Free Republic

A nonsmoking lawmaker who wanted to penalize welfare recipients for smoking backed off the toughest parts of his plan Thursday. Rep. Marty Seifert, R-Marshall, said he will drop provisions to cut income and raise medical co-payments for smokers on public assistance and government health care programs. He aims to win Democrats' support with pilot programs helping pregnant welfare recipients quit smoking. "I have to have something that passes," Seifert said after presenting his bill to the House Jobs and Economic Development Committee. "The penalties aren't going to pass."

WASHINGTON -- At least 28 senior-level federal employees in eight agencies have bogus college degrees, including three managers at the office that oversees nuclear weapons safety, congressional investigators have found. The problem is likely even bigger, mainly because the government has no uniform way to check whether employees' alma maters are ``diploma mills'' that require little, if any, academic work, the General Accounting Office reported. The findings by the investigative arm of Congress were to be presented to a Senate committee Tuesday. An earlier GAO report revealed how easy it is to buy a degree from a diploma mill; this...

Boob tube: Ex-safety boss spent $17G on TV By Jack Meyers Tuesday, January 20, 2004 Former Secretary of Public Safety James P. Jajuga, currently a focus of the burgeoning federal probe into misuse of grant money, spent $17,000 in anti-terrorism funds to buy a 60-inch plasma screen television for his office, records show. The acquisition was made in June 2002 while the Legislature was struggling to bridge a $2 billion deficit, and current public safety officials cannot justify the big screen TV's use in anti-terrorism efforts. ``I've only seen it used as a regular TV . . . or for...

WASHINGTON – A former Energy Department intelligence chief who agreed with the White House claim that Iraq had reconstituted its defunct nuclear-arms program was awarded a total of $20,500 in bonuses during the build-up to the war, WorldNetDaily has learned. Thomas Rider, as acting director of Energy's intelligence office, overruled senior intelligence officers on his staff in voting for the position at a National Foreign Intelligence Board meeting at CIA headquarters last September. His officers argued at a pre-briefing at Energy headquarters that there was no hard evidence to support the alarming Iraq nuclear charge, and asked to join State...