REPUBLICAN DONALD TRUMP’S PAST AND CURRENT GENEROSITY TO DEMOCRATS:

Billionaire real estate tycoon Donald Trump’s recent speech at the Conservative Political Action Conference excited a number of Republicans, many of whom applauded his statement that Rep. Ron Paul (R-Texas) has “zero chance” of winning.  

It also fueled speculation that the mogul would run for president. Cries of “you’re hired!” to a Draft Trump 2012 website added to a growing sense of support among Republicans.

But that GOP support has not always been reciprocated by Trump. 

According to a Center for Responsive Politics analysis of Trump’s federal campaign contribution history, The Donald has been a prolific donor to both Democrats and Republicans during the past two decades.  

In all, Trump has contributed to 96 candidates running for federal political office since the 1990 election cycle, the Center finds. Only 48 of the recipients — exactly half — were Republicans at the time they received their contribution, including ex-Gov. Charlie Crist (I-Fla.) and ex-Sen. Arlen Specter (D-Pa.), who both of whom received their Trump contributions as Republicans.

 

http://www.opensecrets.org/news/2011/02/donald-trumps-donations-to-democrats/ 

10 Scandals Involving Hillary Clinton You May Have Forgotten

Hillary Clinton has been involved in scandals before. Here are some notable ones you may have forgotten.

Chinagate - The Clinton-Gore campaign in 1996 allegedly took bribes from Chinese banks and their government to help their dwindling poll numbers. The Chinese embassy in D.C. helped siphon funds into the DNC. Secretary of Commerce Ron Brown (who was killed in a plane crash), and at Hillary’s instruction reportedly sold seats on department trade missions to China. Joint congressional hearings were canceled after Democrats threatened to bring up Republican campaign issues and then Monica Lewinsky actually saved this scandal from media attention. 

Travelgate Scandal - Catherine Cornelius, a 25-year-old cousin of Bill's was allegedly promised the position of director of the travel office. Hillary Clinton then (indirectly) fired seven employees from the United States travel office and replaced them with associates from Arkansas. Records were either nowhere to be found or incorrectly filed. And, there's a reported attempt to give a White House airline contract to friend. Hillary had the FBI investigate Billy Dale, the head of the travel office, ruining his career who was found to do nothing wrong, but was then audited by the IRS for three years after.

http://www.mrctv.org/blog/10-scandals-involving-hillary-clinton-you-may-have-forgotten#.lqvxnz:wOeZ 

California City Appoints Two Illegal Aliens to Advisory Boards

Officials in Huntington Park, California, a city of 58,000 people in Los Angeles County, announced on August 3 that they would appoint two illegal aliens as commissioners on city advisory boards.

City councilman Jhonny Pineda said he will appoint Francisco Medina to the Health and Education Commission and Julian Zatarain to the Parks and Recreation Commission. Both men are Mexican nationals who came to this country illegally.

The Los Angeles Times reported that Zatarain, who is currently a college student, arrived here from Sinaloa, Mexico, in 2007 when he was 13. He has engaged in community service, such as volunteering for the Red Cross, but has long assumed — quite logically — that because of his illegal status, he could not serve on a city commission.

http://www.thenewamerican.com/usnews/immigration/item/21397-california-city-appoints-two-illegal-aliens-to-advisory-boards

Exclusive Clinton Email News

Judicial Watch has had remarkable success in using the court process to obtain answers on the burgeoning email scandal, including from Hillary Clinton herself.

Since my report to you last week, events have moved quickly.

First, a JW Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) lawsuit forced Mrs. Clinton to do what no other congressional committee, FBI, or Justice Department investigation has been able to do – submit information, under penalty of perjury, about her email system.  The week began with the U.S. State Department submitting to a federal court an August 8 sworn declaration from former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton regarding federal records on her controversial email system.  The declaration states:

I, Hillary Rodham Clinton, declare under penalty of perjury that the following is true and correct:

While I do not know what information may be “responsive” for purposes of this law suit, I have directed that all my e-mails on clintonemail.com in my custody that were or potentially were federal records to be provided to the Department of State, and on information and belief, this has been done.

As a result of my directive, approximately 55,000 pages of these emails were produced to the Department on December 5, 2014.

Cheryl Mills did not have an account on clintonemail.com. Huma Abedin did have such an account which was used at times for government business.

http://www.judicialwatch.org/press-room/weekly-updates/exclusive-clinton-email-news/

Mine spill throws EPA on the defensive

The Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) is under fire over the toxic mine waste spill it caused in Colorado.

The spill of 3 million gallons of sludge filled with heavy metals into a river led to immediate scorn from Republicans and the EPA’s opponents. Critics accused the Obama administration of hypocrisy and said officials are not holding themselves to the same standards as private companies that pollute.

The accident comes at a particularly sensitive time for the EPA and President Obama’s environmental record, putting officials on the back foot.

The spill, caused by EPA contractors trying to evaluate the Gold King Mine abandoned decades ago for a potential clean-up, started on Aug 5., just two days after Obama unveiled his climate rule for power plants, his most ambitious effort yet to fight climate change.
The EPA took note. Administrator Gina McCarthy traveled to the river to meet with locals, coinciding with an increased public relations and transparency push from the agency.

http://thehill.com/policy/energy-environment/251152-mine-spill-throws-epa-on-the-defensive

EPA’s Toxic Mega-spill May Have Been Deliberate, Critics Suggest

Greek Debt Sustainability: The Devil is in the Tails

Some experts view Greek debt as sustainable, while others claim it is not sustainable. This column argues that the distinction between tactical and strategic debt sustainability can explain this difference of opinions. Moreover, strategic debt sustainability analysis should account for tail risk. This approach shows that Greek debt is highly unsustainable, but sustainability can be restored with a nominal haircut of 50%, interest rate concessions of 70%, or a rescheduling of debt to a weighted average maturity of 20 years. Greece and its creditors should ‘bet on the future’ and embrace debt relief.

Who is Right?

Holding a national referendum on a highly technical document on debt sustainability is indicative of the confusion among Greek (and EU) politics in the midst of a never-ending crisis. It is also indicative of some confusion over what debt sustainability analysis tells us.

How could we have conflicting conclusions on the sustainability of Greek debt by credible analysts with access to the same data? For instance, Paul De Grauwe argues that the “Greek debt is sustainable” (De Grauwe 2015), whereas the recent IMF report finds that the “debt could not be considered sustainable” (IMF 2015).

http://www.nakedcapitalism.com/2015/08/greek-debt-sustainability-the-devil-is-in-the-tails.html

The Consumer Financial Protection Bureau Isn't Protecting Consumers!

When a government agency called the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (CFPB) is created by Congress, one would expect that a few consumers could actually receive protection, but that hasn’t been the case with this agency’s track record of mismanagement, inefficiency and waste. The CFPB has been operating for four years now and if it were a sports team, its coach, Richard Cordray, would certainly be looking for work.

CFPB was created as part of a Washington law known as “Dodd-Frank” – named for sponsors former Sen. Christopher Dodd and former Rep. Barney Frank. When CFPB director Cordray announced the laudable goal of investigating instances ofdiscriminatory lending practices, one would have expected to see a team of crack financial analysts and consumer watchdogs identifying racially motivated lending, assessing fines and awarding money to victims. Sorry, that hasn’t happened under director Cordray’s watch.

CFPB tried developing a statistical modeling system using zip codes and last names to pinpoint minorities victimized bydiscriminatory lending practices. The resulting data was supposed to alert regulators to minorities targeted for unfair treatmentby lenders. Unfortunately the CFPB produced a garbage in - garbage out statistical report that is virtually unusable. A peer reviewed study revealed that the CFPB’s methodology for estimating African-American borrowers was off by as much as 41%. The report also said the CFPB method was, “conceptually flawed” and can, “contribute to inflated estimates of alleged consumer harm.”

http://townhall.com/columnists/kenblackwell/2015/08/15/the-consumer-financial-protection-bureau-isnt-protecting-consumers-n2039026