RICK SANTORUM
Mr.Blue-Collar. Not.
Santorum is one of the most corrupt politicians in recent memory... he repeatedly sponsored laws giving very specific help to companies -- worth millions of dollars -- and they immediately gave him large campaign donations and -- after he left the Senate -- hundreds of thousands of dollars in cash. He was twice named one of America's 3 most corrupt senators by CREW, a clean-government group, and has become a millionaire from payments by these companies since he was voted out of the Senate in 2006.
In 2006, Santorum steered millions of dollars in earmarks to clients of American Continental Group, a lobbying firm. They gave him $14,000 that year in donations, and after he left office paid him $65,000 for “legislative policy consulting services.” Another firm he helped, Consol Energy, paid him $142,500 just in 2010 and 2011.
While in Congress, Santorum kept pushing very specific laws increasing Medicare payments in Puerto Rico; one would have cost the government $400 million. (The eventual bill gave them more money, but not that much.)
Santorum, who entered the Senate as one of the least wealthy congresspeople, bought a $2 million, 5,000 SF house in Great Falls, VA in 2007.
While in the Senate, Santorum held weekly meetings supporting Tom Delay's "K-Street Project," an effort to fill lobbying groups with Republican loyalists. In 2006, he received $500,000 from lobbyists, far more than any other federal candidate -- 40% more than the #2 recipient, George Allen.
Santorum introduced a bill that required the National Weather Service to keep collecting weather data, and hand it over to private weather companies, who would make the profit off of it. Accuweather, a private weather company in Santorum's state, gave him tens of thousands of dollars during the time he promoted this absurd bill.
There are many more examples -- $25,000 from execs at Waste Management & Processes, Inc. after Santorum proposed a $100 million subsidy for their coal-to-diesel plant; $20,000 from tobacco interests around the time he blocked a law allowing the FDA to regulate tobacco, etc. etc.
It's pretty shameless...
even by Congressional standards.
Sources 1. Santorum's Skeleton Closet http://www.realchange.org/santorum.htm 2. Santorum Becomes Millionaire in Six Years After Senate Loss, by Heidi Przybyla and Julie Bykowicz, Bloomberg News Service, in San Francisco Chronicle, January 6, 2012 http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/g/a/2012/01/05/bloomberg_articlesLXB3FG1A74E9.DTL&ao=all 3. After Santorum Left Senate, Familiar Hands Reached Out, by Mike McIntire and Michael Luo, New York Times, January 5, 2012http://www.nytimes.com/2012/01/06/us/politics/after-senate-santorums-beneficiaries-became-benefactors.html 4. Beyond Delay: The 20 Most Corrupt Members of Congress (and five to watch), CREW (Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington), 2006 http://www.citizensforethics.org/page/-/PDFs/Reports/Most%20Corrupt%20Reports/Most%20Corrupt%20Report%202006%20-%20Beyond%20Delay%20Report.pdf?nocdn=1 5. Beyond Delay: The 13 Most Corrupt Members of Congress, CREW (Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington), 2005 http://www.citizensforethics.org/page/-/PDFs/Reports/Most%20Corrupt%20Reports/Most%20Corrupt%20Report%202005%20-%20Beyond%20DeLay%20Report.pdf?nocdn=1
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Santorum charity for the poor spent most of its money on management, political friends
"Before it folded in 2007, the foundation raised $2.58 million, with 39 percent of that donated directly to groups helping the needy. By industry standards, such philanthropic groups should be donating nearly twice that, from 75 to 85 percent of their funds. “That’s exceptionally poor,” Ken Berger, president of Charity Navigator, a national organization that rates charitable groups, said of the group’s giving. “We would tell donors to run with fear from this organization.”"
http://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/santorum-charity-for-the-poor-spent-most-of-its-money-on-management-political-friends/2012/01/11/gIQAGDKVwP_story_1.html
That's from your first source. Just take a step back and look at that crap sandwich paragraph. ALL your sources are very lib ones. CREW? C'mon, give us a break!
Since I haven’t studied each of these charges, I am left to respond to you in the following manner. I have to do it going on what I already know about the U. S. Senate in part.
The Senate is a bastion of disgusting people, almost completely dominated by Leftists from both parties. Those of the Left have been particularly bad. How many of them have been consorting with people like Ayers, Soros, and their ilk? It has essentially been a lost cause for the last fifty years, probably a lot longer.
Into this mix, it is now stated that Santorum is one of the top three most corrupt people there. Ted Kennedy, John McCain, John Kerry, Harry Reid,... and on it goes were less corrupt than Rick Santorum. That’s what I’m supposed to believe? Evidently you believe it. I’m having trouble with this premise.
If this premise is flawed, and I think it is, how else has information about Santorum been spun here to denigrate him, take him down, destroy his chances of being president?
You mentioned CREW. I just went to their site.
Here’s CREW’s list of worst governors.
America’s Worst Governors
Gov. Haley Barbour (R-MS)
Gov. Donald Carcieri (R-RI)
Gov. Jim Gibbons (R-NV)
Gov. Bobby Jindal (R-LA)
Gov. David Paterson (D-NY)
Gov. Sonny Perdue (R-GA)
Gov. Rick Perry (R-TX)
Gov. Bill Richardson (D-NM)
Gov. Mike Rounds (R-SD)
Gov. Mark Sanford (R-SC)
Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger (R-CA)
Notice anything in common between these eleven governors? Why of course nine out of eleven are Republicans.
I’m beginning to see a pattern here fella.
Look, nobody around here is going to accuse me of being a supporter of Rick Perry. I still don’t think he’s one of the worst governors by any stretch of the imagination.
I’m not sure who fed you this tripe, but I’m not hungry enough to ask you for a serving for myself. No thanks.
Information can be spun to look very bad, when it really isn’t. I’m going to have to tell you, that’s what it looks like is going on here.
I appreciate your efforts. Later...