Wisconsin Shares Fraud June 13, 2009
Posted by The Underground Conservative in State Government, Waste & Fraud, Wasteful Spending, Wisconsin.add a comment
A state audit found rampant abuse in the Wisconsin Shares program which provides child care for low income families.
No one should really find this story surprising.
After all, it’s only money. More than $20 million to be more precise. And to paraphrase the late Estes Kefauver, $20 million here and $20 million there and pretty soon we’re talking about real money.
Problem is, the politicians who design programs such as this and the bureaucrats who administer them tend to view it as Monopoly money.
RACINE COUNTY — An audit released Friday confirmed suspicions that people are taking advantage of Wisconsin Shares, a state program that pays low-income people for child care so they are better able to find work.
The state Legislative Audit Bureau identified problems like illegal immigrants receiving compensation and fudged child care logs that cost the state more than $20 million in 2008, in addition to other situations where people received money for watching family members’ children.
The audit bureau reviewed 400 randomly chosen participants. For 43 of those participants, or about 11 percent, auditors found problems with eligibility, including inaccurate documentation and using the program while ineligible, according to the report.
The audit bureau concluded this meant the state improperly paid up to $18.5 million in 2008.
“They had cases where workers knew the person applying was not eligible,” said state Rep. Robin Vos, R-Caledonia, who independently investigated the fraud allegations. “One percent of the people in the program were illegal immigrants.”
Because of such problems Vos recommends better, mandated training for program employees.
“They must enforce the rules whether or not they like them,” he said.
The state’s audit bureau also investigated 50 child care providers they suspected of violations. Of those, 45 returned attendance records for October 2008. An analysis of those records shows numerous problems, including 21 providers that were paid for care they did not provide or were not authorized to provide, costing the state $4 million, according to the report.
This is because child care providers are paid based on child attendance, which is self-reported. Vos said this creates an incentive to lie — in some cases attendance logs were not signed by parents and listed a child as arriving at exactly the same time every day, which is unlikely. Problems like this could be fixed through an independent verification system, like fingerprint scanners, Vos said.
The audit bureau further identified a “significant problem” with program rules that lets providers care for each other’s children and hire parents of children they care for, essentially creating “child care rings.” Such rings were specifically found in Milwaukee and Dane counties, the report said.
Waste and fraud. Two elements always predominant in government programs. Why? They tend to attract people who are less than ethical and the people who administer the programs (1) don’t view it as taxpayers’ money, (2) believe the more people they can get into the system, the better it is for them, and (3) enjoy giving away OPM (Other People’s Money).
As bad as this is, it gets even worse. The Budget From Hell as proposed by Gov. Jim Milhous Doyleone, America’s Worst Governor, and taken to even worse depths by Democrats in the state Legislature, actually cuts funds for investigating welfare abuse.
Rep. Vos says he plans on taking the recommendations from the audit bureau to the floor of the state Assembly as well as fighting Don Doyleone’s plans to cut funhding for investing welfare abuse.
Good luck. No way the Democrats will let him proceed. They like and support welfare fraud and abuse. After all, dishing out OPM helps keep them in office.
Palin Fights Back June 13, 2009
Posted by The Underground Conservative in David Letterman, Sarah Palin.1 comment so far
Sarah Palin is doing something conservatives rarely do — other than Rush Limbaugh — when smeared by the Left: she’s fighting back.
In an interview with the state-run media’s Today Show on NBC, one of the Obama Channel’s family of networks, Palin came out swinging against David Letterman and his crude, despicable comments about her and his 14 year old daughter, Willow.
Palin called on the public to rise up in opposition over David Letterman’s “degrading” jokes about her daughter this week. In a Friday morning television interview on NBC’s “Today” show, Gov. Palin said the late-night comedian’s remarks are a “sad commentary on where we are as a culture, as a society, to chuckle and laugh through comments such as he had made the other night, I think is quite unfortunate.”
Letterman’s explanation that he was referring to her 18-year-old daughter, Bristol, instead of her 14-year-old daughter, Willow, who accompanied her recently to New York, was met with derision by the governor. She called the remarks a “very convenient excuse” that took him a couple of days to present. “It was a degrading comment about a young woman. I would hope that people really start rising up and deciding it’s not acceptable. No wonder young girls especially have such low self-esteem in America when we think it’s funny for a so-called comedian to get away with being able to make such a remark as he did and to think that that’s acceptable,” Palin said.
Even if Bristol were Letterman’s target, which they weren’t, since it was Willow who accompanied her mother to New York, the comments are unacceptable. Children of public figures should be off-limits for cruel, mean-spirited comments, be they adult children of Algore, Joe Biden or George W. Bush or minor children of Barack Obama or Sarah Palin.
They didn’t ask to be put in the spotlight simply because Mom or Dad entered the political arena.
And to those who say that Palin has used her kids as political props, then saying the same about the Obamas is fair game. Tit for tat, as the old saying goes.
Leave the kids alone. Period.
Letterman Vs. Imus June 11, 2009
Posted by The Underground Conservative in David Letterman, Hypocrisy, Sarah Palin.add a comment
As we recall, Don Imus was fired from his syndicated radio program for despicable remarks made about the Rutgers University women’s basketball team.
Don’t hold your breath waiting for David Letterman to be held to the same standard by the same people for his vile, despicable comments about Sarah Palin and the vulgar remarks about Alex Rodriguez “knocking up” Willow, her 14 tear old daughter and about Willow being part of the Elliot Spitzer prostitution ring.
After all, Palin is conservative and that makes her as well as her children and family legitimate targets for attacks out of the sewer.
Oh, and what was the reaction of the Feminazis? Cue the chirping crickets. Even that old hag on The View, Joy Behar, found a way to defend Letterman’s indefensible comments.
Nothing like blatant liberal hypocrisy on display.
David Letterman: Sex Pervert June 11, 2009
Posted by The Underground Conservative in Celebritards, David Letterman, Liberal Idiots, Sarah Palin.1 comment so far
Anyone heard the disgusting sexist remarks made by David Letterman about Sarah Palin and Willow, her 14-year-old daughter?
On his show Monday, Letterman’s Top Ten list included a reference to the Alaska governor and future Republican president (crossing fingers) as having a “slutty flight attendant” look. Palin and her daughter took in a baseball game at Yankee Stadium and for good measure Letterman made a crack about Willow “getting knocked up” by Alex Rodriguez.
Really funny. What a knee-slapper.
Here’s the video of Letterman’s Top Ten list:
Here’s Letterman on Willow Palin:
Conservatives4Palin nails it:
Dave, you are a cruel and washed up hack.
At Hot Air, Allahpundit says:
The best part: Letterman wondering why Slutty Flight Attendant didn’t stop by the show. I guess if you can’t make ‘em laugh anymore, you might as well make ‘em wince.
Conservatives4Palin points out that Letterman wasn’t content with having just one foot in his mouth. He had to insert the other with a joke connecting Willow Palin to Elliot Spitzer and prostitution.
Here’s the video:
C4P lists all the contacts for both The Late Show and See BS. Let them know you do not approve of Letterman’s tasteless comments.
Imagine if, say, Sean Hannity made remarks on his radio show about some liberal statist female icon looking like a slutty flight attendant — by the way, talk about a stereotype of flight attendants, all of whom should be outraged — or joking that Our Lord and Savior Barack Hussein Obama’s daughters had gotten “knocked up” by a pro athlete or were involved in a prostitution ring.
Heck, just go back to the liberals’ statists’ heads exploding when El Rushbo said he hopes The Anointed One fails.
But it’s OK for Letterman to exhibit his Palin Derangement Syndrome without repercussion as well as make crude sex jokes about a 14 year old.
Via C4P, here is the response from both Gov. Palin and Todd Palin, the governor’s husband and Willow’s father:
“Any ‘jokes’ about raping my 14-year-old are despicable. Alaskans know it and I believe the rest of the world knows it, too.”
- Todd Palin
“Concerning Letterman’s comments about my young daughter (and I doubt he’d ever dare make such comments about anyone else’s daughter): ‘Laughter incited by sexually-perverted comments made by a 62-year-old male celebrity aimed at a 14-year-old girl is not only disgusting, but it reminds us some Hollywood/NY entertainers have a long way to go in understanding what the rest of America understands – that acceptance of inappropriate sexual comments about an underage girl, who could be anyone’s daughter, contribute to the atrociously high rate of sexual exploitation of minors by older men who use and abuse others.’”
- Governor Sarah Palin
Little Miss Attila schools the old sex pervert here:
[U]nless he’s as slow a reader as the President, he saw those lines before he read them aloud. And he managed not to be embarrassed when he heard what he had said: not by the sexism, and not by the immorality of using a 14-year-old girl as a political pawn, by suggesting a sexual assault that would leave her pregnant (shades of the scummy Guy Cimbalo attack on Mary Katherine Ham).
And now someone’s going to come along and say, “the sins of the mothers,” or “the sins of the sisters,” or some bullshit like that. They will rationalize what they are doing, and say that this is not American Sharia law: after all, we only enforce our notions of sexual purity when it comes to Republican women, or women and girls related to Republican women. (Do we, after all, know what young Willow’s politics are? Does it matter to Letterman? Of course not: this is about hurting her mother by any means possible.)
This is American Sharia, assholes. The practitioners of Sharia in Muslim countries are at least consistent in their contempt for women and in their practice of gender apartheid: you, on the other hand, want sexual slavery for some women in this country; others, whose opinions you prefer, can live in relative peace and freedom. You will allow it.
For the record, The Anointed One’s brother is not allowed to visit England because he sexually assaulted a 13 year old girl. Jim Treacher has a joke in the same light as Letterman’s worth repeating here and see if the typical liberal statist double-standard will apply:
How come the First Family never invites Uncle Samson to visit? Because whenever Sasha and Malia sit on his knee, it takes six Secret Service guys to pry them off!
Is that really any worse than what Letterman did? Of course not. Now Letterman is trying to say the joke was about Bristol Palin, not Willow, but is sexual assault now a laughing matter to the liberals statists?
Apparently it is, but only if the target is someone with differing views or their children — who should be off-limits under any circumstances.
Letterman makes a non-apology apology and actually invites Gov. Palin to come on his show. Yeah, like that is ever going to happen.
Meanwhile, back at the ranch … or rather, over at PMSNBC, John Ziegler applies the smackdown to Contessa Brewer over Letterman’s remarks:
Contessa, you got pwned.
Who’s The Weenie Here? June 7, 2009
Posted by The Underground Conservative in Bureaucrats, General Idiocy, Racine.add a comment
Government bureaucrats are the real weenies in this story — and to quote Gomer Pyle, “Surprise, surprise, surprise” on that one.
A guy loses his job and starts his own business and the weenie bureaucrats from the city try to shut him down.
RACINE — Since he opened Top Dog Hot Dogs a week ago, Caleb Robinson’s mobile business has gotten a lot of customers — and a little unwanted attention from the city.
Robinson, 24, has been told he can’t sell on Monument Square. He said he’s also been told he can’t sell from the sidewalk. His options were difficult to determine Friday.
City ordinance apparently forbids peddlers — and Robinson operates under a peddler’s license — from selling in a city park without that department’s permission. Monument Square is a city park, and that’s primarily where he had hoped to sell.
The Parks, Recreation and Cultural Services Department informed Robinson that he’ll have two main options. He can find a place on private property and set up his cart there, or he must keep moving continuously except when serving a customer.
Friday afternoon Robinson said he wasn’t yet sure what he’ll end up doing.
“I’m just a little irritated, seeing as how I’m trying to do something positive, do something legal, and I’m getting more harassment than support from the city,” he said.
Finding a place on private property translates to paying rent. No property owner is going to allow Robinson to park his hot dog cart free of charge. And the rules-are-rules crowd at City Hall wants him to keep pushing the cart around all the while he is open unless he is serving a customer.
We agree with him here. All the city is doing is harassing him. He’s selling a legal product to customers who want to purchase it. Maybe he should change products and start selling crack cocaine and other drugs out of his cart. Then the city wouldn’t care and would leave him alone. seeing as that is their current approach to drug houses.
