Photo by Giorgio Trovato on Unsplash
Featuring the Fabulous Dadbots: Dave S., Mark M., Mark O., Dennis C., Paul Carter, and Geoff Carter
Several things jumped out at me re this $240M scam our diligent FBI uncovered:
Department of Justice Report on Feeding Our Families Scandal
- Watch out: This will be the poster child for Tucker and Fox (and Cruz and Hawley and…bl. bl. bl…) re liberal giveaways and how the liberals are not only, LGFNs, but also: corrupt to the core.
- Never mind the politics, based on the one story I read, hats off to the much-maligned FBI for uncovering this. $240M is not chump change and the immorality is reprehensible (as currently reported).
- What were this Aimee Bock’s motives??? Feeding the Future is a giveaway watchdog agency. Their mission is to keep others from doing what they/she did. They even deployed a common fake name generator website to rake in the millions. But wait, she/they even went on the counteroffensive—counter suit accusing MN of discrimination against their largely East African clientele. Wait again, did that say East Africa? Bingo, that is a Great Replacement Theory button hit in the Fox anti- immigration algorithm.
- Will be shocked if Fox,(et. al.) don’t jump on the “alphabet soup names of these thieving immigrants”—see below.
- Maybe Fox will be too busy countering the Letitia James (NY attorney general) civil suit offensive or the Special Master findings today—both blows to the Trump army. Wait… might he, ala pal Vlad, simply call up another 300,000 proud delayed adolescents, err…. boys?
–As it appeared in The New York Daily Paper:
“In Minneapolis, for instance, a man named Guhaad Hashi Said told the state that he was serving 5,000 meals, twice a day, at a new facility called Advance Youth Athletic Development.
The site he listed was an unlikely place for anyone to feed children en masse: The address was a second-story apartment.
Mr. Said was one of those indicted; the indictment said he was paid $2.9 million out of federal money routed through the state and Feeding Our Future. But the indictment said that Mr. Said provided “only a fraction” of the meals he claimed. In an interview this year, Mr. Said said that he had never claimed to serve 5,000 meals a day in the first place.”
—https://nydailypaper.com/pandemic-aid-fraud-minnesota-html/
LGFNs: Lying-Good-For-Nothins’
-d.
Feeding the Future got to keep 10-15% of all revenues passed through its auspices. Hence, they encouraged multiple phony charities to apply for funds. That was their motivation.
From what I recall of the article, this “watchdog” agency wasn’t necessarily carrying out the most ridiculous criminal activities (e.g. random name generation). If FTF had been a better kingpin, it would have enforced some discipline on the second tier jokers who brought the law down on the whole crooked operation.
I am not going to cream my jeans at the incredible FBI performance. Sounds like these crooks didn’t do much to cover their tracks. A real law enforcement sgency would have caught them months earlier! (Yes, I know, that’s unfair.)
Maybe we need to replace the FBI with “pre-cogs” as in the Tom Cruise feature “Minority Report” (based, Geoff will be glad to hear, on Philip K Dick).
–Mark M.
Precognition…the gifted twins…basking in the salt baths.
–Dave S.
Damn—”Feeding Our Own Fat Faces” all too easily scammed a cool Quarter Billion smackers– sneaking into Uncle Sam’s barn to brazenly milk the dim-witted cash cows bloated on greasy, unripened dollars spewing from the printing presses of the panic-stricken Feds…. Ok. Ok. My apologies for that overwrought first sentence there.
Here’s the deal (as Uncle Joe says), both the Trump and Biden administrations were throwing a ton of sweet cash money at COVID, hoping it would behave like a third-world dictator and back down with some fat bribes. All those suitcases of $100 dollar bills sent off to appease the Rona — who knows where they ended up, but I’m guessing a lot of that money is currently lining the pockets of those on both sides of the aisle. Hence, the hoopla from Fox and friends may not be as heavy-handed as Dave thinks. Then again, my prediction here perhaps underestimates the often-mind-blowing hypocrisy of the right-wing.
–Dennis C.
One could almost excuse recent immigrants from concluding that this is just how business is done in the U.S.A. For Chrissake, the most recent President made his fortune from a lifetime of grifting. The whole economy seems to be based on half the population running a grift on the other half of the population. Everyone’s doing it, so we are just integrating ourselves into our new society, right?
On the other hand, I don’t care where they came upon their ethical framework, throw the book at them.
MarkO
Among the half of the half of the population that is grifting (not griftee), we find Brett Favre and most of the Republican political elite of the state of Mississippi, including the former governor. These clowns were diverting federal block grant TANF (Temporary Assistance for Needy Families) dollars to all manner of projects. Favre was paid $1.1 million for speeches he never delivered. A total of $2M was directed to a tech startup that Favre had invested in. Ted Dibiase, a former pro wrestler known as the Million Dollar Man, lived up to that moniker by getting $5M, of which $4.5M was spent on wine, women, and song (the rest was wasted). Favre got $1.1 M diverted to build a volleyball stadium at Southern Miss U, where his daughter plays volleyball. And these are just the interesting diversions. They are looking at $94M in questionable funding. Needy Families, indeed. I guess it all depends upon how you define “needy”.
I expect Fox News to be on this story 24/7. IF they can free up a few minutes from their ongoing and gripping corruption tale starring Hunter Biden.
–Mark M.
I don’t know. I can’t say I’m surprised that some American businesspeople would take a quarter of a billion dollars directly out of the mouths of hungry children from families disrupted by Covid. As Mark O. has said, even newcomers to this country aren’t surprised at the corruption. Trump is just the tip of the iceberg. Look at the number of start-up charter schools scamming the state, corporations hiding profits offshore to avoid taxes, or brokers making obscene profits from insider trading. Some of this activity isn’t legal, but it sure as hell isn’t moral.
What’s really disturbing to me is how deeply it pervades the culture. Why would a guy like Favre, worth millions, want to scam more money? He sure as hell doesn’t need it. Neither do doctors scamming Medicare or stockbrokers handing out tips. I think they do it because they can, because on some level they believe it’s cool to scam the system, to be the outlaw. That Favre stole from poor people in his home state or that FOF people were starving children apparently means little compared to the thrill of felony—and now the agony of defeat.
They should pull Favre out of the Hall of Fame in Canton. I’d love to see it happen in Green Bay, but it won’t. Like Trump, OJ, and tons of other celebrity felons, this asshole is going to walk.
Geoff
Geoff: I meant to agree with you wholeheartedly on your suggestion to disrobe Favre. As I am now super mature, I have talked myself into believing that schadenfreude is not my motivation. Rather, this is an important and substantive thing that can be done to call out, punish, hopefully curb this type of behavior. And by disrobe I mean, yank him from the Hall as you suggest but also all the crap up at Lambeau—the retired #, (I hear single digits are all the rage now with athletes now that the NFL has changed the rules. Heck give it to Rashan Gary and watch the jersey sales skyrocket), not sure if they have a statue or street name up there…but I’d disown him big time. Our society is so far out of balance, this is one way to curb the sports hero worship.
Bullies with money (and lawyers…and guns) are bullet proof for the most part. Their Achilles heel is pride and that is one area that society, not SCOTUS can administer justice, (schadenfreude to some). He’ll likely never be substantively punished—other then returning money he previously stole—which he has done already—for speaking engagements that never happened). How do his acts compare to Pete Rose & Lance Armstrong? What were their punishments? One might report that both cheated in their sports and had much glory taken away. Brett did something worse than cheat in a sport. As did the feeding our future suspects.
Let’s see if Wisconsin has the backbone to do what is right. Penn State did.
-Dave.