A Culture of Corruption; Haunted New York

Last week, the GAO found the Education Department broke rules by using taxpayer money to use Armstrong Williams as a conduit to pass pro-Administration propaganda. This, along with the Agriculture departments 'news briefs' that a disguised as local news stories are also used to 'advertise' the Administration's point of view. If there is good, there's good, but there should be critical content as well.

The GAO's findings come at a time when in the past weeks, Tom DeLay has been forced to step aside because of his 'ethical lapses' with golfing trips and cozing up to lobbyists, Bill Frist admitting he knew much more about a hospital conglomerate founded by his brother, Michael Brown's mess at FEMA as the result of him being a political appointee and Karl Rove being called in to testify in the Valerie Plame scandal.

And let's not forget Bush's Texas and family ties cronyism on the Supreme Court, in the State Department, like Condi Rice. She may be extremely well read and intelligent, but will she provide contrary opinions to the White House's foreign policy wishlist? And then there is Ken Lay, the former Republican Chief fundraiser who is going to trial for his part in the ENRON implosion and who may or may not had a hand in Dick Cheney's energy policy which the GAO has tried to get the records from to determine if there was a conflict of interest. One has to wonder if the Administration is above the same rules that lower government employees have to abide by, like the elimination or at least the minimizing of 'fraud, waste and abuse'. And then there is the Congressional 'get togethers' will lobbyists to dole out the spoils for the rebuilding of the Gulf Coast. I wonder how many contracts Halliburton will pick off thanks to having their former CEO as VP?

It is time for accountability for this Administration to put an end to their culture of corruption. The Republicans are acting the same way the Democrats did when they thought their era of power would never end. The Democrats may not do a better job in the long run, but in the short run, they've been out of power for so long, they'll keep their hands clean for a little while. If this country can't get a credible third party to keep the other two honest, then having good old fashioned governmental gridlock would be preferable to having one party running away with the cookie jar.

Its time for a change. Keep this in mind for the November elections and especially for the mid-term elections in 2006.

And now for the next chapter in our trip through Haunted America. Here's haunted New York.