"Sphincter Politicians on Parade”

[LFC]

Moralizing and stealing go together so easily with these people.

Joseph Harding, the now-former Florida Republican lawmaker who authored the state’s infamous “Don’t Say Gay” bill, has pleaded guilty to federal felony charges relating to COVID-relief funds.

Harding entered his plea deal in a federal courthouse on Tuesday. In December, he was charged with two counts of wire fraud, two counts of money laundering, and two counts of making false statements. Harding initially pleaded not guilty to the charges, but now pleads guilty to one count of each charge, cutting his potential punishment in half.

“In pleading guilty, defendant acknowledges that were this case to go to trial, the government would present evidence to support the charges beyond a reasonable doubt,” the plea agreement reads.

The former lawmaker allegedly plotted to defraud the Small Business Administration (SBA) for loans meant for small businesses impacted by the coronavirus pandemic and later filed a fraudulent application for an Economic Injury Disaster Loan (EIDL), according to court documents.

Between December 1, 2020, and March 1, 2021, the Ocala Republican allegedly “made and caused to be made false and fraudulent representations in SBA EIDL loan applications and in supporting loan documents submitted to the SBA in the names of dormant business entities,” the indictment read, “namely, The Vak Shack Inc. and Harding Farms LLC, in order to and in an attempt to falsely qualify for SBA EIDL loans.”

Prosecutors claim that Harding “falsely represented that these business entities were active businesses during 2019 and 2020 when in fact they were not.” His loan application stated that The Vak Shack earned over $400,000 and had four employees before the pandemic, but the company had been dormant from 2017 to 2020, with no gross revenue or staff. Similarly, he allegedly wrote that Harding Farms earned a similar amount with two employees, but it was also long dormant with no revenue and no staff.

He managed to obtain more than $150,000 in federal assistance, Coody’s office alleges, transferring more than $10,000 to his personal checking account, more than $10,000 for a credit card payment, and an additional $10,000-plus to a third-party business entity.

Harding now faces a maximum sentence of 20 years in prison and three years of supervised release for wire fraud, a maximum of 10 years in prison and three years of supervised release for money laundering, and a maximum of five years in prison and one year of supervised release for making a false statement, as well as a $250,000 fine and a $100 special monetary assessment for each charge.

[LFC]

Paging Congressman Kettle Black! Mr. Kettle Black!

[LFC]

Little Lindsey continues to beg people to send Trump money. What a sad, pathetic, closeted little troll.

I like this one.

[LFC]

What a little bitch.

Dan Kelly, the former Wisconsin Supreme Court justice who lost a second race for the bench Tuesday night, delivered less of a concession speech and more of a lengthy, emotional whine.

Milwaukee County Judge Janet Protasiewicz defeated Kelly easily, by 11 points. It’s a similar margin of loss to the one Kelly faced in 2020, when he was beaten by now-Justice Jill Karofsky.

“Now this didn’t turn out the way we were looking for. And I think there are a couple of reasons for it and I think we need to address them head on. It brings me no joy to say this,” he said, haltingly. “I wish that in a circumstance like this I would be able to concede to a worthy opponent. But I do not have a worthy opponent to which I can concede.”

“This was the most deeply deceitful, dishonorable, despicable campaign I have ever seen run for the courts,” he added. “It was truly beneath contempt.”

There's more, including lying about his position on abortion.

[goldenvalley]

Apr 5, 2023 23:25:16 GMT LFC said:

What a little bitch.

What, he didn't complain about Dominion Voting Systems stealing his re-election?  

The dictionary entry for a#*h*#e will be crowded with head shots and it will now include this dude Kelly.

[LFC]

I'll take "Gag Inducing Cynical Pivots" for 100, Alex.

Sen. Ted Cruz built his reputation as a conservative flamethrower after he led the government shutdown over Obamacare funding in 2013, cultivating the brand in his presidential campaign and beyond over the last decade.

Now, Cruz, R-Texas, is seeking to show some bipartisan credentials as he runs for re-election in a state that is becoming more competitive, which gave him a scare in his last race.

In a wide-ranging interview in his Capitol Hill office, Cruz highlighted his work as the top Republican on the Commerce, Science and Transportation Committee and how he has teamed with Chair Maria Cantwell, D-Wash., on legislation to require that consumers be informed if their refrigerators or other home appliances have recording capabilities.

Sane people see Ted for who he really is, of course.

But skeptical Democrats on the Commerce Committee still view Cruz as a partisan attack dog. Asked about Cruz’s bipartisan work on the refrigerator and appliance privacy bill, Sen. Brian Schatz, D-Hawaii, literally rolled his eyes.

“I just haven’t seen any evidence that Ted has changed,” Schatz said. “There’s not a single one of us that doesn’t have one or two bipartisan bills. The question is: How do you behave on a daily basis? And I just haven’t seen a big change. Maybe I’m wrong, and I’d be happy to be proven wrong, but so far it seems like Ted is Ted.”

David Bergstein, a spokesman for Democrats’ Senate campaign arm, was blunter: “Cruz is one of the most vitriolic, least productive, bombastic, self-absorbed members of the U.S. Senate. The idea that he’s a productive working member is laughable to the people of his state.” Bergstein said the committee will “look for opportunities” to put Republicans on defense “in states like Texas.”

[andydp]

Speaking about Sen Cruz, this came up in my FB history:

An article about Sen Cruz provided us with a German word to describe him.

Backpfeifengesicht: a face in need of punching

[goldenvalley]

Apr 11, 2023 22:05:36 GMT andydp said:

Speaking about Sen Cruz, this came up in my FB history:

An article about Sen Cruz provided us with a German word to describe him.

Backpfeifengesicht: a face in need of punching

There are several who have that face...Rand Paul, JD Vance, Josh Hawley who has the scrawny jerk face version of it.

[LFC]

Gym, again.

[LFC]

Today's sphincter is every Republican member of the Tennessee State Legislature, a "Christian" nationalist, God(tm) fearing, gay bashing, racist, steaming pile of shit. This is just who they are. First up, an elected official who wants to be able to hang somebody from a tree.

Here's the Speaker of the State House, a fine, upstanding man. After being divorced once already and married now, he now has a mistress.

And per Wikipedia:

Personal life

Sexton has one child with his wife, Lacey McRae Sexton, a pharmacist, and two children from a previous marriage. Sexton owns a condo in Crossville in his district, as well as a home in West Nashville, which he purchased through an anonymous trust in September 2021. His youngest child attends school near Nashville, and Sexton lives in Nashville during the legislative session, though he collects per diem and travel payments totaling over $91,000 since 2021 as if he commutes from Crossville.

Then there's this shitbag.

But yeah, let's toss out the two black men who were siding with their constituents over the very real and very horrifying problem of children being slaughtered.

[goldenvalley]

This TN situation gripes me.  When I left the state in 1982 there was Lamar Alexander as governor, a fairly progressive Republican protege of Howard Baker, and the legislature was moved to improve education across the state, something that was badly needed. There were some new young House members elected like Al Gore and Jim Cooper (now gerrymandered out of a seat). The feeling at the time was with corporations opening plants in the state...Cheverolet's Saturn, Nissan truck, other stuff, there was more income and more damn Yankees moving in that would support education.  It was always a religious place...first question of any newcomer was what church do you go to, but there were plenty of mainstream Protestant churches there, not just evangelical types.   I don't recognize what the state has become.  

[LFC]

I spent 4 separate weeks doing work in eastern Tennessee in the late 80s, about 25 miles east of Johnson City. The impression I had of that clearly rural area was exactly what I'm seeing now. The racism was casual and pervasive.

[andydp]

After reading these tales of "Peyton Holler" I'm reminded of a line Whoopi Goldberg had in "Soapdish":

"Why can't I write s**t like that ?"

Seriously, if you tried to sell this to a producer, you'd probably get thrown out of the office.

Anyone remember the case of the state representative with a lobbyist mistress in the northwest ?  It was about 10 15 years ago.  Its almost the same plot line.  (Lobbyist GF and legislator)

[goldenvalley]

Apr 17, 2023 19:07:26 GMT LFC said:

I spent 4 separate weeks doing work in eastern Tennessee in the late 80s, about 25 miles east of Johnson City. The impression I had of that clearly rural area was exactly what I'm seeing now. The racism was casual and pervasive.

Yeah that was East Tennessee, land of Republicans actually from way back when they were Whigs and the Whig party died.    I was in Middle Tennessee (on the edge of east but not east).  That area had lots of damn Yankees and business types who maybe were racists but it wasn't something they broadcast and they did want to improve life in the state. I did learn about sun down towns there...a guy who did football analysis for a radio station I worked for refused to go to those towns to cover games.  Far West Tennessee...a whole different story too.  The state flag has 3 stars, one for each section of the state. 

[LFC]

George Santos’ Mysterious Campaign Loans Somehow Get Even More Mysterious

The latest filing changed four things about the more than $700,000 in questionable loans that Santos made to his 2022 campaign: the dates he made them, the dates they came due, the amounts of the individual loans, and the total amount.

None of the campaign finance experts interviewed for this article could explain the changes or offer a scenario where the entries didn’t at minimum run afoul of federal reporting laws.

The question at the heart of the questions about Santos’ finances is how he was able to loan his campaign so much money so quickly. In 2020, Santos reported earning $55,000, and held no assets. But he still loaned his campaign more than $80,000.

The next year, Santos suddenly had more than $11 million in assets and was raking in $750,000 annually—a windfall he has attributed to branching off from his pseudo-brokerage employers and starting a pseudo-brokerage company of his own.

Santos claims the money came from his personal funds—an explanation many campaign finance and legal experts find hard to believe, especially given his history of seemingly compulsive fabrications. But if he couldn’t afford to fund his campaign, then how did he do it?

Brendan Fischer, a campaign finance law expert at watchdog Documented, called the filing “yet another example of Santos’ reports being an indecipherable mess,” and said the FEC would likely be asking a lot of questions.

“These kinds of calculations and debt discrepancies are going to be a big red flag for the FEC’s reports and analysis division,” Fischer told The Daily Beast. “I’d expect them to ask Santos why these reports don’t make any sense.”

[LFC]

Tennessee Republicans, who are all about "decorum", did nothing about this until a news outlet found out and started asking questions. What a bunch of scumbags.

A Republican member of the Tennessee House of Representatives, who voted last month to expel all three Democratic lawmakers for protesting against gun violence, belatedly resigned Thursday—three weeks after a secret ethics subcommittee found that he’d sexually harassed at least one legislative intern.

Rep. Scotty Campbell, who serves as vice chair of the House Republican Caucus, resigned six hours after being confronted about his harassment by News Channel 5 Nashville. Prior to that, there had been no public repercussions for Campbell. Republicans had not removed him from his leadership positions, his committee assignments, or his seat in the House.

In an email given to the news station by a family member, the victim, whose identity is protected, described the harassment she suffered while working under Campbell as an intern.

She recounted Campbell seeing her and another 19-year-old intern entering her apartment near the state’s Capitol Hill, and said Campbell later “made comments about how... he was in his apartment imagining that we were performing sexual acts on one another and how it drove him crazy knowing that was happening so close to him.”

[LFC]

Well, I'm glad she cleared that up. Somebody award this dipshit a Noble Prize in climate science. Her word salad on this one actually surpasses Palin.

[goldenvalley]

Apr 27, 2023 13:35:48 GMT LFC said:

Well, I'm glad she cleared that up. Somebody award this dipshit a Noble Prize in climate science. Her word salad on this one actually surpasses Palin.

I find her words more coherent than Palin who merely strung popular buzz wordy phrases together.  I see the logic in MTG's question. The problem is that the logic stems from a premise that is completely fiction.  The critters in the Ice Age movie weren't organized into a government.  So the premise is fiction layered upon fiction.

[indy]

I wonder, did the Ice Age brutally punished stupidity?

[goldenvalley]

Apr 27, 2023 16:57:52 GMT indy said:

I wonder, did the Ice Age brutally punished stupidity?

A mastodon could step on someone stupid.

[LFC]

Florida's residents are getting bent over and reamed by insurance companies with the help of Ron DeSatanist and his flunkies in the Republican lead legislature. Ron's already been bought and paid for, and he's been busy creating ROI for his masters.

DeSantis, who ran a successful re-election campaign last year, and Friends of Ron DeSantis, a political action committee that supported him, have taken a combined $3.9m in contributions from insurance industry players. If donations to the Republican party of Florida since 1 January 2019 – days before DeSantis assumed office – are added, this total swells to more than $9.9m.

The authors’ analysis of campaign finance data also found that two property casualty insurance firms donated a combined total of $125,000 to DeSantis’s 2023 inaugural celebration, which marked the beginning of his final term as governor in the term-limited state.

They write: “Instead of fixing problems with Florida’s property insurance industry, DeSantis has lavished the industry with favors and benefits while everyday Floridians suffer.”

These benefits have included the creation of $2bn taxpayer-funded reinsurance fund. Such funds exist to insure the insurers and prevent them being wiped out during a catastrophic event. Usually, insurance companies buy such coverage on the open market but, in Florida, DeSantis chose to use tax dollars to provide access to a state-subsidised insurance fund.

Second, the Florida legislature passed a bill that stripped policyholders of the ability to recover legal fees when suing insurance companies that refuse to honour legitimate claims. DeSantis trumpeted the signing of this bill on his official webpage.

Home insurance is a hot-button issue in Florida, where communities vulnerable to the climate crisis face increasingly frequent and severe hurricanes and other weather events. Last year Hurricane Ian caused record levels of property damage and recent storms flooded some Fort Lauderdale neighbourhoods for more than a week.

The report notes: “Communities of color and low-income neighborhoods with significant climate risks face crumbling infrastructure, soaring insurance premiums, and a lack of public investment. Florida cities like Jacksonville (where one in three residents is Black) and Orlando (where one in three is Latino) are at the highest risk nationally, based on the number of properties at substantial climate risk.”

For many, it is getting worse. This year insurance price hikes are expected to average 40%, according to the Insurance Information Institute. This follows a reported 50% climb during the DeSantis administration, industry analyst John Rollins found. The increases are forcing Florida homeowners to forgo coverage at nearly twice the national rate or quit the state altogether.

Tracy-Ann Brown, 53, said by phone from Miami: “The prices are horrendous. Our insurance went up to $1,800 per month and I could not afford it with my husband’s salary and my salary put together. We had a home that we had to take the insurance off and, unfortunately, our house caught fire on Easter Sunday and we didn’t have insurance on it.”

Brown, a community liaison specialist for public schools, added: “The insurance everywhere here is crazy from Broward all the way to Dade. I’ve asked so many people and they’ve said the same thing. Their insurance has gone sky high.”

The report argues that the Florida Office of Insurance Regulation is dominated by industry insiders who approved insurance price hikes at greater rates than were seen under previous governors.

“Evidence is mounting that big insurance has blocked proposals that would have lowered costs for consumers,” it continues. “A 2022 proposal by state senator Jeff Brandes claimed to reduce insurance and save Floridians ‘$750 million to $1 billion a year’ by allowing smaller insurance companies to access the catastrophic reinsurance fund. The insurance-heavy business lobby reportedly blocked the plan.”

[Bact PhD]

Cue up Gomer Pyle saying, “Surprise, surprise, surprise!” (Snort!)

TBH, “quitting the state altogether” is something we may contemplate—especially if insurance simply can’t be had at any price. These insurance crises seem to erupt every few years, especially after a few hits by hurricanes, but the question becomes, At what point does the whole house of cards fall?

[goldenvalley]

May 3, 2023 18:17:02 GMT Bact PhD said:

Cue up Gomer Pyle saying, “Surprise, surprise, surprise!” (Snort!)

TBH, “quitting the state altogether” is something we may contemplate—especially if insurance simply can’t be had at any price. These insurance crises seem to erupt every few years, especially after a few hits by hurricanes, but the question becomes, At what point does the whole house of cards fall?

I've watched California try to figure out how to make insurance companies continue to offer reasonably priced insurance in the face of massive wildfire loss...and now maybe flood loss.   The nature of the insurance business dictates the rates to some degree.  Unless there is state run insurance (and CA has a limited one) I struggle to figure out how the government can do anything.

[LFC]

May 3, 2023 18:51:26 GMT goldenvalley said:

I've watched California try to figure out how to make insurance companies continue to offer reasonably priced insurance in the face of massive wildfire loss...and now maybe flood loss.   The nature of the insurance business dictates the rates to some degree.  Unless there is state run insurance (and CA has a limited one) I struggle to figure out how the government can do anything.

Read the last paragraph I quoted. They can start by not protecting the big insurers from competition.

[LFC]

There's still news coming out about Herschel Walker's grift. He's just a criminal, plain and simple.

When Herschel Walker emailed a representative for billionaire industrialist and longtime family friend Dennis Washington in March 2022, he seemed to be engaging in normal behavior for a political candidate: He was asking for money.

But unbeknownst to Washington and the billionaire’s staff, Walker’s request was far more out of the ordinary. It was something campaign finance experts are calling “unprecedented,” “stunning,” and “jaw-dropping.” Walker wasn’t just asking for donations to his campaign; he was soliciting hundreds of thousands of dollars for his own personal company—a company that he never disclosed on his financial statements.

Emails obtained by The Daily Beast—and verified as authentic by a person with knowledge of the exchanges—show that Walker asked Washington to wire $535,200 directly to that undisclosed company, HR Talent, LLC.

And the emails reveal that not only did Washington complete Walker’s wire requests, he was under the impression that these were, in fact, political contributions.

In the best possible circumstances, legal experts told The Daily Beast, the emails suggest violations of federal fundraising rules; in the worst case, they could be an indication of more serious crimes, such as wire fraud.