The facts regarding the bridge to nowhere

[Cathy_H]

Saw this on CNN last night so why is it still being used in their campaign speeches.

Biden, Obama helped keep 'Bridge to Nowhere' alive

DEWEY BEACH, Delaware (CNN) -- Although Democratic vice presidential candidate Joe Biden routinely mocks his Republican counterpart, Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin, for her onetime support of the infamous "Bridge to Nowhere," Biden and his running mate voted to keep the project alive twice.

Democratic vice presidential candidate Sen. Joe Biden campaigns in Washington on Tuesday.

Both Biden and Democratic presidential candidate Barack Obama voted to kill a Senate amendment that would have diverted federal funding for the bridge to repair a Louisiana span badly damaged by Hurricane Katrina, Senate records show.

And both voted for the final transportation bill that included the $223 million earmark for the Alaska project.

An amendment offered by Sen. Tom Coburn, R-Oklahoma, would have stripped the money appropriated to connect the Alaskan coastal city of Ketchikan to its airport on sparsely populated Gravina Island and diverted the money to Louisiana.

"That is probably the most disturbing element of this and the campaigning on the Bridge to Nowhere," said Bill Allison of the Sunlight Foundation, a taxpayer watchdog group. "Because, yes, they had a chance to vote specifically against the Bridge to Nowhere in Alaska to redirect the money to people, to bridges and infrastructure damaged by Hurricane Katrina going in to New Orleans, and they chose not to."

Don't Miss

This year, Delaware has requested 116 congressional earmarks through Biden, its longtime

See the full story here

http://www.cnn.com/2008/POLITICS/09/23/bid...arks/index.html

I wanted to add that I very seldom watch CNN. Thought I would take a look see and was surprised to see them doing this story.

 

[littlesteppers]

Whoa..he actually voted?? Not just hitting the "present" button??

Our democratic congress would have voted for a bus to the moon..spend, spend, spend..after all election was coming up..needed to run the economy down so they could blame our president and bring out the "Savior"

 

[horseplay]

I have been wanting to find more info. on this but haven't sat down to look, thank you for posting this. Very interesting as I have a couple debators as clients and they tend to hang on this subject so now I will have some facts to show them

.

 

[OhHorsePee]

Isn't it amazing what starts to leak out from the cracks after so long!??! There is this and there is the connections coming out now with him and William Ayers. I am so glad people are opening up their eyes! And then there is also the A.C.O.R.N. group going around already with their fake voting.

 

[Danielle_E.]

and now we have the famous "road to nowhere"

http://www.latimes.com/news/politics/la-na...0,3279132.story

 

[Cathy_H]

And then there is also the A.C.O.R.N. group going around already with their fake voting.

............I came across this a few days ago.... Why are they still getting away with this????




The majority of the fraudulent and duplicate applications are coming from the ACORN group based in Detroit, Michigan, which now has ACORN investigating the problem once again as well as the Secretary of State's Office turning over some of those applications to the U.S. Attorney's Office.

According to the report by Freep.com, the spokeswoman for the Michigan Secretary of State's Office, Kelly Chesney, says there is a "sizeable number of duplicate and fraudulent applications. And it appears to be widespread."

ACORN is for all intents and purposes an arm of the Obama campaign.

The Pittsburgh Tribune also reported the Barack Obama campaign recently amended their Federal Election Commission report to reflect $800,000 to an offshoot of the liberal ACORN group, called Citizens Services Inc., which is a subsidiary of the ACORN group.

The "get out the vote" drives conducted by ACORN typically involve many duplicate and fictitious voters, as well as votes cast by dead people.Given that Obama's connection with ACORN goes back at least to 1992, and that he even trained ACORN activists in their nefarious tactics as part of his "community organizer" activities, it may not be enough for McCain to win — he will have to win by such a large margin that the Dems can't overturn the results by cheating, like they probably did in 1960. It turns out Obama really might have something in common with JFK.

Here is the link for the rest of the story.

http://rightwingnews.com/mt331/2008/09/oba...s_indulge_i.php

 

[Danielle_E.]

That is a great site you mentioned.

Report: Freddie Mac paid McCain aide's lobbying firm

BY PETE YOST • ASSOCIATED PRESS • September 24, 2008

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WASHINGTON -- The lobbying firm of John McCain’s campaign manager was paid $15,000 a month for several years until last month by one of two housing companies taken over by the federal government, a person familiar with the financial arrangement said Tuesday night.

That money from Freddie Mac to the firm of Rick Davis was on top of more than $30,000 a month that went directly to Davis for five years starting in 2000.

The $30,000 a month came from both Freddie Mac and Fannie Mae, the other housing entity now under government control because of the crisis in the financial markets.

All the payments were first reported by the New York Times, which posted a story on its Web site Tuesday night revealing the $15,000 a month to the firm of Davis Manafort. The newspaper quoted two people with knowledge of the arrangement.

In response to the disclosure, McCain’s presidential campaign issued a statement saying Davis left the firm and stopped taking a salary in 2006.

A person familiar with the contract says the $15,000-a-month in payments from Freddie Mac to Davis’s firm started around the end of 2005 and continued until the last month or so. The person spoke on condition of anonymity.

The connection between Davis and the housing giants that figure so centrally in the global financial crisis emerged after the McCain campaign unleashed a sharp attack on Democratic rival Barack Obama.

McCain has tied Obama to Fannie and Freddie’s troubles and has called on Jim Johnson and Franklin Raines -- both Obama supporters and former Fannie Mae executives -- to return million-dollar “golden parachute” payments they received from the corporation after leaving. Obama had chosen Johnson to run his vice presidential search committee, but Johnson stepped down after McCain and other Republicans began criticizing his home mortgage deals.

McCain’s campaign recently released a television ad that says Raines is among those advising Obama on housing policy.

Obama’s campaign released a statement from Raines, who says he is not an Obama adviser.

 

[Pepipony]

Ohhhhh SHAME on themm!!!!!!! Seriously, I mean that. Also remember though that they were voting on a bill, bills contain many many earmarks. So if they shot down this one bill because of that one earmark, they may have shotdown things that were needed. That is why Politicians PUT earmarks like this into bills, its a vote for my thing or shoot the whole bill down, kinda thing. The true blame for this earmark isnt the people that voted yeah for the bill, but the Politican and Lobbyists that got that one earmark into the Bill. And we know who that was.

Bills and earmarks are why politicians get smashed on voting down a certain law/policy in a bill. They may want 99% of the things in a bill, but that 1% they dont. So what do they do? You cannot make everyone happy on what is in a bill. You have to give and take and THAT is the problem with our party system. Way too much cronyism.

 

[OhHorsePee]

And then there is also the A.C.O.R.N. group going around already with their fake voting.

............I came across this a few days ago.... Why are they still getting away with this????

I don't know why they have gotten away with so much. I do know, however that Obama worked with them.

 

[SweetOpal]

I guess I am confused about this whole slay McCain for the freddie mac thing, when I know that the other candidate is just as guilty having taken money himself....

[SIZE=12pt]Freddie and Fannie used huge lobbying budgets and political contributions to keep regulators off their backs. A group called the Center for Responsive Politics keeps track of which politicians get Fannie and Freddie political contributions. The top three U.S. senators getting big Fannie and Freddie political bucks were Democrats and No. 2 is Sen. Barack Obama.[/SIZE]

Now remember, he's only been in the Senate four years, but he still managed to grab the No. 2 spot ahead of John Kerry — decades in the Senate — and Chris Dodd, who is chairman of the Senate Banking Committee.

Fannie and Freddie have been creations of the congressional Democrats and the Clinton White House, designed to make mortgages available to more people and, as it turns out, some people who couldn't afford them.

And what I find more interesting is that it is somehow the Bush administration for the economy and the fall of the banks instead of the people themselves that got into mortgages they couldn't afford....Also the way I see things is that the economy didn't have a change or go down until we had a democratic House of Representatives. But again this is all those darn Republicans fault....Just my opinion.

 

[Gini]

[SIZE=12pt]Just to interject something The only way to get to the island where the airport from Ketchikan is on this stupid ferry that cost 20.00 one way. There is no other way to the island airport. It's not an island with only 70 people on it but it is the only way out of Ketchikan other than a 3 day ferry ride to the lower portion of Alaska that isn't an island. It houses the airport. Maybe they should take some of the dividends and earmark them for this road? Alaska doesn't have a state tax. Possibly put one in that could go towards the road? There is no sales tax in Alaska. This is another possibility? Ketchikan in the summer is a bursting at the seams community. Not too sure who gets the docking fees. Possibly a way to get more revenue for the bridge?[/SIZE]

Since I go to Alaska and am in this area quite a bit these are just my thoughts this morning!

To put things in perspective of what I'm talking about. My son and his all family in Alaska including the Grandkids got whopping big checks last month all totaling $73,000.00. Boy what I could use with a checks like that down here. The dividends this year were approx $1600.00 then with the gas refund added in checks were over $3000.00 to every man woman and child that were residents.

 

[Jill]

[SIZE=12pt]"A group called the Center for Responsive Politics keeps track of which politicians get Fannie and Freddie political contributions. The top three U.S. senators getting big Fannie and Freddie political bucks were Democrats and No. 2 is Sen. Barack Obama."[/SIZE]

http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,423701,00.html

 

[anita]

Thanks Jill for the information!

Now that Palins family and their pets are investigated its time for the press to investigate corrupt Dems, put them in handcuffs and give them to the people. I'm sure we find someone who want to throw the first 1000 stones.