John Ashcroft (Stupidity, Taxpayers' Money) 

FACT: Attorney General Ashcroft decided that he was tired of being photographed in front of the statue of the "Spirit of Justice," in the Great Hall, because while the female form is clad in a toga, one of her breasts is exposed. So, he has decided to have the statue, along with its male companion, the "Majesty of Justice" concealed by curtains at a cost of $8,000 to the taxpayer.

Dan Burton (Taxpayers' Money, Ethics, Lies, Hypocrisy)

FACT: Dan went to Frankfurt to investigate the German postal system. Strangely, Burton traveled without any congressional aides, and had no formal agenda or briefing papers - highly unusual for an official "fact-finding" tour. Truth be told, Burton's wife is in Frankfurt right now undergoing experimental cancer treatment. To sum it up, Burton traveled abroad at taxpayer expense for the purposes of visiting his sick wife and then lied about it. He was taking a government-paid trip, including per diems and Air Force transport, but he'll never be investigated because the congressman in charge of the committee which investigates government waste is none other than….Dan Burton.

Bush Administration (Lies, Taxpayer's Money) 06/2002

FACT: The GAO released its final report on the matter which basically said that the damage left behind by Clinton staffers was not any worse than the damage left behind by Bush staffers in 1993. The cost of damage was estimated at $13,000-14,000, Meanwhile the investigation is estimated to have cost the taxpayer around $200,000.

George W. Bush: The Secret Service (Honor and Integrity, Tax Payers Money)

FACT: After the recent TCU booze-up, Jenna Bush's "boyfriend" William Ashe Bridges (Nash to his friends) was thrown in jail for public intoxication. Four hours later, Secret Service agents showed up in a black Chevy Suburban, bailed him out, and give him a ride home. 

COMMENT: That's our tax dollars at work to support the Bushes and their drunken friends 

Corporate Bastards (Corporate interests, Tax evasion) 

FACT: A recent study by two finance professors at Florida International University showed that multinational corporations managed to avoid paying $45 billion in U.S. taxes last year by overpricing goods sold to foreign affiliates, and underpricing goods bought from those same affiliates. Selling toothbrushes for $5,655 and buying bulldozers for $528 were typical.

COMMENT: These are the same companies to which Bush's corporate welfare program has been distributing billions of our tax dollars. They are the companies that search for offshore tax shelter in Bermuda and the Cayman Islands. They are the Airlines that hire the "lowest bidders" to protect us from terrorism and they are the Energy companies that inflate prices and steal employees' pensions (Enron).

Katherine Harris (Taxpayers' Money, Aristocracy)

FACT: Republican legislators in Florida are now actively investigating Harris for spending inordinate sums of taxpayers' money on herself. According to the St. Petersburg Times, "During her first 22 months in office, Harris amassed more than $106,000 in travel bills, more than any Cabinet officer and the governor. She visited eight countries on 10 foreign trips, staying at luxury hotels at taxpayer expense." Believe it or not, Florida's budget for "international relations" (read: free vacations) has risen from $783,000 in 1999 to $3.4 million in 2001. 

Orrin Hatch (Lies, Hypocrisy, Self Serving, Taxpayers Money) 

FACT: Hatch was trashing Democrats for a "systematic and calculated effort to confirm the absolute minimum number" of George W. Bush's judicial nominees. "Contrary to the widely held belief," he whined, "the Republicans did not play such games when Bill Clinton was president." Back in the world of reality, the Washington Post had this to say of Hatch's claim: "During Mr. Hatch's tenure as committee chairman, the average time between a judicial nomination and final Senate action grew substantially, with individual nominees sitting around for outrageously long periods of time - sometimes years. In 1999, Mr. Hatch went so far as to freeze consideration of all nominees for several months in an effort to force Mr. Clinton to nominate a conservative lawyer favored by Mr. Hatch for a district judgeship in Utah. Before Mr. Hatch complains too loudly about the 28 nominees the Senate confirmed this year, moreover, he should recall that in 1996, the Senate confirmed only 17." 

Trent Lott (Misuse of Government Resources, Ethics, First Ammendment Rights) 

FACT: Last week the Senate Minority Leader called for the IRS to audit the NAACP, on the grounds that "They were acting totally as an arm of the Democratic National Committee in a totally vicious, inaccurate television ad." 

COMMENT: This was not only a gross violation of any standard of ethics, but also a blatent shot across the bow to all who wish to express their Constitutional right to free speech.

Republicans (Clinton Investigation, Taxpayers' Money) 06/2002

FACT: The eight-year, nearly $80 million investigation has yielded no indictments on the Lewinsky
matter. No indictments on Whitewater. No indictments on the travel office. No indictments
on the FBI files. No indictments on the Vince Foster suicide. No indictments all up and
down the line. 

Republicans (Despicable Behavior, Taxpayers' Money, Criminal) 

FACT: When the Bush tax cut was first installed, the IRS sent a letter praising George W. Bush to all taxpayers who received refunds. The cost of the mailing: $30 million. Since the mainling was essentially a campaign letter for Bush, Democrats tried to pass an amendment to remove the cost of the mailing from the IRS budget, and were joined by 11 Republicans to reach a majority of 218. But as the official House floor clock reached 00:00, signifying the end of the vote, Doug Bereuter (R-Neb), the congressman presiding over the vote, refused to bring down the gavel. Upon receiving instructions from the Republican leadership, Bereuter waited until Tom DeLay had completed several rounds of the floor, on a mission to persuade key Republicans to change their votes. As onlooking Democrats cried "Shame!" six Republicans changed their votes before Bereuter gaveled the session closed. So by stopping the clock and extending the vote, Republicans have now authorized the IRS to spend $30 million sending what is essentially a Bush campaign letter to taxpayers, which is a crime though no one will get even a slap on the wrist. 

Thomas E. White (Taxpayer's Money, Honor and Integrity)

FACT: Army Secretary Thomas "Enron" White is a public servant, so why shouldn't he spend the public's money on things like flying across the country to close on the sale of his house? Indeed the multi-millionaire Army Secretary used an army jet to fly to Aspen, Colorado, and sell his $6.5 million, three-story house all on the taxpayers' dime. 

Kay Bailey Hutchison (Indictment, Taxpayer's Money, Aristocracy, Ethics) 

FACT: "Senate staff are compensated for the purpose of assisting senators in their official legislative and representational duties, and not for the purpose of performing personal or other non-official activities." - so says the Senate Ethics Manual. But now Kay Hutchison, the junior senator from Texas, is causing a bit of a stir on Capitol Hill. It was alleged last week that she is indeed using her staff for unofficial and personal duties - duties which include chauffeuring her husband around town, checking out the mall sales at Tyson's Corner, Virginia, and bringing bagels and coffee to her home every morning and waiting on the doorstep without knocking until the door is opened. In fact, a source in her office reported that Hutchison threw a fit when a staffer showed up one morning with bagels from Union Station and not from her favorite bagel shop at Dupont Circle (halfway across town). However, it's not the first time that Hutchison has been in trouble for this kind of behavior - when she was Texas' state treasurer back in 1993, several staffers publicly accused her of making them perform personal tasks, and she was indicted by a grand jury for official misconduct that same year. 

Dirk Kempthorne (Stupidity, Cowardice) 

FACT: Idaho residents have renamed the state capital Fort Kempthorne after Governor Dirk Kempthorne recently surrounded it with concrete barriers and other security measures in the wake of September 11. You see, Dirk spent $335,000 on fortifying the capital when the rest of state government is cutting spending in other areas. "I hope the governor feels secure sitting in his fortress while the rest of us are sitting in traffic,'' wrote a Boise resident to The Idaho Statesman. "The office of the governor is not for cowards, something to think about next election." 

Roy Moore (Religious Fanatic, Taxpayers’ Money, Separation of Church and State)

FACT: The Chief Justice of the Alabama Supreme Court, Roy Moore, unveiled a new 5,800-pound granite monument to the Ten Commandments in the rotunda of the state Supreme Court. No doubt this was unrelated to a possible upcoming gubernatorial run. He claimed to be fulfilling a campaign pledge to "restore the moral foundation of law." 

COMMENT: Let’s all take a deep breath and forget that he used taxpayers money to shred the U. S. Constitution and force his beliefs on the citizenry. Can you say separation of church and state?

George Pataki (Hypocrisy, Taxpayers' Money) 

FACT: When George Pataki ran against Mario Cuomo for New York Governor, he blasted Cuomo for using public money to swan around the state in a private jet. But what's this? It would appear that Governor Pataki took 34 flights between March 1999 and November 2000, to the tune of $136,636. Not only that, but Pataki decided that rather than use state aircraft he would take luxury charter jets, and managed to get a temporary waiver so that he could spend more than the state-allowed limit on these flights. 

Eugene Scalia (Nepotism, Taxpayers Expense, Payback, Election 2000, Labor)

FACT: The New York Post reported last week that Eugene, the nominee for Labor Department attorney, will be up before the Health, Education and Labor Committee in September. However, Eugene didn’t quite get the free ride that Strom Jr. received. You see, Eugene face a tough time over some comments he made, "Ergonomics is quackery" - it's not like he’s ever had to actually do any hard work in his life before, so how would he know? Although it's lucky for him that his daddy was in charge of deciding who won last year's election, otherwise he probably wouldn't have been nominated at all.

COMMENT: It seems that affirmative action is a-okay with the GOP when you're talking about rich white men.