Kucinich Demands Retraction from Issa for Stimulus Barb
It’s an interesting claim given that there are two possible interpretations of the phrase. Indeed, it can refer to money given to campaign workers to buy things like gas and doughnuts. As a piece by Christopher Beam on Slate.com points out:
It’s cash that’s given to help get people to the polls. The money can go toward perks like coffee and doughnuts for door knockers, gas for volunteers to chauffeur elderly voters, or pocket money for kids who distribute fliers and sample ballots on Election Day. Also known as “walking-around money” or “get-out-the-vote money,” it’s most common in poor areas of Philadelphia; Chicago; Newark, N.J.; Baltimore; Los Angeles; and other big cities. Both parties use street money, but it’s more common among Democrats, who tend to be better represented in the areas that rely on it.
Additionally, it can refer simply to pocket money used for meals or cabs and such.
Certainly, Kucinich has accepted his share of the stimulus for his district — to the tune of more than $150,000 for groups in his area.
This would include $95,920 for Onix Networking so it could buy the Google Maps API, $50,000 to allow Cleveland Public Theater to hire a marketing and communications director, and $7,124 through HUD for lefty group Environmental Health Watch to do something called neighborhood stabilization. While this is chump change compared to $787 billion, it’s still a nice piece of walking-around money in and of itself.
In his letter, Kucinich states:
While one may quarrel with the use to which the economic stimulus has been put, or even whether fiscal stimulus is an appropriate governmental response to the worst economic recession since the Great Depression, it is not possible to argue that the economic stimulus resembles “walking-around money.” There is no evidence with which I am familiar which substantiates your claim, and much which refutes it.
Therefore, I am writing to demand that you produce your evidence or retract your comment. I look forward to hearing from you.
Leaving aside the $150,000 Kucinich brought home to his district, there is evidence that the allocation of “stimulus funds” was politically motivated.
Indeed, according to a March 31 piece by Veronique de Rugy on National Review Online:
On average, Democratic districts received one-and-a-half times as many awards as Republican ones. Democratic districts also received two-and-a-half times more stimulus dollars than Republican districts ($122,127,186,509 vs. $46,139,592,268). Republican districts also received smaller awards on average. (The average dollars awarded per Republican district is $260,675,663, while the average dollars awarded per Democratic district is $471,533,539.)
Read that again — Democratic districts received one-and-a-half times as many awards as Republican districts and two-and-a-half times more money.
This would seem to be prima facie evidence of vote buying on a grand scale.
That Mr. Kucinich is playing power politics in hopes of garnering a powerful seat on a powerful committee is unsurprising given his record of political maneuvering. However, the evidence which he has demanded was easy to find with a few minutes of searching.
Perhaps Mr. Kucinch should issue the apology and retraction he demanded from Mr. Issa.
I live in Ohio’s 10th Congressional District. As a consequence, I am quite familiar with Kucinich’s kooky ways. (I was also a resident of Cleveland proper decades ago, when Denny K made a mess of his brief tenure as the city’s “boy mayor.”)
My long experience with “Dennis the Menace” leads me to concur with those who see his recent letter to Congressman Issa as nothing more than a grandstanding ploy. Kucinich can’t easily run for president (yet again) in 2012 — in opposition to an incumbent from his own party.
So angling for a high-profile committee gig is probably the only option available to the spotlight-hungry, aging politician.
But, but, but… these things are carefully scrutinized by all these layers of government! You can TRUST the government! Yep, he’s a Dem. They do love the government, don’t they?
Kucinich is the guy who was living in his car in ’82, because he could not hold down a job in the private sector. The only steady employment he has ever had was as Mayor of Cleveland and as Congressman. But, his failure in the private sector cannot be HIS fault! He, himself, is awesome. It must be the system! Thus he embraces Marxist nonsense. He fortunately comes across as kooky, and so is not really dangerous.
It would be a boon to the nation if Dennis would go back to living in his car. Wait! He is so concerned about environmental issues and such, perhaps he should consider living on his bicycle. How does this goof-ball continue to get elected? He is so utterly useless that I cannot imagine any rational human voting for him.
It would be a boon to the nation if Dennis would go back to living in his car. Wait! He is so concerned about environmental issues and such, perhaps he should consider living on his bicycle.
Or, he should live in a van down by the river. (SNL reference)
As a resident of California, I wonder the same thing about boxer… how does she continue to get elected when she’s proven to be a crook.
Here in Ohio, Dennis the Menace throwing a tantrum on whatever subject is before the house is about as newsworthy as the revelation(s) that rain is wet, or snow is cold. Actually, Dennis has spent his entire career being indignant- mainly about the existence of people who do not think exactly like him.
The only good thing about Kucinich getting the slot he wants is that he will probably be at once so obnoxious and so bizarre in his demands for “vital spending” that he will probably do an even better job of discrediting the “progressive” philosophy on what to do with taxpayers’ money than The One, Pelosi, Reid, etc., already have.
From the standpoint of anyone who wonders what motivates progressives to consistently ignore reality in favor of their dogmas, Kucinich is a gift from on high. Simply because he never shuts up. If you want a spokesman for “progressivism” who does not understand the concept of “When you’re in a hole, stop digging”, Dennis is your man.
This new session promises to be even more entertaining than the election. So, who wants popcorn?
clear ether
eon
I’ve always thought of Dennis as Ralph Nader but without the humor.
Ralph Nader has humor??? NO WAY!!!
Nader was born without a sense of humor. Kucinich had his removed because it got in the way of being perpetually indignant about, well, everything. A small difference, but a rather significant one.
cheers
eon
“The letter, which was sent on Nov. 11 and obtained by PJM, attempts to call Issa to task for saying the $787 billion stimulus amounted to little more than “walking around money” for Obama.”
So, what’s wrong with this statement? I would go one step further. The only thing the $787 billion “stimulus” stimulated were a bunch of union jobs and a bunch of pork that the Democrats had been dreaming of since Obama came into office. It had absolutely NO effect on the economy or the unemployment rate. This is why the Democrats had to go into the lie of jobs “saved or created,” is figure nobody could measure or prove. If I were Issa, I would force Dennis Kucinich and all of the other Democrats responsible for this vote to defend it. Make them prove why this money wasn’t just thrown out the window, especially after Obama admitted to the New York Times that there was no such thing as a “Shovel-Ready Job,” which is how he sold this bill. I would love to see some Democrats try to explain that. They’ll probably choke on their own tongues if they tried.
A Democrat be truthful? From the inception of the party they have been allergic to the truth.
ALL of the money given away by the Democrat-controlled Congress and the Obama administration went to pay off Democrat constituencies for their support. GM was “given” to the auto unions and the NEA received billions while legitimate investors were aced out. Anyone paying attention can see that.
Nothing the Dems can do in committee. GOP will have the votes so all they have left is big mouthed Dem liberal crying about “children”, “racists” and that their coffee has gone cold.
If the $787 bil, or whatever it really is, is not “walking around money” then just where are the results? Same place as the recent Summer Stimulus funds I guess.
Give Kucinich a key spot, the worse the insanity the more the spotlight. Let the Normal People view another liberal[?] nut job.
Little Dennis suffers from a Napoleonic complex, except that Bonaparte was much taller. Cleveland voters had the opportunity to remove this worm from office and blew it. He outlived his right to continue to hold it many elections ago. The rest of Ohio voters threw most of the other bad politicians out of office. Cleveland’s next chance to show they have some intelligence in the voting booth will be 2012 when another radical liberal, Sherrod Brown, is up for re-election in the Senate.
Somebody get a net. Prince Mishkin’s on the loose again.
Somebody get a net. Prince Mishkin’s on the loose again.
To: The Honorable Dennis Kooknick
From: The Honorable Darrell Issa
Subject: Get a grip
Dennis,
Dude, you are such a horse’s ass!
Best wishes,
Darrell
If Dennis Kucinich wants to be taken seriously, he would not attack Issa over superfluous semantics; however, this is a trite political gimmick in a sad, pathetic attempt to raise his profile.
Dennis is a nutjob, plain and simple. With a Obama attention mentality. How does he keep getting elected? Is his district full of Crackheads?
Cummings at least might get some work done.
The only reason he seeks what Issa wants is so he can cover his tracks for the last 2 yrs. under Obama other than that do you think there’s any reason to want to be a do gooders for the general public like they all campaign on to get elected. He along with the CBC and others in their party are very afraid of Issa as I would be as well if I were in there shoes !!
Let the games (hearings) begin!
I already am enjoying Rangel’s ethics hearings. He can no longer afford a lawyer? It’s just an ethics hearing. If you weren’t such a crook, you wouldn’t need a lawyer.
Sic ‘em, Issa! Bring in Michelle Malkin to help. Lordy, but she goes after the rot!
Poor Charlie. Paid for his lawyers and then they walked out on him. Seems they should be charged with fraud too. Taking his money without defending him (what they were hired to do) is just as dishonest as the things he is charged with, and has admitted to doing. A crook being victimized by other crooks, er, lawyers.
One thing that really ticks me off about Dennis is———his wife!
My band got a gig playing an UAW picnic. Dennis was there to shake hands, as he was running for Mayor. I’m over 6’3″ tall. I shook that little twerp’s hand pulled him up close so he had to crane his pencil neck back to even see my face, and told him, “I’d never, ever vote for you.” Ya shoulda seen the look on his face!
Ouch! the truth hurts, little man.