Posted on 06/27/2011 7:23:13 AM PDT by freespirited
Despite all the talk of belt-tightening in Washington, CNN’s Lisa Desjardins dug through many Congressional expense reports and discovered up to $6.1 million was paid out in bonuses to Congressional staff members during the beginning of the year, at the height of talks about a potential government shutdown.
In the expense statements, bonuses are included within the broadly defined category of “other compensation.” After confirming with various offices, Desjardins reports the amount of bonuses handed out by Republicans in the time period was $908,000 and for Democrats it was $3.1 million in bonuses, while the remaining amount was awarded by Congressional committees. Some representatives are happy to defend the expenditure like Democratic Congressman Jim Clyburn who said in a statement:
“My staff worked extremely hard . . . including quite a few all-nighters and many weekends . . . and I rewarded them with an end-of-the-year bonus.”
Yet many others were less eager to justify it. Even though Congressional staffers do not earn a high salary to begin with, the idea of taxpayer money being used for discretionary bonuses is sure to rub many people the wrong way.
Trying to remember...what did they do with the industry folks who got contractual large bonuses? Didn’t they target their homes, threaten to tax the bonus at 100% and force them to return them??? Just sayin...
I’ll bet it’s a lot more than that.
DC Phone: (202)225-3315
Fax: (202)225-2313
Clyburn Staff Members:
Chief of Staff: Yelberton Watkins
Scheduler: Alexandria Russell
Policy Director: Barvetta Singletary
Communications Director: Kristie Grecho
http://www.legistorm.com/person/Yelberton_R_Watkins/8872.html
Yelberton R. Watkins (Yebbie) trip to Ankara, Turkey on Apr. 24, 2011
http://www.legistorm.com/trip/33982.html
******
What: Piazza Sempione Opening
When: Wednesday, October 7.
Where: Piazza Sempione at the Collection at Chevy Chase.
Admission: Free, but it was an invitation-only event.
Around 100 of Washington’s well-heeled set showed up in Chevy Chase last night for a grand-opening fête for the Italian designer line Piazza Sempione, who opened its latest stand-alone store late last month. The party, sponsored in conjunction with Vogue magazine, included free appetizers and Champagne as well as a DJ, in-store modeling, and an exclusive spring 2010 trunk show with a 15-percent discount on purchases.
The crowd: The well-dressed crowd, mostly of the ladies-who-lunch variety, included many of Washington’s boldface names, such as BET CEO Deborah Lee; Real Housewives of DC cast member Mary Amons; Cindy Jones; Yelberton Watkins, chief of staff for Congressman James E. Clyburn; plus Lucia Riddle, Tim and Shigeko Bork, and Charrisse Jordan.
http://www.washingtonian.com/blogarticles/shopping/shoparound/13792.html
If Republicans had spent three times as much as the rats, the headline from CNN would say so.
House Minority Leader James Clyburn (D-SC) for agreeing to share a venue with Louis Farrakhan after denigrating senatorial candidate Sharron Angle for her reference to “Second Amendment remedies,” which Clyburn viewed as inflammatory. Questions of free speech aside, it is my opinion that Clyburn’s decision to appear with Farrakhan, whom I identified in the title of the article as a “race-baiting loon,” was a lose-lose in any case because the view of Farrakhan as a kook and provocateur is pervasive and far-reaching.
It is not, however, universal. Today I received an email from one of Farrakhan’s supporters that was intended as a rebuttal of my arguments. The email ended with a challenge to me to reprint the views it contained. Ordinarily, I would have pointed out to its author, Hassan Hartley, that Examiner.com provides a comments feature where readers can freely express their views on an article, but some of the language in his email would have resulted in its being blocked by the program’s profanity filter.
In the interests of equal time for alternative views, I have therefore reprinted the email exactly as written, redacting only the words that would have been rejected by the filter.
My name is Hassan Hartley, and I stumbled upon the rank stupidity and egomaniacal white supremacist smegma that was your March 14th article on U.S. Representative James Clyburn, attending the town hall forum meeting with the Honorable Minister Louis Farrakhan.
I have outlined several points of BLATANT disrespect and, as most rappers call it, “b*tch-a*s-ness” on your part. They are as follows:
1)You blatantly tell the LIE that Minister Farrakhan is “filth” and an “anti semite”, but i can guarantee without even knowing you, that he has done more for marginalized people around the world than your arrogant, b*tchy a*s EVER has, wants to, or ever will.
2).James Clyburn and Louis Farrakhan are important voices in OUR(black) community. Slavery ended in 1863, you racist b*stard, so the day where white arrogant pricks like YOU pick and choose who speaks for us IS OVER. GET OVER IT.
3).Sharon Angle, the stupid broad that f**ked HER OWN CAMPAIGN up by the dumb sh*t that flew out of her mouth, needs to be muzzled, as no person has been inspired to violence as a result of Farrakhan’s rhetoric. If it were possibile, im sure white racist sh*theads like you would have been dead LONG BEFORE your disgusting fingers penned that schm*cky article today.
4).If you have NO evidence to refute Farrakhan’s allegations, then SHUT THE F**K UP. Bring proof or go home, b*tch.
5).Strom Thurmond advocated a way of thinking that led to THOUSANDS OF BLACKS BEING LYNCHED, BEATEN, AND TREATED AS SUB-HUMAN. Farrakhan only wants black people to have JUSTICE. You KNOW this, yet you feed the idiots that follow your thoughts with bullsh*t, to keep them dumb.
6)The arrogance of any white or non black to think that black leaders primary job is to impress white America, is SICKENING. You show your slavemaster mentality by bashing a man that your people CANNOT control or make capitulate to your way of thinking. The same libertarian BULLSH*T that cries for deregulating markets, was the same mentality that brought my ancestors to these shores in chains, and forced them to work for centuries for NO PAY. So spare me the bullsh*t spewing from your old, middle aged, decrepid [sic] racist fingers.
7). I DARE you to reprint this, you ego-maniacal bastard.
Staffers have to eat, don’t they?
I had the same thought. Congress creatures exist to exploit the taxpayer.
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