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The latest example of violating principles of transparency and accountability in the single-minded pursuit of legislative victory. Look for House Speaker Nancy Pelosi and Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid to try to circumvent the traditional conference committee process by which the different versions of health care reform passed by each house will be reconciled. If so, it will be the latest example of violating principles of transparency and accountability in the single-minded pursuit of legislative victory. Conferences involving members from both houses are messy things. They are usually conducted in public and often televised, and can produce a compromise version...

(CNSNews.com) – In Ansonia, Conn., $2.3 million in federal stimulus funds is being used for insect research, specifically the “rearing [of] large numbers of anthropoids” which includes the “Asian long-horned beetle, the nun moth and the wooly adelgid,” the New Haven Advocate reported. Duluth, Minn., rarely known for its high temperatures, received $6 million in economic stimulus funds for a snowmaking facility, even though it is the 15th snowiest city in America, according to City-Data.com.

A prize for not being George W. Bush. This year's awarding of the Nobel Peace Prize to President Obama can only hasten the decline in prestige of an award that has already gone to people like Yasser Arafat, UN General Secretary Kofi Annan (who presided over the Iraqi oil-for-food scam) and the fabulist Guatemalan activist Rigoberta Menchu. For this year's Nobel, the deadline was February 1, barely ten days after Mr. Obama had assumed the presidency. Though the Nobel committee of five Norwegian politicians presumably considered the evidence over the summer, it's fair to say their award represents little more...

Voters want enough time to debate bills. Nancy Pelosi doesn't. Polls show overwhelming agreement outside the Beltway that it's more important for Congress to get health-care reform done right than done quickly. A Polling Company survey conducted last month found 95% agreeing that members of Congress shouldn't vote on any bill they haven't read in full. That's why the bipartisan duo of Rep. Brian Baird, a Washington Democrat, and Rep. Greg Walden, an Oregon Republican, came up with the "72-hour resolution," which would require all non-emergency legislation to be posted online, in final form, for at least 72 hours prior...

AIKEN, S.C. (AP) The South Carolina congressman who gained national attention for shouting "you lie" at President Obama during a speech to Congress will attend a Republican rally in Aiken. The Aiken Standard reports the Saturday rally will be held at the Republican Party headquarters in Aiken. Some have called the event a fundraiser and a show of support for Wilson. Aiken County Councilman Scott Singer called the rally awkward. He said he didn't want the rally to appear to support of Wilson's outburst. Wilson's shout at the president came after Obama said that extending health care to all Americans...

Only one of the five television networks that interviewed President Obama for their Sunday shows bothered to ask him about Acorn, the left-wing community organizing group whose federal funding was cut off last week by an overwhelming vote in Congress. "Frankly, it's not something I've followed closely," Mr. Obama claimed, adding he wasn't even aware the group had been the recipient of significant federal funding. "This is not the biggest issue facing the country. It's not something I'm paying a lot of attention to," he said. snip Given his longstanding ties with Acorn, President Obama's protestations of ignorance or disinterest...

You've got to just love John Fund and the work he has done on voter fraud and ACORN. Here's a video of John Fund discussing ACORN, which includes voter fraud, of course.

WASHINGTON, July 1, 2009 – Servicemembers’ long-term rehabilitation shouldn’t keep them, or their family members, bound to the hospital grounds, and the Yellow Ribbon Fund is working to make sure that doesn’t happen. Roseanna Smith was the 1,000th renter through the Yellow Ribbon Fund’s car rental program. Her son, Army Pfc. Craig Smith, has been recovering at Walter Reed Army Medical Center after losing a leg while serving in Iraq. Photo courtesy of Yellow Ribbon Fund  (Click photo for screen-resolution image);high-resolution image available. Founded in 2005, the organization was created to assist injured servicemembers and their families while they recuperate at...

Navy veteran and Alaska citizen Mark Bowers (follow Mark on Twitter) received a pleasant surprise after he donated to the Alaska Fund Trust to preserve the integrity of the Governor's Office of the State of Alaska. His donation helps to cover the legal expenses of defending against the frivolous complaints filed against Governor Sarah Palin. She surprised him with a personally written thank you note from the governor herself. See photo here.

TALLAHASSEE — The $66.5 billion state budget Gov. Charlie Crist will sign Wednesday is likely to appease at least one vocal Florida constituency: gun owners. Crist will sign a budget balanced with $2 billion in tax and fee increases, including a dollar-a-pack increase in the cigarette tax, the first such tax hike since 1990. But he plans to veto a $6 million transfer, or what critics call a raid, on a fund backed by fees that people pay to seek or renew their concealed weapons permits, which are valid for seven years. "I'm inclined that way," said Crist, noting that...

LOS ANGELES – A Beverly Hills hedge fund manager was arrested Friday on a charge he bilked investors out of $44.3 million, including $5 million he lost playing poker, the U.S. attorney's office said. Bradley L. Ruderman, 46, surrendered to FBI agents after being named in a wire fraud complaint. He was later released on $500,000 bond. The government alleges he spent at least $8.7 million of investor money on personal expenses including a summer rental of a Malibu beach home and two Porsches. He admitted in an FBI interview that he lost $5.2 million of investor money in poker...

REUTERS A lawsuit charges hedge-funder Ezra Merkin "knew or should have known" that Madoff was a fraud, and seeks $500M from Merkin's funds. Merkin's Gabriel Capital Corp. received $tens of millions in fees from deals with Madoff. Stanley Chais of California was charged last Friday. Microsoft's wholly owned affiliate, Microsoft Licensing GP, one of the pioneers in the field of computerized stock trading, joined the Bankruptcy Court case against Madoff, but declined to discuss its claims against the swindler.

Mrs. Obama Announces New Fund to Aid NonprofitsBy RACHEL L. SWARNS Published: May 5, 2009 The first lady, Michelle Obama, ventured publicly into the policy realm on Tuesday, announcing that the Obama administration planned to create a $50 million “social innovation fund” to help finance and expand promising nonprofit agencies. The fund would offer financial support to nonprofit and community groups that focus on education, health care and economic mobility, among other issues, officials say. The administration plans to encourage foundations, philanthropists and corporations to help raise additional money for the program. “The idea of the fund is simple: find...

Washington, DC -- Now that President Barack Obama has fulfilled his promise to overturn the Mexico City Policy and fund groups that promote and perform abortions in other countries, he is laying out additional pro-abortion plans. In his statement accompanying his executive order, Obama says UNFPA funding is next. Funding United Nations Population Fund has long been a controversial topic and President Bush annually withheld the $40 million in taxpayer dollars the UN group had typically received. He did so because a State Department investigation found the agency was working hand-in-hand with Chinese officials who instituted its one-child population control...

Washington, DC -- Barack Obama promised during the presidential campaign that he wanted to reduce abortions and said as much in a statement yesterday in association with the anniversary of Roe. Today, however, he betrayed that promise by forcing taxpayers to fund groups promoting and performing abortions overseas. In an executive order, the president officially scrapped the Mexico City Policy that protected taxpayers from involvement in overseas abortions for eight years. Now, Obama will send hundreds of millions of dollars to groups that aggressively promote abortions on a worldwide scale. Obama was slated to overturn on Thursday the protections President...

Washington, DC -- Officials with the incoming administration of Barack Obama have confirmed that he will indeed overturn a pro-life policy of President Bush on his first day in office. Despite campaigning on the rhetoric of wanting to reduce abortions, Obama will make one his first actions promoting them globally.

Bernie Madoff's investment fund may never have executed a single trade, industry officials say, suggesting detailed statements mailed to investors each month may have been an elaborate mirage in a $50 billion fraud. An industry-run regulator for brokerage firms said on Thursday there was no record of Madoff's investment fund placing trades through his brokerage operation. That means Madoff either placed trades through other brokerage firms, a move industry officials consider unlikely, or he was not executing trades at all. "Our exams showed no evidence of trading on behalf of the investment advisor, no evidence of any customer statements being...

Washington, DC -- Incoming president Barack Obama is considered very likely to restore funding to the UNFPA soon after he takes office in January. However, a group that has been the top monitor of the UN agency says Obama would be forcing taxpayers to fund a group involved in forced abortions if he does.

The unwinding of the investment vehicles that drove the credit boom is roiling the once-staid corporate leveraged loan market, and the pain may not be over yet. For years the US loan market was a clubby world dominated by banks, insurance companies and a few mutual funds. In the early part of the decade steady returns, low defaults and high recovery in bankruptcy attracted new buyers that used leverage to boost returns. Now these vehicles are unravelling in a wave of selling that is causing and feeding on volatility in the asset class. “We expect market volatility around loans to...

A Goldman Sachs hedge fund that launched in January with over $6 billion (3.8 billion pounds) under management lost close to $1 billion by September, according to the Financial Times. The fund, known as Goldman Sachs Investment Partners, has told investors it lost $989 million by September, the newspaper said on Monday. Most of the fund's losses stemmed from investments in commodities, basic materials, metals, mining, energy and agriculture, the FT said. Losses from investments in convertible bonds -- debt instruments that can convert into equity -- also contributed to poor returns, the newspaper said. Goldman Sachs spokesmen could not...

Acorn, the liberal "community organizing" group that claims it will deploy 15,000 get-out-the-vote workers on Election Day, can't stay out of the news.The FBI is investigating its voter registration efforts in several states, amid allegations that almost a third of the 1.3 million cards it turned in are invalid. And yesterday, a former employee of Acorn testified in a Pennsylvania state court that the group's quality-control efforts were "minimal or nonexistent" and largely window dressing. Anita MonCrief also says that Acorn was given lists of potential donors by several Democratic presidential campaigns, including that of Barack Obama, to troll for...

House GOP Leader ask Bush to cut off ACORN funds. AP Associated Press Link: http://ap.google.com/article/ALeqM5i0S0UhNW8kVPuYQ2AdeMzmY8qGRgD93VPMOG0

OH. You bet they just "knew" each other. September 2001 http://web.archive.org/web/20011006125627/www.woodsfund.org/about/staff January 2002 http://web.archive.org/web/20020206042459/www.woodsfund.org/about/staff Board of Directors January 2003 http://web.archive.org/web/20021203011711/www.woodsfund.org/about/staff February 2003 http://web.archive.org/web/20021203011711/www.woodsfund.org/about/staff Howard J. Stanback, Board Chair Manager, New Kenwood, LLC Maria G. Valdez, Board Vice Chair Attorney-at-Law Mexican American Legal Defense and Education Fund William C. Ayers Distinguished Professor Of Education, University Of Illinois At Chicago Cynthia M. Campbell President, Mccormick Theological Seminary R. Eden Martin President, Civic Committee And The Commercial Club Barack Obama State Senator And University Of Chicago School Of Law Charles N. Wheatley President, Sahara Enterprises, Inc. Suzanne Boyle, Board Treasurer Kristin Patton, Board...

Washington, DC -- Last week, the Bush administration used a national law prohibiting American taxpayer funding of international groups that promote forced abortions to de-fund UK-based Marie Stopes International. The decision to points to how the policy could change if Barack Obama becomes president. In April 2005, Obama supported an amendment to nullify the Mexico City Policy, which prevents forcing taxpayers to fund performing or promoting abortions in other nations.

““SEC. 1338. Housing Trust Fund. “(a) Establishment and purpose.—The Secretary of Housing and Urban Development (in this section referred to as the ‘Secretary’) shall establish and manage a Housing Trust Fund, which shall be funded with amounts allocated by the enterprises under section 1337 and any amounts as are or may be appropriated, transferred, or credited to such Housing Trust Fund under any other provisions of law. The purpose of the Housing Trust Fund under this section is to provide grants to States for use— “(1) to increase and preserve the supply of rental housing for extremely low- and...

Putnam money-market fund suddenly closes after institutional investors pull cash Putnam Investments on Thursday suddenly closed a $12 billion money-market fund and announced plans to return investors' money after institutional clients pulled out cash despite the fund's lack of exposure to troubled financial firms such as Lehman Brothers Holdings Inc. The move, believed to be unprecedented in the nearly $3.4 trillion money-market fund industry, came a day after asset managers sought to reassure investors in the wake of a massive pullout from large retail fund Reserve Primary Fund. The run on that fund caused its assets to plunge in value...

BIDEN'S SON IN FUND SUITBy KAJA WHITEHOUSE Posted: 4:35 am August 31, 2008 Hedge fund executive Hunter Biden has had anything but a quiet introduction to his career in finance. The 38-year-old son of Democratic vice presidential candidate Sen. Joe Biden is caught up in several lawsuits regarding the acquisition and operation of Paradigm Companies, an investment firm that operates a fund of funds - a hedge fund that invests in other hedge funds. Biden also appears to be feuding with partner James Park, the son-in-law of the Rev. Sun Myoung Moon, Court papers show. Biden, also a Washington lobbyist,...

The Gun Owners of America have launched a campaign to help support the family of a man sentenced to 30 months in jail for a rifle that misfired. Officials with GOA today announced they will be working to generate support for the wife and three children of David Olofson, on whom WND has reported in the past, while a GOA-orchestrated appeal of his conviction proceeds. "Not only is Gun Owners of American representing Olofson during his appeal, we have set up an Olofson relief fund so that his wife and mother of their three young children will be able to...

According to a recent Guttmacher Institute report 1, state and federal tax dollars paid for 177,404 abortions in 2006, at a cost of $89 million. Also at taxpayer expense, a whopping $1.85 billion was spent on family planning client services in the same year. Even more alarming is the rate at which these expenses are rising, primarily because of Medicaid expansions that have substantially increased the number of people eligible for Medicaid family planning services. And although taxpayer-funded abortions are limited by law in many cases, pro-abortion forces are working surreptitiously to render those laws useless. The Hyde Amendment, implemented...

WASHINGTON -- Democrat Barack Obama raised $22 million in May for his presidential campaign, his weakest fund-raising month this year, and ended the month with $43 million cash on hand, the campaign reported Friday. Though Mr. Obama has been the fund-raising leader in the presidential contest, his May totals are just slightly above Republican rival John McCain's fund raising for the month. Overall, Mr. Obama has raised more than $287 million during the past 17 months, while Mr. McCain has raised a total of $115 million. Mr. Obama, who is bypassing the public financing system in the general election, reported...

My, oh my, but weren’t those fellows from ABC News rude to Barack Obama at this week’s presidential debate. Nothing but petty, process-oriented questions, asked in a prosecutorial tone, about the Democratic front-runner’s personal associations and his electability. Where was the substance? Where was the balance? Where indeed. Hillary Rodham Clinton and her aides have been complaining for months about imbalance in news coverage. For the most part, the reaction to her from the political-media commentariat has been: Stop whining. That’s still a good response now that it is Obama partisans — some of whom are showing up in distressingly...

NEW YORK: Peloton Partners, the hedge fund manager that is liquidating a $1.8 billion asset-backed fund, says that it is a victim of Wall Street's reduced lending. "Credit providers have been severely tightening terms without regard to the creditworthiness or track record of individual firms, which has compounded our difficulties and made it impossible to meet margin calls," the Peloton co-founders, Ron Beller and Geoff Grant, said Thursday in a letter to clients. Peloton, based in London, joins Thornburg Mortgage and Sailfish Capital Partners on the growing list of funds and companies that have had to sell securities or shut...

WASHINGTON -(Dow Jones)- A tiny free-enterprise fund wants Exxon Mobil Corp. (XOM) and Charles Schwab & Co. (SCH) shareholders to consider banning advisory proposals favored by activist stockholders it views as a nuisance. Advisory or "precatory" proposals aren't binding on companies, but they are a popular vehicle for shareholders to express their views on issues from climate change to executive compensation. The Free Enterprise Action Fund (FEAOX), based in Bethesda, Md., is seeking to close off that option and has filed proposals with Exxon Mobil and Schwab targeting what it calls "nuisance shareholders." Specifically, the fund wants shareholders at both...

Click to Play: The Joe Fund "Fat Girls Need Loving Too" http://www.myspace.com/joefund 

REPUBLICANS MITT ROMNEY Total receipts to date (includes contributions for the primary and general elections, loans and transfers): $90.1 million, Total contributions to date: $53.9 million Total spending: $87.6 million Fourth quarter contributions: $9.1 million Fourth quarter spending: $34 million Fourth quarter transfers or loans: $18 million Cash on hand: $2.4 million Debt: $35 million Top donor states this quarter: California, $1,182,895.91, Florida, $954,869.03, New York, $597,719.00, Employees from Lehman Brothers gave $44,300, employees of Sun Capital Partners gave $34,200, employees of Olympia Asset Management gave $32,200 JOHN MCCAIN Total receipts to date: (includes contributions for the primary and general...

John Fund writes: Mr. McCain bruised his standing with conservatives on the issue when in 2005 he became a key player in the so-called gang of 14, which derailed an effort to end Democratic filibusters of Bush judicial nominees. More recently, Mr. McCain has told conservatives he would be happy to appoint the likes of Chief Justice John Roberts to the Supreme Court. But he indicated he might draw the line on a Samuel Alito, because “he wore his conservatism on his sleeve.” My hostility to John McCain is well known to regular readers, and it’s tempting to believe this....

WASHINGTON, Jan. 28, 2008 – Servicemembers from the Tar Heel state who face financial burdens can turn to a newly established fund for assistance. The North Carolina Heroes’ Fund was established to provide support to military men and women from North Carolina or stationed at one of North Carolina’s many military bases, said Scott Stone, the fund’s chairman. “This support is primarily centered on hardships which these men and women, or their families, may have endured due to their service overseas,” he said. The assistance is provided through various methods, including direct payments or coordinating volunteer efforts. Family members...

Panic selling shuts £2bn fund · Scottish Equitable acts after slump · Fears that other funds are at risk Patrick Collinson The Guardian (UK) Friday January 18 2008 The fund, invested in London office blocks and shopping centres across Britain, apparently no longer has sufficient cash reserves to meet demands from investors. Photograph: Martin Argles One of Britain's biggest property funds was forced to shut its doors to withdrawals yesterday after the slump in commercial prices triggered panic selling by small investors. The move prompted fears of a Northern Rock-style run on billions of pounds invested in once high-flying funds...

The American economy may be teetering on the brink of a recession, but there's an industry our hedge fund gurus believe has an almost limitless future: the Chinese police state. In a stunning report in the New York Times last week, correspondent Keith Bradsher documented the rise of China's electronic surveillance industry, whose leading companies have incorporated themselves in the United States and obtained the lion's share of their capital from U.S. hedge funds. Though ostensibly private, these companies are a for-profit adjunct of the Chinese government. Li Runsen, technology director of the government's ministry of public security and the...

CHICAGO (AP) - Bill Clinton can't seem to get enough of Chicago. After chatting on Oprah Winfrey's show last week, he is back in town tonight to raise money for his wife's presidential campaign. Before entering tonight's fundraiser, Clinton said he owes Hillary Rodham Clinton quite a few years of campaigning after she campaigned for him for so many years. He says he is loving working for his wife's election. The popular former president is helping his wife cash in on their longtime political alliances here. Organizers have sold more than 600 tickets for the fundraiser at a downtown restaurant...

Michael Deaver, worked for Ronald Reagan for more than 20 years, was philosophical about being in Reagan's shadow. "My obit will probably say 'Close Reagan Aide Dies,' " he told the Los Angeles Times in 1988. "That doesn't bother me a bit. That's my life." When Deaver, 69, died Saturday of pancreatic cancer, his obituaries indeed highlighted his longtime association with both Ronald and Nancy Reagan. Historian Douglas Brinkley, who edited the recently released "The Reagan Diaries," says Deaver's "exceedingly close" ties to the Reagans allowed him to "learn how to properly market" the president. "He became one of the...

WASHINGTON, Aug. 9, 2007 – Each year, the country pauses to remember the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks and all who perished in them. One group, however, works year round to honor the 343 firefighters killed that day and to help servicemembers and their families. The Terry Farrell Firefighters Fund was founded in memory of its namesake, a decorated member of Rescue 4 of the New York Fire Department and chief of the Dix Hills Volunteer Fire Department, who was firefighters killed in the attacks. The fund offers education and financial assistance to servicemembers and firefighters, said Brian Farrell,...

North Korea starts moving funds from BDA accounts Tokyo, April 19 (RIA Novosti) Holders of North Korean accounts at the Macao-based bank Banco Delta Asia (BDA) have started transferring their deposits, worth $25 billion, to other East Asian banks, the Japanese daily Yomiuri said Thursday. Under an agreement reached at the six-nation talks on denuclearising North Korea in February, Pyongyang was to shut down and seal its nuclear reactor, produce a list of other nuclear facilities and swap access to International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) inspectors for energy supplies and other assistance within 60 days, a deadline which expired Saturday....

WASHINGTON, Feb. 28, 2007 – Defense leaders yesterday called on Congress to approve a further $2.4 billion to defeat the biggest killer of Americans in the Middle East: the improvised explosive device. Defense Secretary Robert M. Gates and Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Marine Gen. Peter Pace told the Senate Appropriations Committee that the fiscal 2007 emergency supplemental request includes money to fund research into defeating IEDs. The money is in addition to $2 billion Congress already has appropriated this year to deal with the problem. Gates stressed to the senators that this is an overriding concern...

'Philanthropy' Under The Radar The words "Human Rights" always catch my attention, since along with words like "diversity" and "advocate" they signal the Left at work within the Media. The Media Class specializes in the purloining of words for propaganda purposes and surely "gay" is the classic example.   One is reminded of the real estate world in which the words used have a kind of irony about them. For example, in a new development the streets may have names like "Orchard Close", "The Meadows" and "Foxhill" and you know that orchards, meadows and foxes have been eliminated in the...

SACRAMENTO — A tax-exempt group set up to create jobs is being used by Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger to bankroll a pair of splashy bill-signing events designed to attract publicity as he runs for reelection. Unlike contributions to Schwarzenegger's campaign account, donations to the nonprofit are not subject to caps or disclosure requirements. Schwarzenegger this week staged carefully choreographed ceremonies against the picturesque backdrops of Malibu and San Francisco Bay's Treasure Island, signing legislation to curb emissions that contribute to global warming. The events were meant to showcase the governor's environmental credentials at a time when he wants to maximize his...

A global warming fund could succeed where Kyoto failedAuthor: Jagdish N. Bhagwati, Senior Fellow for International Economics August 16, 2006 Al Gore has been busy returning global warming to centre stage with terrifying warnings of disaster with his bestselling book, An Inconvenient Truth, and the popular companion documentary. Tony Blair has joined—even led—the renewed focus on global warming, charging Sir Nicholas Stern, the economist, with solving the problem. Alongside his successful initiative on Africa, this is to be his sure-fire international legacy as he ends his last term in office. Getting global warming on the radar screen is only half...

PARIS - France's highest court upheld George Soros' conviction for insider trading Wednesday in a case dating back nearly 20 years, and the billionaire investor vowed to fight the ruling at the European Court of Human Rights. The Court of Cassation upheld the 75-year-old American financier's conviction for buying and selling Societe Generale shares in 1988 after receiving information about a planned corporate raid on the bank. Apart from this case, Soros' record is unblemished after five decades in finance. Lawyer Ron Soffer said Soros planned to take the case to the European Court of Human Rights, saying that the...

Is Cannon Fodder? One GOP congressman may lose his seat for his pro-immigration views, while another offers a compromise. Tuesday, May 30, 2006 12:01 a.m. EDT Timing is everything in politics. Late next month, just as the conference committee that will decide the fate of an immigration bill gets down to business, a GOP primary for a Utah House seat in the country's most conservative congressional district may set the boundaries for any legislation that has a chance of passing both the House and Senate. Illegal immigration is the key issue in the race, and should five-term incumbent Rep. Chris...

Iran: Fund to 'demolish' Israel set up Iranian students set up fund dedicated to Israel's destruction. Encouraged by regime, students call fund 'symbolic move' in support of Palestinians A group of Iranian students announced Sunday at an event attended by a high-ranking member of the elite Revolutionary Guard that they were setting up a fund to destroy Israel. Although the initiative's name - "The Student Fund for Demolishing Israel" - brings to mind President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad's call last year to destroy the Jewish state, an organizer said its goal was to support the cash-strapped Palestinian government. Some 300 students attended...