Faux newspaper in Hallandale Beach finds out that elections DO have consequences -new pro-reform HB City Commission ends city's advertising deal with South Florida Sun-Times

So, that shoe finally dropped that everyone in Hallandale Beach and environs as well as the larger South Florida civic activist community had been hoping for and waiting for since... what seems like forever.
(Yes, election results have consequences. Even in Hallandale Beach. Perhaps you've heard.)

That would be the shoe literally dripping with ethical and journalism conflicts of interest, rife with egregious examples of crony capitalism, plus, one of the frequent secondary issues in South Florida,
the South Florida's news media's own longstanding disinterest (and condescension) in covering certain kinds of public policy/scandal stories unless they happened in cities or places that had more cachet and pop than Hallandale Beach does.

I was at the Hallandale Beach City Commission last month when this matter of keeping campaign promises came up,  and more than a few people in the crowd -including me- were quick to ask themselves, "So where's someone from the faux newspaper in the room to actually write this down?'

The irony of this thought course was that because they DON'T cover the city accurately or fairly, because that would upset the apple cart and their deal with Mayor Joy Cooper, there was no one there from the South Florida Sun-Times to hear the news in-person.

And now it's too late for them.
That city advertising money is gone for good! 
Gone With The Wind!

I "reported" on this within 90 minutes of it happening via an email to about 150 people in South Florida, including many of you readers of the blog, but haven't written about it since because I've been waiting to add some facts and photos to what I was going to post here.
Today's Florida Bulldog story, though very welcome, caught me by surprise, hence there's not as much original content for you here as I hoped to have the first time I mentioned it on the blog this year.
But trust me, more is coming!

People in the city who follow what goes on here are eager -even giddy- to talk about this matter, and what it represents in getting this city turned around and finally moving in the right direction -towards some semblance of normalcy and general competency and accountability.
Any journey begins with the first step.
And this is clearly a step in the right direction.

1/ #propaganda MT @Florida_Bulldog #HallandaleBeach halts #advertising in faux 'newspaper' where mayor is columnist. https://t.co/BB4lzva7ov

— HallandaleBeachBlog (@hbbtruth) January 25, 2017

Florida Bulldog
Hallandale Beach halts advertising in local newspaper where mayor is a columnist
By William Gjebre, FloridaBulldog.org
JANUARY 25, 2017 AT 4:59 AM

Hallandale Beach city commissioners have pulled the plug on city advertising in the local Sun Times newspaper featuring articles by Mayor Joy Cooper that drew fire from commission colleagues as “propaganda” for the mayor.

Cooper used the platform regularly before and after the weekly newspaper received a favorable — and controversial — $50,000 loan from the city’s Community Redevelopment Agency (CRA). The Sun Times, according to city documents, has been paid nearly $400,000 in city advertising to publicize events since 2003, most of the money coming after the loan was made during the 2008-2009 budget year.

Read the rest of the article at:
http://www.floridabulldog.org/2017/01/hallandale-beach-halts-advertising-local-newspaper-tied-mayor-cooper/

Having written about this subject dozens of times the past ten years, I will be updating this blog post throughout the day.

2/  #propaganda - For yrs #HallandaleBeach taxpayers & #SmallBiz owners wondered why 'faux' newspaper NEVER showed up 4 imp. public mtgs,

— HallandaleBeachBlog (@hbbtruth) January 25, 2017

3/ #propaganda - 'Faux' newspaper's deal/dependence on #HallandaleBeach mayor made covering HB accurately a no-no! https://t.co/ADnOpzasuq pic.twitter.com/4BAX9831Im

— HallandaleBeachBlog (@hbbtruth) January 25, 2017

4/ #propaganda - .@MiamiHerald's @grimm_fred in 2012 on faux newspaper in #HallandaleBeach's sweetheart #CRA deal. https://t.co/QlJjUxfE97

— HallandaleBeachBlog (@hbbtruth) January 25, 2017

5/ #propaganda - For yrs, 99% of #SoFL media refused to show ANY interest in #HallandaleBeach story re #ethics #journalism #CronyCapitalism.

— HallandaleBeachBlog (@hbbtruth) January 25, 2017

Below, a nugget reflecting the reality of life in Hallandale Beach in 2008, as reflected in one of my emails:

Do you recall what I wrote/joked about last year on my blog, after the city purchased space in the vanity sheet rag, the South Florida Sun-Times, and ran a completely preposterous ad masquerading as news about Pastor Anthony Sanders and the funny appraisal numbers for his property?

I 

I joked that with a little more advanced warning and time, the city hall employee dispatched to write that condescending tripe on taxpayer time might've even written that Sanders was born in a log cabin -that he built himself. (A la the jokes about Chuck Norris.)

See http://hallandalebeachblog.blogspot.com/2008/10/decreasing-value-of-miami-herald.html

He's no Houdini! Why Hallandale Beach Commissioner Anthony A. Sanders is so worried: He can't hide anymore from his crony capitalism and dismal record of words & votes against logic, common sense, financial accountability -and HB's future Quality-of-Life. The tide of change against him is rising, NOT fading. Vote for Kulin!

Contents below are a slightly-expanded version of an email I sent out last night to people all over Hallandale Beach, Hollywood, greater Broward County and throughout South Florida who care about cleaning-up one of the most incompetent and corrupt local governments in all of Florida, the City of Hallandale Beach.

He's no Houdini! Why Hallandale Beach Commissioner Anthony A. Sanders is so worried: He can't hide anymore from his dismal record of words & votes against logic, common sense, financial accountability -and HB's future Quality-of-Life. The tide of change against him is rising, NOT fading

Dear Friend of Common Sense in Hallandale Beach,

Hallandale Beach Commissioner Anthony A. Sanders is worried.
And he has good reason to be worried.
He's NOT an escape artist like Houdini, and his dismal and ruinous record in office is all around us! 
Right where we can see it.

Comm. Sanders knows that after six years of his consistently unsatisfactory performance in office, six years of his continually being shown as not only un-informed but also consistently
dis-connected from the legitimate concerns of the majority of HB residents and small business owners, six LONG years of his consistently being disrespectful of them while casting votes that've negatively affected them and their family's present and future Quality-of-Life, that the tide of change against him is rising, NOT fading.

Despite his recent (ill-chosen) boast in the South Florida Sun-Sentinel that he was perfectly prepared to stand by his record in elective office after six years, the reality is that Comm. Sanders CAN'T defend it. 
The unintended irony of this, of course, is that his record can also NOT be defended by his own supporters among the anti-reform Cooper Rubber Stamp Crew, or among City Hall's selfish crony capitalism crowd of friends. 
Friends who love being rewarded for being friends of the powers-that-be: with COHB and HB CRA dollars.

But then that only stands to reason, since despite six long years of opportunities to do so, Comm. Sanders himself has been unwilling to defend his own record and votes with anything even remotely resembling logic or reason. 
Not just at the time Comm. Sanders was casting his predictable Rubber Stamp votes, but unable even to explain those votes and policy views with any degree of persuasion or conviction in the minutes, hours, days or weeks AFTER he's cast those same votes against
common sense and financial accountability, often at the same time.

Most of us who have paid even the slightest amount of attention to what happens in Hallandale Beach and its neighboring cities know that Comm. Sanders has never had to publicly defend that woeful record of poor performance, despite how egregious many of Sanders' actions have been, whether in the area of his questionable ethics, uniformily poor
judgment, or even his failure to consistently show-up at public meetings fully-informed and prepared to ask cogent questions, as the HB community has a perfect right to expect of any elected official.

What's particularly galled so many of us is that Comm. Sanders has been aided and abetted in that effort by a largely pliant and sleepwalking South Florida news media, that, with a few rare exceptions, never wanted to directly challenge Sanders' myopic and upside-down world view, to say nothing of personally holding him and his ineffective words/votes to account for the reality of the abymally poor governance we see in this city no matter where we go.

Now part of that is because Sanders, even after so many awful years in office, always wanted to play the role of voice for the disaffected and forgotten in this community. 
As IF that could in any way be explained by his six years of ALWAYS voting FOR real estate developers, no matter how incompatible or harmful the individual project was to the nearest neighborhood or the city at large

And year-after-year, the local South Florida news media -with a few exceptions- has lacked the mettle, gumption and attention-span to directly and publicly challenge Comm. Sanders on that faux pose of his, though the facts are clear they could've clobbered him using his own words and votes whenever they chose on a whole host of issues.
But sadly for us, the news media has consciously chosen NOT to challenge and press Sanders to fully explain his strange utterings and troublesome votes up on the dais. 
That failure has only exacerbated the growing sense of frustration and alienation in this city among reasonable people who simply want it to be MUCH BETTER than has been allowed to be.

One of the few shining exceptions to this apathy by local South Florida journalists has been Local10's Glenna Milberg.
http://hallandalebeachblog.blogspot.com/2012/07/video-local10s-glenna-milberg-examines.html
actsofsedition video:  Local10/Miami: "City's pricey purchase." 
On July 26, 2012, Local10 reporter Glenna Milberg went to Hallandale Beach to learn more details about the curious case involving Pastor and City Comm. Anthony A. Sanders' rushed sale of his and his wife's property at 501 N.W. 1st Avenue to the city in 2009 -when the city had ZERO written plans for what it would actually do with the property afterwards!- for about $89,000 more than it was actually worth. Sanders continues to stonewall Hallandale Beach taxpayers about the exact details of this deal as he has now for over three years, and he refused to speak with Milberg on Thursday. Outside of the city-owned property that the city now receives $10 a year in rent for, Mayor Joy Cooper's explanation was unconvincing for HB taxpayers. Three years later she continued to hem and haw when asked simple questions -and to defend the indefensible- as she still can't logically explain what the rush was to buy the property at a higher price, esp. if there was no definite plan in place. It was left to former Comm. Keith London -the only vote against the purchase and Cooper's re-election opponent in November of 2012- to again explain why this deal was so egregious from HB taxpayer's point of view. It's just one of the dozens of inexplicable and nonsensical things that I've personally observed with Hallandale Beach taxpayer or CRA funds under Mayor Cooper's reign since I moved here. Uploaded July 27, 2012. http://youtu.be/XlOgkrL9CWI


People like you and your neighbors who want policy arguments at HB City Hall to be over commonly-agreed-upon facts and the best way to make good ideas become a reality, the exact opposite of what we've had in this city for far too long, with Sanders always on the wrong side of both common sense and history.

Six years later, with Sanders continually failing to rise to the responsibility, and in fact, to be found wanting by the majority of Hallandale Beach residents, even among those in NW HB, Sanders knows that the real disaffected people in this city are the very citizens,residents and small business owners like you who for years have been made to feel like uninvited and unwanted outsiders at your own City Hall.

Forever being treated shabbily, callously or even publicly insulted, by both an autocratic mayor and a power-hungry city manger, as they and their bureaucratic minions continually tried to flip norms of public democratic participation on its side, so they alone could be
left alone to form this city in their own image(s).

Far too often, despite our best efforts to positively change the culture of entitlement and self-evident wrong-way driving up on the dais, we were forced to watch in silence as this happened, with Comm. Sanders sitting up on the dais totally oblivious to what was taking
place, and not at all interested in putting HB residents and small business owners first, not forever second to someone else's interests.

Since Comm. Sanders can NOT defend that abysmal record of his, naturally -along with his cohorts among the Cooper Rubber Stamp Crew- he's eager to change the subject of this Commission race to something else, anything else -and distract voters from his own inability to make a positive difference for the whole community.
Year-after-year. 
Please don't let him get away with it again!

IF there were actually honest-to-goodness candidate debates and public forums in this city, venues where HB residents and small business owners like you could speak truthfully about their legitimate concerns and fears, without Mayor Cooper and City Manager Miller constantly interfering -or running to protect Comm. Sanders from his own words and actions on the dais- trust me, my good friend, HB civic activist Chuck Kulin, would be constantly reminding Comm. Sanders that he was running against HIM and Sanders' failed record for reasons that he'd only be too happy to enumerate and articulate, with facts and precision that make the case.

But now in the last 20 days, even after all of Chuck's hard work on his campaign, absent those public venues to directly challenge Comm. Sanders and his votes directly on the record, and the news media's reluctance to print or air what so many of us know about Sanders' record in a way that aligns with what most of us have grown-up thinking is reasonable to expect in an election campaign, Comm. Sanders is relying upon the friends and cronies of Mayor Cooper and the myriad businesses who deal with HB City Hall to finance him and run interference for him.

Anthony A. Sanders/Commission Seat No. 1

Qualified as of 6/19/2014

M4, M5 , M6, M7, M8, G4

People who are determined to keep this seat on THEIR side, opposing needed reforms and more meaningful public accountability and public input.

That’s why I need your help and am writing you now. 
Three weeks from this morning we'll all wake-up with the knowledge that the opportunity
to positively change things in this community has come and gone for another two years.
Do you want to wake-up feeling good that morning, energized and positive that this city can FINALLY start being the sort of place we can all take pride in, or, do you want to be suffering from a headache, knowing that things CAN and often DO get worse in this city
when consistently ineffective and inattentive incumbents are returned to their seats at City Hall?

If you want it to be the former and not the latter, please contact Chuck and offer to help him in this campaign however you can, doing what you can right now to show Comm. Sanders that he is going to be replaced by someone who can and will be a positive can-do voice for
you, common sense and financial accountability.

Chuck Kulin
1835 E. Hallandale Beach Boulevard, #130, Hallandale Beach, Florida 33009
Cell 954-804-2210 
E-mail ChuckKulin2014@gmail.com
www.chuckkulin.com/

It seems to me that we are so close to winning this pivotal seat, and so close to sending Sanders packing -but we can only get there when everyone looks themselves in the mirror and is willing to expend some time and effort in changing the dynamic and reality of this city.

There's now less than 20 days left.
What are YOU going to do?

Public Policy Life in South Florida: Billionaire Miami developer Jorge Pérez acts like he's a billionaire sports owner, and thinks his Pérez Art Museum Miami -on public land directly across from his luxury condos- is entitled to more taxpayer $$$. And he might just get it...

Life in #SoFL: Billionaire Miami developer Jorge Pérez acts like he's billionaire sports owner, and thinks his new museum on public land 1/2
— HallandaleBeachBlog (@hbbtruth) July 7, 2014

2/2 -directly across from his luxury condos- is entitled to more taxpayer $$$. http://t.co/nKRDevlmg0 #SoFL #PérezArtMuseumMiami #Miami
— HallandaleBeachBlog (@hbbtruth) July 7, 2014

My comments below article.

Miami Herald
Pérez Art Museum seeks sharp boost in county funding
By Douglas Hanks dhanks@MiamiHerald.com
July 6, 2014

The Pérez Art Museum Miami wants a $2.5 million boost in government support, with taxpayers set to cover a third of the museum’s budget next year.Housed in a new $130 million waterfront headquarters built largely with government money, PAMM’s celebrated debut late last year also tripled the non-profit’s annual operating expenses, to $14 million from $5 million. Private dollars have not kept pace with the higher costs, leaving a gap that PAMM wants Miami-Dade to help close with a 60 percent increase in the museum’s operating subsidy from hotel taxes, according to interviews and budget documents.

Read the rest of the article at:
http://www.miamiherald.com/2014/07/06/4218146/perez-art-museum-seeks-60-percent.html

Be sure to read reader Gary Rosen and Richard Strell's comments below the article at the URL above, which are very similar to what I've heard from others who've gone to the museum.
Can't begin to tell you how disappointed people I spoke to back in March & April, who were leaving it were: actually angry, yet almost philosophical about  yet another bad decision and blown opportunity for South Florida to suffer through for years to come, just like Marlins Stadium.

Friday begins a very bumpy couple of weeks for real estate developer Jerome Hollo and his plan to NOT pay Hallandale Beach taxpayers the $450,000 that Florida East Coast Realty owes them. And a storm is coming...

View Larger Map

Above, looking south from the southwest corner of U.S.-1 & Atlantic Shores Blvd., back when it actually had an operating business, near the entrance of Mardi Gras Casino. The building immediately south of the one in the foreground has NEVER  been open in the nine years I have lived here, which gives you some clear idea of both how truly incompetent the former owners were, thinking it'd be a gold mine someday -and then the recession hit!- and how genuinely short-sighted and incompetent the Hallandale Beach City Commission and HB CRA -the same guilty parties!- have been that entire time, allowing a location that should've been a key economic engine along U.S.-1 to simply rot before residents eyes year-after-year. To say nothing of the empty space south of that which used to be the Kelly Chevrolet dealership. That whole area has been largely ignored by HB City hall for years, chronically poorly-lit and dangerous at night. And Joy Cooper has been mayor the entire time that's been the reality. Coincidence? I think not. Nice job, HB Chamber of Commerce!  

Friday begins a very bumpy couple of weeks for real estate developer Jerome Hollo and his plan to NOT pay Hallandale Beach taxpayers the $450,000 that Florida East Coast Realty  owes them. And a storm is coming...

AFTER the city has already given him and his company $25k in a CRA grant to demolish HIS eyesore buildings on U..S.-1, near the eastern entrance to the Mardi Grass Casino.
https://maps.google.com/maps?hl=en&ll=25.994793,-80.14272&spn=0.001432,0.002663&t=h&z=19&layer=c&cbll=25.994793,-80.14272&panoid=lV8wFVvQtGrRxC-Nmi7lHw&cbp=12,222.26,,0,-8.97

Hollo might want to consider putting a construction hat on, because I have it from good authority that a storm is coming, and part of that storm will consist of cold, hard facts raining steadily on the head of him and his company.
Facts of the sort that his regular retinue of assorted attorneys, consultants, PR pals and business sycophants will NOT be able to unspin.

Agenda item #10 involving Hollo was pulled from Wednesday night's Hallandale Beach City Commission consent agenda and is likely to come back for discussion on Wednesday night February the 20th.

10.  CONSENT AGENDA A.   A RESOLUTION OF THE MAYOR AND CITY COMMISSION OF THE CITY OF HALLANDALE BEACH, FLORIDA, AUTHORIZING THE CITY MANAGER TO FULLY MITIGATE ALL CODE COMPLIANCE LIENS ON REAL PROPERTY LOCATED AT 801, 805, 811 AND 821 NORTH FEDERAL HIGHWAY, HALLANDALE BEACH, FLORIDA, AND TO AUTHORIZE THE RELEASE OF SAID CODE ENFORCEMENT LIENS; AND PROVIDING AN EFFECTIVE DATE. (STAFF: DEVELOPMENT SERVICES) (SEE BACKUP) (Staff Report, Supporting Docs)

Staff Report is at
http://www.hallandalebeachfl.gov/files/2013-02-06/Staff%20Reports/00011990.htm
Supporting Documents at
http://www.hallandalebeachfl.gov/files/2013-02-06/Item%2010A/index.html

Getting the government out of the game of picking winners and losers! It's as if Paul Ryan was reading my mind, and warning the City of Hallandale Beach, as well as the army of lobbyists and Poverty Pimps all over South Florida and Tallahassee who have their hand out and a campaign check at the ready - Video of Rep. Paul Ryan while House Budget Comm. Chairman on Entrepreneurial Capitalism vs Crony Capitalism - #PaulRyan, #RomneyRyan

HouseBudgetCommittee video: House Budget Comm. Chair Paul Ryan: Entrepreneurial Capitalism vs Crony Capitalism. Uploaded August 2, 2012.
http://youtu.be/fDzRFSPglM4

Getting the government out of the game of picking winners and losers!
It's as if Paul Ryan was reading my mind, and warning the City of Hallandale Beach, as well as the army of lobbyists and Poverty Pimps all over South Florida and Tallahassee who have their hand out and a campaign check at the ready - Video of Rep. Paul Ryan while House Budget Comm. Chairman on Entrepreneurial Capitalism vs Crony Capitalism - #PaulRyan, #RomneyRyan

Bob Norman's must-see video of Florida Panthers president, who DOESN'T want to answer questions about $7.7 million sweetheart loan from Broward County

The must-see Bob Norman investigative video I have for you at the bottom of this post, from Thursday night's Channel 10 six o'clock newscast, is the perfect follow-up to my recent emails to some of you out there in the blogosphere on the never-ending subject of the NHL's Florida Panthers asking the Broward County Commissioners, their landlord at the Bank Atlantic Center, for a multi-million dollar loan, an egregious example of crony capitalism.


It's a subject that I first raised here on the blog in a November 6, 2011 post titled, The Florida Panthers hockey team's owners & mgmt. are about to get a cold dose of economic reality falling on their head -no taxpayer money for you!

http://hallandalebeachblog.blogspot.com/2011/11/florida-panthers-hockey-teams-owners.html


I was wrong about the "no taxpayer money for you" part, though, as on Tuesday afternoon, the Commission caved-in to specious reasoning by a vote of 6-2.


It was the worst sort of crony capitalism, as instead of just picking winners and losers, and in this case, one where one party will profit much sooner at the expense of the other -as so often has happened the past ten years in my own city of Hallandale Beach with CRA loans under the direction of Mayor Joy Cooper- the County Commission was given financial information days before the vote by County Auditor Evan Lukic that the deal as reconfigured from November would make taxpayers 'The Biggest Loser,' they went ahead and voted for it, anyway.


The most recent South Florida Sun-Sentinel articles on this anti-taxpayer vote:

Panthers deal enriches arena operator, not Broward, county auditor charges

By Brittany Wallman, Sun Sentinel

January 17, 2012  9:26 p.m.

http://www.sun-sentinel.com/fl-arena-waste-watch-broward-20120117,0,7670061.story

Florida Panthers back at table with new loan request, $7.7 million Broward vote Tuesday

By Brittany Wallman, Sun Sentinel

January 31, 2012  4:10 a.m. EST, 

http://www.sun-sentinel.com/sports/florida-panthers/fl-panthers-loan-newdeal-20120130,0,7432033.story

Broward Politics blog

Lobbyist Watch: Milledge says county shouldn't be looking for profit from Panthers

By Brittany Wallman, Sun Sentinel 

January 31, 2012  02:56 PM

http://weblogs.sun-sentinel.com/news/politics/broward/blog/2012/01/broward_gives_panthers_a_win_o.html

Broward says yes to Florida Panthers $7.7 million loan

By Brittany Wallman, Sun Sentinel

January 31, 2012  6:55 p.m. EST

http://www.sun-sentinel.com/news/broward/fl-broward-panthers-loan-20120131,0,635932.story

My favorite take away is from the first one from January 21st:

Broward County has gotten the short end of the stick in its financial deal with the Florida Panthers, and a proposed loan would only tip the scales further, the county's auditor charges.

To date, the county has paid more than $90 million for the arena that serves as the Panthers' home, and gotten back just $331,000 in profit-sharing.

The Panthers side of the scoreboard is far brighter, according to county records. Since the doors at BankAtlantic Center opened 13 years ago, Arena Operating Co., the Panthers' sister company that runs the arena, has rung up a reported $117.4 million in profits. That's more than 353 times what the county has banked.

This absurd loan to the Florida Panthers, via the use of the county's hotel bed tax,
is opposed by the Greater Ft. Lauderdale hospitality industry, a preening, self-important and self-serving group to be sure, but one which most people would agree has a much better idea about what tourists do and do not want to do when they visit Broward than the County Commission, and going to a Panthers game on the outskirts of The Everglades near nothing but a huge shopping mall -Sawgrass Mills- is NOT one of them.

My last bit of context for you to absorb before watching Bob Norman's eye-opening video is this Forbes.com video featuring the Florida Panthers' smug and tone-deaf president Michael Yormark.


Yormark won't answer reasonable questions from an actual reporter from the area like Bob Norman, someone who WONT feed him marshmallow questions like Forbes.com's Executive Editor Mike Ozanian does.



Forbes.com video:, Winning Panthers Look To Cash In. January 11, 2012.
http://youtu.be/wCld3dhT3V0

SPORTSMONEY 
January 12, 2012 @ 3:12PM
Panthers Skate Towards More Revenue

Article at: 

http://www.forbes.com/sites/mikeozanian/2012/01/12/panthers-skate-towards-more-revenue/

The Channel 10 video, and the antics of the people shown, speaks for itself.



WPLG-TV
Bob Norman's Blog
The BankAtlantic shuffle
Published On: Feb 02 2012 08:03:45 AM EST  
Updated On: Feb 02 2012 08:26:55 AM EST

http://www.local10.com/news/blogs/bob-norman/The-BankAtlantic-shuffle/-/3223354/8582968/-/i3du6wz/-/

Coming tonight on Channel 10's 11 p.m. newscast, Bob Norman asks, Where are the profits?

Insight into the world of insider trading & crony capitalism on Capitol Hill via Peter Schweizer's new book; gets the 'Sixty Minutes' halo effect!

CBS News Sixty Minutes: Congress: Trading stock on inside information? Steve Kroft reports that members of Congress can legally trade stock based on non-public information from Capitol Hill.

Aired November 13, 2011, posted online at 4:02 PM

http://www.cbsnews.com/video/watch/?id=7388134n&tag=contentBody;storyMediaBox

Transcript and story at:

http://www.cbsnews.com/8301-18560_162-57323527/congress-trading-stock-on-inside-information/

Insight into the world of insider trading & crony capitalism on Capitol Hill via Peter Schweizer's new book, "Throw Them All Out"; gets the 'Sixty Minutes' halo effect!

So, I don't know whether or not you were able to see the powerful segment on CBS News' Sixty Minutes on Sunday with correspondent Steve Kroft interviewing Peter Schweizer of

the Hoover Institution -whose mailings, like those of AEI and Brookings, I've been receiving for well over 20 years- about his hot new book on the Congressional culture of insider trading that's long existed on Capitol Hill, and its current manifestation as crony capitalism, but if not, you were in the distinct minority among the well-informed set.

I guess you were probably watching NBC's far-too-long Football in America pre-game telecast.

(Surprise, NBC sports gave us a New York team playing again on national TV!

What are the odds of that? More of the unfortunate NFL/Madison Avenue nexus cramming down our throat of Cowboy, Jet & Giant games early in the season to get those network TV ratings up before the holidays, and the late-season cherry-picking which allows NBC to select games that are actually of interest to the greatest number of fans outside the East Coast!)

This particular story has absolutely blown-up, and is driving much of the discussion about Congress among the smarter and more-observant Beltway pundits and think tanks.

And this story has legs with the general public far from the Beltway precisely because everyone can understand exactly what it means; no translation necessary!

(Just asking: Is anyone at the Miami Herald, South Florida Sun-Sentinel or South Florida's local TV news outfits actively asking who among our South Florida congressional delegation -or their spouses- has profited from this sweet pipeline to inside info and $$$? Don't hold your breath!)

View Larger Map

Today, a few hours later than I originally planned, I've got some of the things that have been said and written about the book that's caught fire and how it's arrived on the national stage at a most opportune time for both the public and the publisher.

Above, for your perusal, I've got the segment itself, and below, I've got a terrific Washington Post column by AEI's Marc A. Thiessen about the author -a friend of his- and this ethical subject du jour, along with some links to more blog posts about the book and what it says about the political class in Washington we currently have.

Crony capitalism and insider trading were something I heard discussed a lot, mostly in dribs-and-drabs during my 15 years living and working in the Washington, D.C area, at parties and get-togethers, formal and informal, all over the D.C. area, even up at Camden Yards during Orioles games, but always, of course, sotto voce.

And it goes without saying, always said after craning their neck around to see who was nearby before the magic words were spoken: "Dave, I don't know if you have heard but..."

The variation on this was usually something like, "Did you hear that the WSJ might be working on investigating the links between...?"

After awhile, in part because of my great memory and sheer repetition, I had practically memorized who was reportedly taking advantage of their position for financial gain, as well as the location of House and Senate members offices by heart, along with things that while not THE most-important things to know, still came in damn handy.

Things like knowing which House Post Office was most efficient and usually had extra FREE copies of Roll Call displayed longer in their lobby, in case I needed more, since I often mailed copies to friends from there, back in those pre-Internet days of yore, even sending a few to Bill Clinton in Little Rock in '91, long before he announced he was running; which soda vending machines always worked and were the coldest; which of the House and Senate cafeterias gave you the best value for your dollar -and had the quickest cashiers!; and which of the myriad House and Senate entrances were quickest to get thru when there was a horde of lobbyists descending on the Hill clogging up the works, based on which Capitol Police members happened to be manning the security areas.

In short, the very useful kind of info that you only obtain by actually being somewhere and which makes your daily schedule run more smoothly.

It's not a stretch at all to say that during the 1990's, I often felt like I lived in the Rayburn HOB and could find my way around the place blind-folded. The main plus, of course, was the number of very close friendships I made with staffers who were smart, thoughtful and dedicated, even while their boss or committee often weren't.

Relationships that came in handy many times over the years, and continue even today.

Not having read the book yet, I can't say with certainty whether or not there's anything good and juicy about former New Jersey Senator Robert Torricelli, but his name was the first I thought of when I saw what the segment was about.

Frankly, I'd be surprised if there wasn't at least something about him, given that his name was the one I heard about more than any other with respect to taking advantage of his position to make money via tips and insider info. Someone who lived far beyond his means.

http://topics.nytimes.com/topics/reference/timestopics/people/t/robert_g_torricelli/index.html

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Marc A. Thiessen is a visiting fellow with the American Enterprise Institute and writes a weekly column for The WaPo.

Archived columns: http://www.washingtonpost.com/marc-a-thiessen/2011/02/24/ABwzFYN_page.html

http://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/crony-capitalism-exposed/2011/11/14/gIQACiK4KN_story_1.html

The Washington Post

Marc A. Thiessen, Opinion Writer

Crony capitalism exposed

By Marc A. Thiessen

November 14, 2011

Insider trading is illegal — except for members of Congress. A Wall Street executive who buys or sells stock based on insider information would face a Securities and Exchange Commission investigation and quite possibly a federal prosecutor. But senators and congressmen are free to legally trade stock based on nonpublic information they have obtained through their official positions as elected officials — and they do so on a regular basis.

Read the rest of the column at:

http://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/crony-capitalism-exposed/2011/11/14/gIQACiK4KN_story_1.html

CBS News Sixty Minutes video: Correspondent Candids - Questioning Pelosi: Steve Kroft heads to D.C.

November 13, 2011 6:46 PM

Article and video at: http://www.cbsnews.com/8301-504803_162-57323518-10391709/questioning-pelosi-steve-kroft-heads-to-d.c/

Breitbart TV video: Democratic Minnesota Rep. Tim Walz calls on House Speaker John Boehner to take up "The Stock Bill" in response to revelations from Scweizer book.

http://www.mrctv.org/videos/dem-rep-calls-anti-insider-trading-law-congress

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See also:

SLATE

Breitbart’s Big House

The conservative media firestarter opens up shop in Washington with a major story to sell.

By David Weigel|Posted Monday, Nov. 14, 2011, at 7:15 PM ET

http://www.slate.com/articles/news_and_politics/politics/2011/11/peter_schweizer_throw_them_all_out_60_munutes_watch_party_at_andrew_breitbart_s_new_house.html

Heritage Foundation

The Foundry blog

Heritage Foundation, Report: 80% of DOE Green Energy Loans Went to Obama Backers

By Lachlan Markay

November 14, 2011 at 10:43 am

http://blog.heritage.org/2011/11/14/report-80-of-doe-green-energy-loans-went-to-obama-backers/

From Schweizer's book, referenced above:

...But an examination of grants and guaranteed loans offered by just one stimulus program run by the Department of Energy, for alternative-energy projects, is stunning. The so-called 1705 Loan Guarantee Program and the 1603 Grant Program channeled billions of dollars to all sorts of energy companies…

…In the 1705 government-backed-loan program [alone], for example, $16.4 billion of the $20.5 billion in loans granted as of Sept. 15 went to companies either run by or primarily owned by Obama financial backers—individuals who were bundlers, members of Obama’s National Finance Committee, or large donors to the Democratic Party. The grant and guaranteed-loan recipients were early backers of Obama before he ran for president, people who continued to give to his campaigns and exclusively to the Democratic Party in the years leading up to 2008. Their political largesse is probably the best investment they ever made in alternative energy. It brought them returns many times over.

The Foundry blog: http://blog.heritage.org/category/scribe/

Andrew Breitbart's Big Government blog is all over this story of congressional insider trading, much to the dismay of his many MSM critics: http://biggovernment.com/

Peter Schweizer's new book, Throw Them All Out: How Politicians and Their Friends Get Rich Off Insider Stock Tips, Land Deals, and Cronyism That Would Send the Rest of Us to Prison, is available via Amazon.com at

http://www.amazon.com/Throw-Them-All-Peter-Schweizer/dp/0547573146