout its bonus program as a way to attract and retain the best and brightest employees,” Miller wrote. “Unfortunately, often times the employees VA rewards with thousands in taxpayer-funded bonuses are not the type of people the department should be interested in attracting or retaining.”

In the current Congress, the House has passed a number of bills that include language to rein in the department until better results are obtained, including recouping bonuses paid to employees, changing the cap on bonuses from $360 million to $300 million, and limiting senior-level bonuses to $2 million per year.

The Senate Committee on Veterans’ Affairs is currently considering three of the House-approved bills.

“Rewarding failure only breeds more failure. Until VA leaders learn this important lesson and make a commitment to supporting real accountability at the department, efforts to reform VA are doomed to fail,” said Miller.

*** Some other truths about the VA: 300,000 Veterans Die Waiting

NASHVILLE, Tenn. — In a Fox 17 Waste Watch investigation, government findings finally confirm reports you’ve seen on Fox 17 News about US veterans dying while waiting for healthcare through the VA.

To make matters worse, the number of those who have died while waiting for this care is six times higher than originally estimated.
Even with an increase in funding, the VA’s Office of Inspector General is calling for an overhaul.
Midstate veteran David Jones says he’s among the more than 800,000 veterans whose file is stuck in a “pending” status.
Jones says, “People are trying to get well, they’re trying to get benefits and it’s next to impossible.”

Jones is unable to get the care he needs because his application to the Veterans Health Administration’s Health Eligibility Center is backlogged in its Enrollment System.

This VA Office of Inspector General report confirms that not all of these applicants are for veterans actively seeking enrollment in VA health care.
It says the applications of these veterans have been “inactive” for years and more than 300,000 veterans died during this time.
Congressman Diane Black (R-TN, 6th District) says, “I was surprised.  I thought we’d see a different number than what we did.”

Since reports of this VA issue initially surfaced about two years ago, the President has named a new head of the agency.  Congress has approved for VA Secretary Robert McDonald to fire employees not doing their jobs.

The agency’s data system has changed and it’s received a 5.5 percent budget increase with the President allocating more than $168-billion dollars to the VA in his 2016 budget. Fox 17 News has also found this OIG report calls out VA employees for incorrectly marking unprocessed applications as “completed” and may have deleted more than 10-thousand transactions from its system.

The government’s Human Resources Office and General Council are now determining if administrative action should be taken against any senior officials in the Veterans Health Administration or Office of Information and Technology.

Fox 17 News will continue bringing you updates on this developing story.

A Confirmation he is Gay or What?

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There is a real kinship in the Obama White House with the whole LGBT agenda and it has been going on for years. Now it appears some aggressive tactics are surfacing at universities.

Good to know that US Secretary of Education is committed to ending racism on college campuses.

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. & I have been strategizing & connecting today!

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Last June, enough time to organize as noted below:

is in good company at The White House today!

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Other world leaders must be asking themselves and others just what the hell is going on. The world is in a meltdown and Obama is concerned with climate-change and LGBT agendas, even Israel is questioning the White House priorities and relationships.

The top activist at the University of Missouri is Payton Head and as suggested by a previous post on this site, the White House has their fingerprints all over the matter of the protests at Mizzou.

Payton Head has been to the White House along with several other Black Lives Matter activists, so this is no surprise.  

Hat tip to Breitbart: The University of Missouri’s student body president, Payton Head, is apologizing“for scaring everybody with false KKK on campus rumor.”

It was a rough night on the campus of the University of Missouri, thanks in large part to Student Body President Payton Head. Head posted on Facebook earlier in the night that the KKK was confirmed on campus and that he was working with “the MUPD, the state trooper and the National Guard.”

The only problem with that terrifying statement is it wasn’t true and Head was forced to delete the post and apologize:

Given Head’s central role in recent protests at Mizzou, some may not be surprised to find a connection between Head, from an upper middle class Chicago neighborhood, and the nation’s community organizer in chief, Barack Obama. Per his Facebook page, the two met in July, 2011 when Head visited the White House.

There are also as yet unconfirmed Internet reports that Head interned for Chicago Mayor Rahm Emanuel.

Payton Head came from an upper middle class black family in Cook county. He was at the core of the debate over racial tensions. He wrote a long and vivid story on his experience at MU, and posted it on Facebook. Despite being only 7% of the student population, the student council is overwhelmingly (100%) black.

Who is Payton Head? Payton head was an honor student from Chicago. He is openly gay, and calls himself a Christian. He is well traveled. Within one year of his senior graduation from high school, Head traveled to Europe. He met Barack Obama. https://www.facebook…35072167&type=3 When he got to MU, he was selected to be a guide. Not many get that privilege. He resigned that position, and spent the summer in Chicago working on behalf of Rahm Emanuel. Here is a link showing Head being hugged by coldfish Emanuel. Although he is a third year student, Payton Head is still undeclared, but he is very interested in Social Justice. He has helped with seminars in Columbia, and elsewhere on Social Justice. In these seminars they talk about gender inequities, racial discrimination, same sex relationships, and the whole spectrum of sexual deviancy.

Also, Head’s father Lawrence was a Chicago high school principal apparently fired for performance, who then went on to sue the school system.

Lawrence Head, Plaintiff-Appellant, v. Chicago School Reform Board of Trustees, Defendant-Appellee.

No. 99-3408

In the United States Court of Appeals For the Seventh Circuit

Hold on…there is more.

Hat tip again to Breitbart:

OUT

President Obama has made history by becoming the first sitting U.S. president to pose for the cover of an LGBT magazine.

Obama is on the cover of Out magazine’s latest Out 100 issue as the publication’s “Ally of the Year.”

“The 44th President of the United States is our Ally of the Year—a president who came to office on a wave of euphoria, appeared to lose momentum halfway through, and has since rallied, helping us secure marriage equality, among other landmark initiatives that are transforming our place in America,” the editors of Out wrote in an article accompanying the cover.

Obama granted a wide-ranging interview to the LGBT publication, weighing in on his administration’s focus on LGBT rights, the “generational difference” in his daughters’ attitudes toward homosexuality and the role the United States could play in challenging the human rights records of more restrictive regimes in Middle Eastern countries.

Obama told the magazine his fight for equality began “from when I was a kid, because my mom instilled in me the strong belief that every person is of equal worth.”

Obama explained:

At the same time, growing up as a black guy with a funny name, I was often reminded of exactly what it felt like to be on the outside. One of the reasons I got involved in politics was to help deliver on our promise that we’re all created equal, and that no one should be excluded from the American dream just because of who they are. That’s why, in the Senate, I supported repealing DOMA [the Defense of Marriage Act]. It’s why, when I ran for president the first time, I publicly asked for the support of the LGBT community, and promised that we could bring about real change for LGBT Americans.

Obama also said he “wasn’t surprised” by the Supreme Court’s decision in Obergefell v. Hodges earlier this year, which legalized same-sex marriage nationwide.

“Well, I try not to guess how the Supreme Court is going to rule,” Obama said when asked if he expected the Supreme Court’s decision, adding:

But even before the decision came down, one thing was clear: There had been a remarkable attitude shift — in hearts and minds — across America. The ruling reflected that. It reflected our values as a nation founded on the principle that we are all created equal. And, by the way, it was decades of our brothers and sisters fighting for recognition and equality — and too frequently risking their lives or facing rejection from family, friends, and co-workers — that got us to that moment.

Obama also offered some advice for the “Kim Davises of America.” Davis, a Kentucky court clerk, was briefly jailed earlier this year for refusing to issue a marriage license to a same-sex couple, citing her Christian beliefs.

“I am a man of faith and believe deeply in religious freedom, but at the end of the day, nobody is above the rule of law — especially someone who voluntarily takes an oath to uphold that law,” Obama told the magazine. “That’s something we’ve got to respect.”

You can read the rest of President Obama’s interview with Out magazine here. The “Out 100″ issue is on newsstands this month.

 

CIA’s Fugitive Banker in Idaho

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This is a story that makes for a great movie script but there are some that would push back especially those involved during the Reagan years and the Contra arms deal.

The newspaper article found here expands even further, naming more names.

A Nugan Hand branch in the Thai opium-producing country, for example, abutted the office of the American Drug Enforcement Administration – and even shared a receptionist with it. Important American companies in Saudi Arabia backed Nugan Hand’s aggressive sales there to American workers; big investment money was raked in, sometimes being carried away in plastic garbage bags, much of it disappearing forever. In 1979, Nugan Hand hoped to gain United Nations money to settle Indochinese refugees in the Turks and Caicos Islands, seen as ideal Caribbean transshipment points on the narcotics routes from South America.

FOUND After 35 Years: CIA’s Fugitive Banker

How Michael Jon Hand, who founded an Australian bank with ties to American military and intelligence officials that defrauded depositors and investors, was tracked to Idaho.
By Raymond Bonner, Special to ProPublica

It was one of the greatest disappearing acts of modern times.

Amid a swirl of allegations and rumors that the Nugan Hand Bank was involved in arms smuggling, drug-running, and covert operations for the CIA, the institution’s American founder vanished from Australia. Thirty-five years later, that man, Michael Jon Hand, was tracked to a small town in Idaho where he has been living under the name of Michael Jon Fuller.

Hand was found by an Australian writer, Peter Butt, whose just-released book, Merchants of Menace, discloses Hand’s whereabouts after decades of mystery.

If finding Hand, now 73, solves one mystery, it raises another. How could he have lived in the United States so long without being detected? He changed his name only slightly, from Hand to Fuller, and did not get a new Social Security number, according to Butt.

Hand’s company, G.M.I. Manufacturing, is registered with the Idaho secretary of state. The company “now manufactures tactical weapons for US Special Forces, special operations groups and hunters,’’ Butt writes. Has Hand/Fuller been brazen, foolish, or, as Butt asks, does he belong “to a protected species, most likely of the intelligence kind?”

Two years after fleeing Australia, in 1982, when the CIA was involved in a covert operation to overthrow the left-wing Sandinista government in Nicaragua, Hand was working as a military adviser in the region where the anti-Sandinista “contras” were based, according to an Australian intelligence document, which was declassified earlier this year.

The FBI did not immediately respond to a request for comment. The CIA has previously denied it had any links to Hand.

Hand had been a Green Beret in Vietnam and a CIA operative in Laos before moving to Australia, where he and Frank Nugan, a wealthy playboy, established the Nugan Hand Bank in 1973, with $80. Hand fled Australia seven years later, after Nugan was found dead inside his Mercedes-Benz, his left hand holding the barrel of a .30-caliber rifle a few inches from his head, his right hand near the trigger.

During an inquest into Nugan’s death, Hand testified that the bank was insolvent, owing investors large and small some $50 million. The inquest ruled Nugan’s death a suicide, a finding many Australians found dubious.

With depositors and law enforcement authorities in pursuit, Hand, with assistance from a former CIA officer, secured a forged Australian passport, donned a false mustache and beard, and fled Australia in June of 1980. He flew to Fiji, then on to Canada, from which he could cross into the United States without a visa.

The Sydney Morning Herald first reported on Butt’s findings on Monday. In a segment that aired Sunday night, Australia’s 60 Minutes filmed Hand/Fuller emerging from a pharmacy at a shopping mall in Idaho Falls. He has a full beard and neck brace, and was wearing sunglasses and a blue checked shirt. He refused to answer any questions or speak at all when confronted by 60 Minutes reporter Ross Coulthart.

Suspicions about the bank’s links to the CIA arose almost immediately after Nugan was found dead. His wallet contained the business card of William E. Colby, who had been director of the CIA from 1973 to 1976.

Colby was forced to resign when it was reported that the agency had been engaged in illegal spying on American citizens. He became a legal adviser to Nugan Hand, and on the back of his business card were handwritten dates when someone, presumably Colby, would be in Hong Kong and Singapore.

As reporters began digging into Nugan Hand, they found that Colby wasn’t the only individual with an intelligence or military background involved with the bank.

“Nugan Hand had enough generals, admirals, and spooks to run a small war,” Jonathan Kwitny, an investigative reporter at The Wall Street Journal, wrote in the definitive book about the bank, The Crimes of Patriots: A True Tale of Dope, Dirty Money, and the CIA.

Pentagon: Taliban is Now a U.S. Partner

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Really? Tell it to those warriors who fought them in Afghanistan. Yet this is not a new standard especially as the Obama White House released 5 of their top commanders back to the ranks of the Taliban.

Shameful…

WASHINGTON: The US Department of Defence has said that it’s no longer conducting counter-terrorism operations against the Taliban in Afghanistan because it views the group as an important partner in its efforts for restoring peace in the war-ravaged country.

“What we’re not doing (is) counter-terrorism operations against the Taliban,” Pentagon spokesman Navy Captain Jeff Davis told a Wednesday evening news briefing in Washington.

“We actually view the Taliban as being an important partner in a peaceful Afghan-led reconciliation process. We are not actively targeting the Taliban,” he added.

‘No institutional presence of IS in Pak-Afghan region’

The briefing, however, focused on US efforts to defeat the Middle East-based terrorist group IS (the self-styled Islamic State) which also has some presence in the Pak-Afghan region.

Capt Davis said that some “lone wolves” in Pakistan and Afghanistan were using the IS brand to raise their stature but the group did not have an institutional presence in the region.

He said the IS had a “pretty good” command and control system in Iraq and Syria but those claiming to represent the group in Afghanistan and Pakistan did not have the command and control relationship with the main IS.

The Pentagon official said the United States was working “very extensively” with the Pakistani government in the fight against terrorists.

Capt Davis explained that while the Coalition Support Fund was aimed to enhance Pakistan’s ability to fight the Haqqani Network, it also helped develop other broader spectrum counter-terrorism capabilities.

In Afghanistan, the US ended its combat operations last year and its role there now was simply to advise and assist the Afghan forces, he said.

Capt Davis said the US also had “unilateral role” of being able to conduct counter-terrorism missions in Afghanistan primarily against Al Qaeda and its remnants.

“But IS would be fair game as well,” he added.

(CNN) Here’s a look at the Taliban, a Sunni Islamist organization operating primarily in Afghanistan and Pakistan.

Facts:
Reclusive leader Mullah Mohammed Omar led the Taliban from the mid-1990s until his death in 2013.

Mullah Akhtar Mohammad Mansour was announced in July 2015 as the new leader.

Taliban, in Pashto, is the plural of Talib, which means student.

Most members are Pashtun, the largest ethnic group in Afghanistan.

 

The exact number of Taliban forces is unknown.

The group’s aim is to impose its interpretation of Islamic law on Afghanistan and remove foreign influence from the country.

Timeline:
1979-1989 – The Soviet Union invades and occupies Afghanistan. Afghan resistance fighters, known collectively as mujahedeen, fight back.

1989-1993 – After the Soviet Union withdraws, fighting among the mujahedeen leads to chaos.

1994 – The Taliban is formed, comprised mostly of students and led by mujahedeen veteran Mullah Omar.

November 1994 – The Taliban seizes the city of Kandahar.

September 1996 – The capital, Kabul, falls to the Taliban.

1997 – The Taliban issue an edict renaming Afghanistan the Islamic Emirate of Afghanistan. The country is only officially recognized by three countries: Pakistan, Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates.

1996-2001 – The group imposes strict Islamic laws on the Afghan people. Women must wear head-to-toe coverings, are not allowed to attend school or work outside the home and are forbidden to travel alone. Television, music and non-Islamic holidays are also banned.

1997 – Mullah Omar forges a relationship with Osama bin Laden, who then moves his base of operations to Kandahar.

August 1998 – The Taliban captures Mazar-e-Sharif, gaining control of about 90% of Afghanistan.

March 2001 – The Taliban destroys two 1,500 year old Buddha figures in the town of Bamiyan, saying they are idols that violate Islam.

October-November 2001 – After massive U.S. bombardment as a part of Operation Enduring Freedom, the Taliban lose Afghanistan to U.S. and Northern Alliance forces.

December 2006 – Senior Taliban leader Mullah Akhtar Mohammad Osmani is killed in an airstrike by the U.S.

February 2007 – Mullah Manan, a senior Taliban commander, is killed in an air strike in southern Afghanistan.

May 2007 – Mullah Dadullah Lang, a senior Taliban leader, is killed in a U.S.-led coalition operation supported by NATO.

August 2007 – During a visit to Afghanistan, Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad denies his country is providing the Taliban weapons.

December 11, 2007 – Afghan troops backed by NATO recapture the provincial town of Musa Qala from Taliban control.

February 2008 – Taliban operative Mullah Bakht Mohammed is captured by Pakistani forces.

October 21, 2008 – Foreign Minister Saud al-Faisal confirms that Saudi Arabia hosted talks between Afghan officials and the Taliban in September. It is reported that no agreements were made.

April 25, 2011 – Hundreds of prisoners escape from a prison in Kandahar by crawling through a tunnel. The Taliban takes responsibility for the escape and claims that 541 prisoners escaped, while ISAF says the number is 470.

September 10, 2011 – Two Afghan civilians are killed and 77 U.S. troops are wounded during a vehicle borne improvised explosive device (SVBIED) attack at the entrance of Combat Outpost Sayed Abad, an ISAF base in Afghanistan’s Wardak province. The Taliban claims responsibility.

September 13, 2011 – Taliban militants open fire on the U.S. embassy and NATO’s International Security Assistance Force headquarters in central Kabul. Three police officers and one civilian are killed. Taliban spokesman Zabiullah Mujahid tells CNN their target is the U.S. embassy, governmental organizations and other foreign organizations.

February 27, 2012 – The Taliban claims responsibility for a suicide bombing near the front gate of the International Security Assistance Force base at Jalalabad airport in Afghanistan. At least nine people are killed and 12 wounded in the explosion. The Taliban says the bombing is in retaliation for the burning of Qurans at a U.S. base last week.

August 8, 2012 – According to senior U.S. officials, in an effort to revive peace talks with the Taliban, President Barack Obama‘s administration has proposed a prisoner swap under which it would transfer five Taliban prisoners to Qatar in exchange for a U.S. soldier held by the Taliban. The new proposal involves sending all five Taliban prisoners to Qatar first, before the Taliban release Sgt. Bowe Bergdahl, a member of the U.S. army captured in 2009. The original offer proposed transferring the Taliban prisoners in two groups, with Bergdahl being released in between.

June 18, 2013 – An official political office of the Taliban opens in Doha, Qatar’s capital city. The Taliban announces that they hope to improve relations with other countries, head toward a peaceful solution to the Afghanistan occupation and establish an independent Islamic system in the country.

September 21, 2013 – Pakistan announces that Mullah Abdul Ghani Baradar, one of the founding members of the Taliban, has been released from prison. Baradar had been captured in Karachi, Pakistan in 2010.

May 31, 2014 – The United States transfers five Guantanamo Bay detainees to Qatar in exchange for the release of Sgt. Bowe Bergdahl: Khair Ulla Said Wali Khairkhwa, Mullah Mohammad Fazl, Mullah Norullah Nori, Abdul Haq Wasiq and Mohammad Nabi Omari. It is believed Bergdahl was being held by the Taliban and al Qaeda-aligned Haqqani network in Pakistan.

September 26, 2014 – A Taliban offensive in Ghazni province, Afghanistan, leaves an estimated 100 civilians dead or wounded, including some women and children who were beheaded, according to a provincial deputy governor.

July 29, 2015 – The Afghan government says in a news release that Taliban leader Mullah Omar died in April 2013 in Pakistan, citing “credible information,” and a spokesman for Afghanistan’s intelligence service tells CNN that Omar died in a hospital in Karachi at that time.

September 28, 2015 – Taliban insurgents seize the main roundabout in the Afghan provincial capital of Kunduz, then free more than 500 inmates at the prison. This is the first time the Taliban have taken over a provincial capital since 2001.

Sanctuary City Supporter to Head Border Patrol?

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Chief Fong drew criticism in June 2008 for failing to complete firearm recertification for over five years though all San Francisco police officers are required to recertify annually by department regulations. Chief Fong was quoted as saying that she was too busy to recertify. When the controversy erupted in the local media, she was recertified a week later. Additionally, in 2003 there was a police scandal in San Francisco where she was involved but skirted prosecuted.

Sources: Vocal supporter of sanctuary cities on short list to be next head of Border Patrol

FNC: A former San Francisco police chief and vocal supporter of a sanctuary cities policy is on a short list of candidates to become the new chief of the Border Patrol, according to sources.

As police chief, Heather Fong shielded illegal immigrants, including aliens who committed crimes, from deportation. In contrast, it is the job of the U.S. Border Patrol to catch and deport all illegal immigrants, including those with a criminal history.

“If they bring (a police chief) in for political purposes based on the sanctuary cities model, that politicizes the job and I think it completely undermines credibility and morale in the organization,” House Committee on Homeland Security Chairman Mike McCaul, R-Texas, told Fox News.

“If you have someone who is advocating for sanctuary cities, that’s the opposite side. They welcome these illegal immigrants to stay in the country. And so I think it’s at cross-purpose with the mission itself.”

Fong, according to Border Patrol, DHS and Capitol Hill sources, is one of several candidates to replace current chief Mike Fischer, who announced his resignation last month.

Fong is currently an assistant secretary for state and local law enforcement at the Department of Homeland Security. If tapped, she would be the first outsider to lead the Border Patrol in its 90-year history.

That decision is up to Customs and Border Protection Commissioner Gil Kerlikowske, who released a statement Monday saying, “”At this time, CBP has not begun the search for the Chief of the U.S. Border Patrol. It is completely false that any individual could be a potential candidate at this time. We are currently preparing the paperwork to begin the process.”

Rank and file agents were surprised she would be considered.

“The appointment of Heather Fong would prove that the Border Patrol is no longer the enforcement agency that Congress and the American public intended it to be,” according to a statement released by Brandon Judd, head of the agents’ union.

“Heather Fong oversaw a sanctuary city, which is directly contrary to our mission. Her appointment would be for political purposes and the trust of the men and woman of the Border Patrol in DHS and CBP leadership would be lost.”

During her five years as the chief of SFPD, Fong refused to cooperate with ICE, telling reporters in November 2008, “We do not cooperate with ICE when they go out for enforcement of immigration violations of the law.”

A few months earlier, she appeared in a public service campaign telling illegal immigrants they’re welcome in the city. In promoting San Francisco’s sanctuary city policy on TV, radio, posters and brochures in five languages, Fong said illegal immigrants had nothing to fear under her watch. “San Francisco is committed to providing safe access to public services to our communities,” she said.

In a news conference unveiling the campaign, she told reporters, “We do not work on enforcing immigration laws.”

The chief of the Border Patrol position does not require congressional approval. But given the “border security first” mentality among many on Capitol Hill, McCaul said he believes bringing in an outsider could be a hard sell.