Posted on 04/26/2013 8:08:46 PM PDT by grundle
the Obama administration’s political appointees at the Justice and Agriculture Departments engineered a stunning turnabout: they committed $1.33 billion to compensate...
The deal... was fashioned in White House meetings... the $50,000 payouts to black farmers had proved a magnet for fraud.
the claims process prompted allegations of widespread fraud and criticism that its very design encouraged people to lie... Agriculture Department reviewers found reams of suspicious claims, from nursery-school-age children and pockets of urban dwellers, sometimes in the same handwriting with nearly identical accounts of discrimination.
As a senator, Barack Obama supported expanding compensation for black farmers, and then as president he pressed for $1.15 billion to pay those new claims.
In 16 ZIP codes in Alabama, Arkansas, Mississippi and North Carolina, the number of successful claimants exceeded the total number of farms operated by people of any race in 1997, the year the lawsuit was filed. Those applicants received nearly $100 million.
In Maple Hill, a struggling town in southeastern North Carolina, the number of people paid was nearly four times the total number of farms. More than one in nine African-American adults there received checks. In Little Rock, Ark., a confidential list of payments shows, 10 members of one extended family collected a total of $500,000, and dozens of other successful claimants shared addresses, phone numbers or close family connections.
In Arkansas, prosecutors rejected a test case against a Pine Bluff police officer who had admitted lying on his claim form.
in one ZIP code in Columbus, Ohio, nearly everyone in two adjoining apartment buildings had filed, according to the former high-ranking agency official.
She cinched the claim, he said to a ripple of laughter, by asserting that her father had whispered on his deathbed, “I was discriminated against by U.S.D.A.”
(Excerpt) Read more at nytimes.com ...
.
This is why the sequester is a joke. The government is giving taxpayer money away like Santa does presents.
I read something about this a while back and the government basically said they didn’t care about fraud because the money had been allocated and was going to be paid out no matter what.
It’s the peoples tax money not the fricking governments.
So sick of those a holes.
Oh, say it isn't so!! NOT on Obamao's watch!!
/sarc
But5 only to the right kind of people, obamas kind, because sewing dissatisfaction and jealousy among people is one of the
strongest tools of the communists.
I’m surprised the NY Times ran this piece, where did they bury the story, in the help wanted section?
I have purposely not been planting crops for 40 years.
Fedgov can send my check to...
Fake Farmers?
Fake President?
What could possibly go wrong? /sarcasm
and America takes another one in the........
just damn, and here i always thought it was a J.Giles song...
and why are they coming out with it now, after so long?
I’m surprised the NY Times ran this piece, where did they bury the story, in the help wanted section?
I read this story this morning, all 8 pages of it. it was on the front page online edition, had a hard time believing they would print this story, perhaps the tide is turning, but I wont hold my breath just yet
J. Giles did a great job, but I seem to have a habit for liking the originals.
And next up there are the women/Hispanics who wanted to farm but the USDA wouldn’t loan them money. Well, I’m both and would love to farm but I know the USDA wouldn’t give me a loan to buy a farm. Think I should file a claim?
i never heard of it before J.Giles did it and thought of it as a joke song, but now hearing the original, i know it's how that culture really thinks about women and work, why work when you can live off women and welfare
The song was always intended as a joke. Watch the Contours perform the song and I think you will see what I mean. My favorite line occurs at the end:
I don't care is she's got the rash
Just so long as she has lots of cash
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.