Tag Archives: Corruption

Obama wants 23 billion more from taxpayers to bailout teacher unions again

Story from Fox News.

Excerpt:

Despite President Obama’s pledge for honest budgeting and billions of dollars in stimulus money spent to save teachers’ jobs, the Education Department is asking for off-the-books emergency funding to keep local districts from laying off school teachers next school year.

Education Secretary Arne Duncan sent Democratic lawmakers a request Thursday to pass a $26 billion emergency supplemental to fund up to 300,000 teachers’ jobs that he says will otherwise be lost in the fall.

[…]The request comes just a year after an unprecedented $100 billion in federal stimulus money was allocated to school districts as part of the $863 billion recovery act. Of that amount, $48 billion was designated for saving teachers’ jobs and investing in educational programs. Another $31 billion in stimulus funds were sent to states for Pell grants, competitive funds and programs helping disadvantaged students.

[…]An Education Department spokesman acknowledged that the stimulus funds have already saved roughly 300,000 teachers’ jobs once, but an additional $23 billion more is needed to preserve education jobs, along with $1 billion in funds to save early childhood education jobs and an additional $2 billion to support public safety.

Yet another bailout from productive private sector taxpayers, for yet another unproductive Democrat special interest group.

Oh well, at least the teacher unions are happy with their bailout. And the Wall Street bankers are happy with their bailout. And the auto unions are happy with their bailout. And the public sector unions are happy with their bailout. And so on, and so on, and so on.

I would expect that the left-wing media will getting a bailout soon. And then the left-wing trial lawyers. And then the left-wing illegal immigrants. And then the left-wing prisoners. That should about cover it, I guess.

Who else is left?

Hey Obama! Where's my bailout?

Oh. Of course.

Richest hedge fund managers gave 98% of contributions to Democrats

Story here on Big Government. (H/T ECM)

Excerpt:

The world’s top-earning hedge fund managers have bankrolled almost exclusively Democratic campaigns.

The top 10 highest-paid hedge fund managers in 2009 have dished out campaign contributions almost only to Democrats.

Over their lifetimes, those managers have given almost $33 million in campaign contributions to Democrats, according to research by the National Republican Congressional Committee (NRCC) and that is based on data maintained by the nonpartisan CQMoneyline.

The same managers gave roughly $600,000 to Republicans, according to the research. The contributions went 98 percent to Democrats and two percent to Republicans.

But there’s more:

As the Senate prepares to debate possibly hundreds of amendments to a Wall Street overhaul bill, labor unions and others have criticized the bill for not having tough restrictions on hedge funds.

“It’s very disconcerting to see this legislation moving forward that gives them a complete pass,” said Heather Slavkin, of AFL-CIO.

I wonder if the two facts are connected in some way? Maybe.

Related posts

    Democrats propose 23 billion bailout for teacher unions

    Story here from the leftist Washington Post. (H/T Ace of Spades via ECM)

    Excerpt:

    As public schools nationwide face larger class sizes and cuts in programs, the Senate’s leading Democrat on education issues proposed a $23 billion bailout Wednesday to help avert layoffs of tens of thousands of teachers and other school personnel in the coming academic year.

    […]Education Secretary Arne Duncan estimated that school layoffs could total from 100,000 to 300,000 unless Congress acts.

    “It is brutal out there, really scary,” Duncan told reporters on Capitol Hill. “This is a real emergency. What we’re trying to avert is an education catastrophe.”

    Duncan stopped just short of endorsing Harkin’s bill. But he said efforts to improve schools will suffer if class sizes rise, summer school is cut and other programs are jettisoned.

    Harkin, chairman of the Appropriations Committee’s panel on education and of the Committee on Health, Education, Labor and Pensions, said time is running out because states are starting to issue layoff notices. “We must act soon,” he said. “This is not something we can fix in August. We have to fix it now.”

    […]Sen. Lamar Alexander (R-Tenn.) said he worried about where the government would find $23 billion for a bailout in a time of growing federal budget deficits. “I wonder from whose schoolchildren we are going to borrow this money, because we have a looming debt crisis in this country and we’ll need to debate this,” he said. “We all want to help our children and our schools, but that is a deep concern.”

    A fitting follow-up to today’s earlier education policy post. This is why you don’t put silver spoon liberals in charge of the country – they just keep spending and spending to bail out their greedy special interest groups.