Political Corruption Reaches Courtrooms.

      What does Chicago, one of the largest cities in the country, and the tiny, impoverished municipality of Bell, California have in common?

      Corrupt politicians begging for mercy this past week before courtroom judges.

      Both settings provided tragic examples of our political structure crumbling before the American public's eyes. Instead of watching like a hawk, we naively click away to the next controversy for more juice and sensationalism.

      Just what were Chicago's attractive darlings, Jesse Jr. and Sandi Jackson, thinking during their political tenures?

      Perhaps they fantasized about a royal reality show as king and queen of the windy city.

    In real life, the power couple faces prison dates this summer after both pled guilty Wednesday to siphoning roughly $750,000—three-quarters of a million dollars—in campaign funds into personal accounts for their lavish personal and political lifestyles.

      Jesse Jr., veteran U. S. Congressman and son of the famous Reverend Jesse Jackson, and his wife Sandi, a Chicago city alderman, stonewalled the public for nearly a year. But they ran out of excuses Wednesday in separate courtrooms and entered guilty pleas to agreements afforded them by the U. S. Justice Department.

      More specifically, they lied to the IRS and the public they supposedly served.

      Will they receive the maximum sentence or just a pat on the wrist in U. S. District Court?

      The plea agreements with federal authorities are troubling.

      Jesse Jackson Jr. was reeled into the Justice Department investigation of former Illinois Governor Rod Blagojevich, currently serving a 14-year prison sentence on bribery charges. Those charges included the selling of President Barack Obama's Illinois Senate seat when Obama was elected to the Presidency in 2008. Feds had caught Blagojevich on tape offering a trade of campaign money in exchange for the U. S. Senate appointment. Jackson was identified as the candidate offered the dirty deal.

      But Jackson was allowed to stall his own investigation, citing a six-month absence for "health problems" up through the 2012 elections, and he retained his 17-year Congressional seat before resigning after last November's election.

      What legitimate legal system remains here in the United States?

      Friday, the citizens of Bell, California, asked that very question while observing a political corruption trial too unbelievable to sensationalize.

      The two year-old Bell story, broken by a pair of investigative reporters at the Los Angeles Times, is just one more tale of the American political system failing because the public wasn't in tune with public meetings, albeit through ignorance and apathy.

      In the four week-old trial currently in the jury's hands, six Bell city council members Luis Artiga, Victor Bello, George Cole, Oscar Hernandez, Teresa Jacobo, and George Mirabal are charged with financially raping the city and its 40,000 citizens in Los Angeles County of more than $10 million worth of inflated salaries, bogus contracts, and outrageous fees.

      The apparent mastermind behind the whole scheme that had played out over a six-year period is former city administrator Ron Rizzo who, along with his assistant Angela Spaccia, will go on trial separately this summer.
     They forged signatures on contracts. Approved contracts in private closed-door meetings. Gave themselves $100,000 annual salaries without voters’ knowledge or approval, and also wrote up lucrative pensions.
      The Bell fiasco was so secretive and complex, California state judges had to nullify the contracts written and signed by the former office holders before the state could bring them up on trial and prosecute them.
      The real key in American government is the domino effect here. If indeed 9 of 10 United States cities are considered by experts to be "financially stressed", where does this road leave city citizens tomorrow?
      It is just a matter of time before another municipality falls under the bridge, due to corrupt politicians operating behind closed doors. Six like-size California municipalities and their office holders are currently under investigation in southern California. And the cry for public election campaign reforms has fallen on deaf ears in Washington, DC for decades.
      Ask yourself if we can afford the next scandal.      

America's Transparent Fiscal Cliff Mirror

      Where is this fiscal cliff I keep hearing Americans talk about?

     Does anybody really know? Can anyone show me a picture or even define what exactly is a fiscal cliff?

     Over the past nine months, I have traveled through twenty-seven different states throughout the country from the Pacific to the Atlantic Ocean in search of a landmark I'm unable to locate.

     It doesn't exist. No one can offer concrete facts and figures. And there within lies the problem.

     We don’t even have a starting point in the debate. The argument should have taken place years ago.

     The real issue here, ladies and gentlemen, is transparency.

     Apathy and ignorance dominate the American public. Fiscal cliff, you ask?

     It’s a catch phrase. Two buzz words. Talk points, as they call them today.

     What you need to know is The U. S. is in debt for $16 trillion dollars and counting. Such a debt obviously doesn’t occur overnight. In general terms, less than half the population is working to support the remaining human beings wandering around our country. That’s a huge problem.

     So why do we talk about this fiscal cliff like it’s Santa Claus’ business.  Because it might as well be. We didn’t care when the national debt started, didn’t pay attention when it rose to monumental levels, and even now we aren’t talking about realistic ways and means of getting ourselves out of delinquency and financial ruin.

     Maybe the debt will just go away with the winter weather pattern.

     NOT!

     We are all to blame for this miserable blizzard that has hit the American economy and the idea that something concrete will be done to solve the upcoming crisis is as Bob Dylan would say, “Blowin’ in the wind.”

     When was the last time you really believed the public had a say in what the national government does and does not do? When was the last time you got involved? How difficult would it be to get straight answers about the fact and figures?

     The answer is right before the American public’s eyes, and we are too busy blowing and powdering our noses to see it. We’re letting our rights, power, and financial welfare fade away and swirl down the drain with each passing day.

     The United States Constitution protects us all. We still have rights. It’s guaranteed. Yet we allow ourselves to be trampled over by greedy lobbyists, selfish corporate entities, and an arrogant Wall Street gang that make Bonnie and Clyde look like angels.

     If you had valuable equipment in the garage, you’d make sure the doors and windows were locked each night before you went to sleep at night. We leave the doors wide open to local, state, and federal thieves. Then we make excuses why we can’t close the windows or shut the light off. Then we wonder why the cars and valuables have gone missing by morning.

     Americans have been feeling the current financial heat and economic stress for half a decade now. We haven’t heard any concrete answers for our unemployment, housing, taxation, and banking woes. Yet the wizards in the know play with numbers. Continue to play with numbers to furnish their needs ahead of the people they work for. And we fear China? We have enough to fear right here at home in Washington, D. C.

     Records show six billion dollars was spent on the most expensive election in America’s history in 2012, including some $129 million in completely anonymous funds, thanks to a ridiculous U. S. Supreme Court decision. And yet, after one of the most grueling, negative, and polarized elections in modern day history, what really happened?

     The same players are in the same hot spots. President Barack Obama was re-elected, perhaps as the lesser of two evils. House Majority Leader John Boehner and Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi returned to their cozy power spots as the 113^th Congress opened. And Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid faced off against Senator Minority Leader Mitch McConnell over the fiscal cliff myth with basically the same arguments they have been arguing over for more than a decade.

      “We must restore the American public’s confidence,” chanted Pelosi, referring to the fact that the 112^th Congress was rated as the worst ever by the American public .

     Then Pelosi went out and ordered a photo of the women in the 113^th Congress super-imposed or “doctored up” to include four women who weren’t at the photo shoot on Capitol Hill. She ordered staff to throw their individual photos into the group shot, if they were posing along with the fifty-seven other women who made up the historic largest female contingent.

     That must have been some restoration project.

     We need open debates in America. No more backroom deals. Live discussions. Facts and figures intelligent minds can understand. Formulas that actually make logical sense.

     So I’m shouting out, via a blog, for something new that should actually be an old way to educate. Transparency. Open documents. Use of the internet to give us money trails for government finances that the real and true bosses, the American public, should be able to review at their leisure.

     There are easy ways to achieve this goal. It’s a silent revolution. You can read on as I enclose some of the ways to get involved. It’s all free reading and doesn’t really matter to me how involved you get.

     After all, it’s your dollars and your debt.