Job Creators: The Root of Most Evil

It appears as though the more money one has, the more they want...almost like an addiction. And the more money evil people can acquire, the more evil it enables them to do.

And the more money they have, the more inclined they are to also evade paying taxes.

Money may not be the root of all evil, but it certainly seems to be at the root of most evil. From the bankers to the CEOs, from the hedge fund mangers to the doctors...the top 1%.

Yes, I know, and there are also a few drug kingpins, politicians, dictators, and gang members too - - but I just wanted to focus on the "pillars of our society" and the "captains of our industry" and our "job creators" for the sake of this post.

The TV show American Greed explores the darker side of the American Dream, and I've used their list of episodes, along with a few other additions of my own, to show you who the Republicans such as Mitt Romney, Rick Santorum, Newt Gingrich and Ron Paul think should all pay less in federal income taxes.

Obviously the list below isn't complete, and many more are presently engaged in these ongoing activities, and may or may never be caught...but you'll get the idea.

NOTE: I didn't include heiresses such as Kim Kardashian and Paris Hilton on this list because they were never arrested or convicted of any major crimes.

Personally, I would list the bank bailouts as the biggest financial fraud ever in the history of the U.S. - - but check out this list of "job creators" from our past (excluding AL Capone and other notable mobsters):

• Bernie Madoff holds the world-record for biggest Ponzi scheme in history. Madoff stole billions while chairing the Nasdaq and maintaining cushy relationships at the SEC. He received the maximum sentence of 150 years in prison.
• Joseph P. Nacchio - The CEO of Qwest Communications International. He was convicted of 19 counts of insider trading in Qwest stock and was sentenced to six years in federal prison
• Kenneth Lay and Jeffery Skilling -- Enron -- Total Scammed: $74 Billion.
• Thomas Joseph Petters - The former CEO and chairman of Petters Group Worldwide and convicted for turning his company into a $3.65 billion Ponzi scheme. He received a 50 year federal prison sentence.
• Raffaello Follieri was accused of misappropriating a $50 million investment from billionaire Ronald Burkle meant to buy up Roman Catholic churches. Bishop Joseph Anthony Galante was implicated in the scandal.
• Dr. Gerald Barnbaum - Medicaid fraud, mail fraud, identity theft, sexual battery, medical malpractice and second-degree murder.
• Eugene Plotkin and David Pajcin, both formerly of Goldman Sachs, were the masterminds behind a complex Wall Street con and a scam using strippers to solicit information from Wall Street bankers.
• Richard Scrushy - He was once the superstar CEO of HealthSouth, a huge provider of outpatient rehab services until federal prosecutors accused him of masterminding a $2.7 billion fraud.
• Samuel Israel III turns his wall street hedge fund, "Bayou Investments", into a Ponzi scheme after poor management, then attempts a fake suicide to flee prosecution.
• Dennis Kozlowski - He was once described as "The Most Aggressive CEO in America," now sits behind bars. A poster boy of excess, the former CEO of Tyco stole millions from his company, using the money for a lavish party, a gilded shower curtain and expensive art.
• Dr. Jorge Martinez - Expensive, painful and unnecessary shots, all part of a multi-million dollar billing scheme.
• Anthony Elgindy - "The Mad Max of Wall Street" - The founder of Pacific Equity Investigations was a short seller who made millions in a trading scam using government secrets.
• Lou Pearlman - The manager of bands like *NSYNC and The Backstreet Boys and masterminded scams of $500 million from investors in the longest running Ponzi scheme.
• Al Parish - An economics professor and a trusted financial advisor was sentenced to federal prison after pleading guilty to financial fraud. Nearly 600 people lost up to $90 million invested in Parish Economic's private investment "pools."
• Dr. Ronald Mikos - The story of a another murderous Chicago doctor who bilked Medicare.
• Sholam Weiss - He helps fix the National Heritage Life Insurance's gaping $35 million accounting hole, and ends up partnering up with them - and bilking customers out of $500 million. He was sentenced to 845 years in prison.
• Robert W. McLean - An investment manager and arts patron who traveled by limousine and ran a Ponzi scheme that had siphoned tens of millions of dollars from close friends and business associates. He eventually killed himself.
• Stephen Trantel was once a Wall Street insider, a broker making hundreds of thousands of dollars in the Manhattan trading pits. After becoming unemployed, he started robbing banks.
• Nancy Kissel murders her husband Robert Kissel, who had been a vice president in Goldman Sachs' Asian special situations group. His brother, Andrew Kissel, who had been accused of defrauding a New York co-op board of millions of dollars, was found murdered at his rented Greenwich, Connecticut estate.
• Troy Titus - A disbarred and disgraced attorney who was sentenced to 30 years in federal prison for defrauding clients and friends out of more than $8 million in Ponzi scheme.
• Alberto Vilar - An investor who was known as "a patron of opera". He was tried and convicted in November 2008 on charges of money laundering, investment advisor fraud, securities fraud, wire fraud and mail fraud, and was sentenced in February 2010 to nine years in prison.
• Dr. Vilas Likhite - An elaborate sting operation exposes a doctor and former Harvard Medical School professor who was stripped of his medical license and began a new career as a con man selling fake art treasures.
• Danny Pang - He was the CEO of Private Equity Management Group who ran a Ponzi scheme and made millions betting on when people will die. His wife, ex-stripper Janie Louise Pang, was murdered in the Villa Park house, possibly by a contract killer, after she took steps toward a divorce. He has also since died. Wall Street Journal
• Marc Harris promised financial freedom to people with off-shore bank accounts as a way to keep assets out of the reach of government. But the "guru" was running a Ponzi scheme and bilking clients out of millions of dollars.
• Greater Ministries International - A story of religious fraud and a $500 million dollar pyramid scheme.
• Robert Allen Stanford - He was the chairman of the now defunct Stanford Financial Group and was a sponsor of professional sports - - now accused of a massive Ponzi scheme.
• Larry Salander - One of the biggest names in New York’s art world (Salander-O’Reilly Galleries), but collectors see red when he swipes more than $100 million from their pockets.
• Sholom Mordechai Rubashkin - The former CEO of Agriprocessors, now-bankrupt slaughterhouse and meat packing plant. He was convicted of 86 counts of financial fraud, including bank fraud, mail and wire fraud and money laundering. In June 2010, he was sentenced to 27 years in prison.
• William “Boots” Del Biaggio III - A venture capitalist and former co-owner of the hockey team San Jose Sharks. He was sentenced to eight years in prison and more than $67.4 million in restitution for misappropriating funds from individual investors he advised.
• Scott W. Rothstein - A disbarred lawyer and the former managing shareholder, chairman, and chief executive officer of the now-defunct Rothstein Rosenfeldt Adler law firm. He was accused of funding a massive 1.2 billion dollar Ponzi scheme.
• The Baptist Foundation of Arizona - Their fraud led to the largest collapse of a religious financial institution in U.S. history.
• John Bennett - His Foundation for New Era Philanthropy operated a notorious Ponzi scheme. After having raised over $500 million from 1100 donors, he embezzled $135 million.
• Martin Frankel - A financier and con-man who vanished with $200 million dollars. A story of money laundering, prostitution, bizarre sex and drug abuse.
• Eric Stein - Masterminded one of the largest Ponzi schemes in Nevada history, cost his victims nearly $34 million.
• Reverend Abraham Kennard - As many as 1600 churches nationwide are swindled out of $10 million.
• Reed Eliot Slatkin - An ordained Scientology minister and co-founder of EarthLink was the perpetrator of one of the largest Ponzi schemes in the United States since Charles Ponzi himself.
• Robert Ray Courtney - A former pharmacist who owned and operated Research Medical Tower Pharmacy. He was convicted of pharmaceutical fraud and sentenced to federal prison.
• Bernard Ebbers - The CEO of WorldCom becomes the poster child for everything that went wrong on Wall Street in the 1990s. WorldCom's eventual downfall shakes the financial community and the lives of thousands of investors.
• Stefan Wilson - Operated a fraudulent investment fund. His Ponzi scheme took almost $13 million from over 50 investors and landed him 20 years in prison.
• Marc Dreier is a high-powered lawyer with celebrity clients. But Dreier is a conman and steals more than $700 million from hedge funds.
• Dr. Michael Rosin - Convicted of telling patients they had cancer and performing unneeded operations, now sentenced to 22 years for fraud.
• Arthur Nadel - Manages the hedge fund Scoop Management Co, a $350 million fund. In the blink of an eye, he disappears and leaves clients without their life savings.
• Joseph Medawar - A television producer runs a scam to rob investors out of millions of dollars.
• Barton Harry Watson - One the chairman of Cybernet, a wildly successful global technology company, he stood accused of stealing millions in an elaborate fraud.
• Dr. Mark Weinberger – A self-proclaimed “nose doctor” – has it all and isn’t afraid to flaunt it. But inside The Weinberger Sinus Clinic, all is not what it seems. Malpractice and fatalities are now on his resume.
• Dana Giacchetto - Advised Hollywood's hottest stars (from Leonardo diCaprio to Ben Affleck) But his star-power faded when nearly $10 million goes missing, for which he spent 5 years in prison.
• Alfred Taubman - A wealthy art collector and the former chairman of Sotheby's who is now a convicted felon for the price-fixing scandal at Christie's and Sotheby's.
• Matt Cox and Rebecca Hauck team up to make millions in the real estate fraud.
• Nevin Shapiro - A University of Miami football booster who is currently imprisoned for orchestrating a $930 million Ponzi scheme. He even purchased a yacht on which sex parties with prostitutes were held.
• Kenneth Starr - An accountant to stars like Sylvester Stallone, Diane Sawyer, and Wesley Snipes, but mismanages his clients’ money, pockets millions, and then he marries an exotic dancer. But then later he gets more than seven years behind bars for a multimillion-dollar investment scheme.

(Pictured below) Kenneth Starr (67) and his stripper wife, Diane Passage (37). New York Magazine says she's one of the greatest hustlers of our time (And all this time I thought Anna Nicole Smith was the ultimate "gold digger".)

The New York Daily News reports that while Diane Passage was not charged with any crime (as of this post), sources said Kenneth Starr secured her love by buying her fabulous baubles - and even a boob job - with other people's money. He bought her all the latest designer fashion and really expensive jewelry, as well as Alexander McQueen dresses, Giuseppe Zanotti shoes and furs. For one of her birthdays, Kenneth Starr rented out a Manhattan club and hired the rock band Everclear. He funded her charity which raised money through pole-dancing competitions.

Besides just young women, see what else these greedy people and those on the Forbes 400 List can buy with their ill-gotten fortunes (scroll half-way down this page).

And the Republicans such as Mitt Romney, Rick Santorum, Newt Gingrich and Ron Paul think all these people need more tax breaks?

GOP's Energy and Jobs Bill is Transparent

Considering the lack of information presented in the Republican-sponsored bill (American Energy & Infrastructure Jobs Act - H.R. 7), here are four claims they made that really stood out to me:

• use the revenues from oil production to repair infrastructure.
• permanently remove government barriers to energy production.
• lower energy prices for families and businesses by allowing increased production.
• create millions of new American jobs.

It almost sounds too good to be true. But if this were possible, why wasn't it ever done before? Is it just because of the proposed Keystone pipeline?

The Republican's "energy and jobs" bill is so transparent; it's all about more BIG OIL profits, not infrastructure, cheaper energy, or jobs. I once thought the Republicans were better liars...or maybe the American people are just getting a lot smarter.

I had a much better idea. I proposed an idea about the Keystone pipeline, funding a massive non-profit public works program to build an oil company that's operated and owned by our government (the people). Read more details.

The Speaker of the House John Boehner says, "Government doesn't create jobs, it's the private sector that creates jobs." That's simply not true. No matter what you think about "government", it (we, the people) has always been a huge "job creator". Read how and why.

Below is the full text of the GOP's pitch for their "energy and jobs" bill.

Original source posted by Speaker Boehner's Press Office

The House Republicans has just formally introduce a bill called the American Energy & Infrastructure Jobs Act (set to be H.R. 7), which would link new American energy production to high-priority infrastructure projects. Instead of more ‘stimulus’ spending or wasteful earmarks, the bill would permanently remove government barriers to American energy production and use the revenues to repair and improve America’s roads and bridges – both of which support long-term job growth. Republicans expect to move the bill through the House before the end of the year.

Energy Reforms to Create Jobs, Lower Costs Generate Revenue for Infrastructure

The American Energy Infrastructure Jobs Act is the latest measure in the House GOP American Energy Initiative, an ongoing effort to support job creation and lower energy prices for families and businesses by allowing increased production of American-made energy. This measure would help create millions of new American jobs by eliminating some of the unnecessary government barriers that prevent our country from utilizing its vast energy resources, and also provide a new revenue stream for infrastructure repair and improvement. Specifically, the American Energy Infrastructure Jobs Act includes:

• The Energy Security and Transportation Jobs Act, introduced by Rep. Steve Stivers (R-OH), which would lift President Obama’s drilling ban on new offshore areas by requiring the administration to lease offshore areas estimated to contain the most oil and natural gas resources.

• The Protecting Investment in Oil Shale the Next Generation of Environmental, Energy, and Resource Security Act (“PIONEERS” Act), introduced by Rep. Doug Lamborn (R-CA), which would set clear rules for the development of U.S. oil shale resources and promote shale technology research and development.

• The Alaskan Energy for American Jobs Act, introduced by Chairman Doc Hastings (R-WA) and Rep. Don Young (R-AK), which would open less than three percent of ANWR’s 19 million acres in the North Slope, an area that was specifically set aside by Congress and President Jimmy Carter, for oil and natural gas development.

Funding High-Priority, Job-Creating Infrastructure Projects With Less Bureaucracy No Earmarks

Rather than relying on ‘stimulus’ spending, higher taxes and short-term gimmicks, the American Energy Infrastructure Jobs Act would build on the natural link between energy production and infrastructure. The measure provides responsible infrastructure funding for the next five years, and links new energy revenue from production of American energy to the Highway Trust Fund. Specifically, the bill would:

• Fund High-Priority Projects. The bill would remove federal requirements that currently force states to spend highway money on non-highway activities, helping to ensure that our nation’s highways and bridges are repaired and properly maintained and that federal dollars are spent on our most critical infrastructure needs.

• Speed Up Bureaucratic Approvals. The bill would speed up bureaucratic approvals and streamline the project delivery process – the real hurdles delaying improvements to highways, bridges, and other projects – with reforms like concurrent review that will cut the project review and permitting process in half.

• Eliminate Needless Programs. The bill would eliminate and consolidate nearly 70 surface transportation programs that are either duplicative or not in the federal interest.

• Embrace More Private-Sector Involvement. The bill would reform financing programs to increase private sector involvement in infrastructure.

• Enhance Safety Programs. The bill would strengthen safety programs and gives states more flexibility to develop innovative safety initiatives that save lives.

• Include No Earmarks. Like every bill passed through the House since the American people entrusted Republicans with a majority, this one will have no earmarks in it.

One commenter left this message at the GOP website: "John Boehner is mathematically challenged. He is proposing a transportation bill that does not add up. It is a 5 year appropriation of $260 billion. The problem with this is, the highway trust fund revenues needed for this will be $50 to $60 billion short of this amount. Not hard to understand when you realize that the primary funding source is our gas tax, which has been at 18.3 cents a gallon for 2 decades. (Think about how much vehicle gas mileage has improved in this time.) Boehner’s answer is to throw in some giveaways to oil companies with the claim they will make up the difference. It is absurd. Industry estimates that the oil company royalties would only bring in $2 to $5 billion in 10 years - most of that at the end. On this even his party mate Jim Inhofe says, “You can’t very well use revenues you don’t have.” This strategy of Mr. Boehner's is taking something we badly need, like a transportation bill or a payroll tax deduction, and linking it to legislation that benefits his clients (oil companies), but which he is unable to get through congress on its own merits. It is offensive."

As I said before, I have a much better idea...stop giving oil companies taxpayer subsidies, start making them pay taxes, and have our government fund a massive non-profit public works program to build an oil company that's operated and owned by our government (the people) to directly compete with BIG OIL. Read the details.

The United States could have 100% of the world's oil supply - - 100 trillion barrels of crude oil just inches below the surface of our federal lands, and the big oil companies like Exxon-Mobil will still take possession of our natural resource the oil and sell it to anyone they can for "whatever the market will bear" for corporate profits. The cost of our energy would never be cheaper, and we would never have "energy independence" either, because as things are now, we would still be held hostage by the big oil companies.

If it's "transparency" we want in our government, we can certainly "see through" the Republican's "energy and jobs" bill. It is nothing more than a fallacy, fable, fib, farce, falsehood, fraud, myth, deception, and lie.

Or should I be more politically correct and say the Republicans are being a little "disingenuous"? Or should I say it like a politician would, "The Republicans misspoke."

Millionaire Tax Hurts Small Businesses - DEBUNKED!

Small businesses in the U.S. create most of our jobs. Are we in agreement so far? This is the one thing that the Democrats AND the Republicans can rarely agree on these days.

According to the Census Bureau the vast majority of small businesses have 9 employees or less. In 2008 there were 27,757,676 total firms. 

• Of these only 21.8% have any employees at all.
• Of the firms that have employees 78.8% have 9 employees or less.
• Of the 6,049,655 employer firms in 2007 61.2% had sales receipts of $999,999 or less, so the owner can't pay themselves a million-dollar salary.

Fox News and the Republicans are always saying that Obama wants to tax small businesses, hurting "job creators", when it's only a proposed tax on those earning over $1 million a year. But those are usually CEOs of BIG businesses, not small businesses. And they usually earn much more than $1 million (Unless you were like Karl Rove, incorporated yourself, and ran a supper PAC, and paid yourself a million dollars or more.)

Millionaires (large corporate CEOS, etc.) get paid from profits in the corporate treasury. If there's some cash left over after operating costs, the board of directors can vote themselves a bonus. It has nothing to do with creating jobs. And like Warren Buffett says, these large corporate CEOs are paying a lower tax rate than their secretaries.

Corporate taxes on the corporate treasury after profits is an entirely different matter. Example: Exxon-Mobil had the greatest profits ever in the history of mankind, paid no corporate taxes and even received a taxpayer subsidy....and they employee 83,600 people worldwide out of a U.S. labor force of 150 million. Exxon's CEO Rex W. Tillerson earned $29 million in total compensation in 2010.

Obama only wants tax Mister Tillerson the same effective tax rate that's currently being taxed on the owner and sole proprietor of Sally's Lemonade Stand and Mister Tillerson's secretary. Obama wants to tax him, not you.

John McCain once claimed that 23 million small-business owners would pay higher tax rates under Obama. He was wrong. The vast majority would see no change, and many would even get a cut.

The U.S. Small Business Administration Office of Advocacy estimates the total number of "small" firms with fewer than 500 workers reached 26.8 million in 2006. That’s the most recent estimate. But even that number is inflated.

It turns out, SBA’s estimate includes more than 20 million "non-employer" firms, an unknown number of them sideline or hobby businesses run by persons who actually make their living some other way. Census and SBA count as a "small business" anyone who reported as little as $1,000 of business receipts.

By that very broad definition, Barack Obama would also be a small-business owner, by virtue of his book income. As would President Bush, Vice President Cheney, Karl Rove, and maybe even myself (if you left me a modest donation with Paypal) 

Of the 26.8 million that SBA counts as "small businesses," fewer than 6 million are actually "employer firms" with any payroll (I don't hire people either).

From this, we must conclude that to arrive at McCain's previous 23 million figure, he and the Republicans are counting mostly "business owners" with no workers, including those who simply report small amounts of income from sideline or freelance work. The Republicans are arguing that Obama’s tax increase would "destroy jobs," but he’s counting mostly firms that don’t produce any.

That in itself is seriously misleading. If the Republicans want to focus on the effects of Obama’s plan on employment, they would do better to confine their count to employers – the just under 6 million firms that actually have workers.

And even that figure wouldn’t be applicable because Obama’s tax increase wouldn’t fall on all employers, only on those with PERSONAL INCOMES over $1 million. Taxes will go up only if small-business owners have capital gains or dividends, but Obama’s proposal would not increase rates on capital gains or dividends for couples making under $250,000, or singles making under about $200,000, regardless of whether they are classified as small-business owners or not.

Recently on Fox News Eric Bolling had said that 96% of the U.S. Chamber of Commerce's members are small businesses. But what he also deliberately failed to mention was that only 11% of all small American businesses actually belongs to the U.S. Chamber of Commerce.

The actual number of business owners who would be affected by Obama's "millionaire tax" turns out to be well under a million, and the number of employers would be even less.

However, not even all of those can properly be called "small-business owners" (or "JOB CREATORS"). Some are farmers. Many are lawyers, accountants or other professionals who get some of their income in the form of partnership distributions. Others may be passive investors in real-estate partnerships or similar investment arrangements and not really persons who own and manage a business....OR HIRE PEOPLE.

For all these reasons it was judged that the actual number of small-business employers who would face higher tax rates under Obama is probably far below what the Republicans claim. and certainly a far cry from the Republican's ridiculously inflated 23 million figure.

So what have we learned? Let's recap: Most jobs are created by small business owners and most small business owners don't have personal incomes over $1 million a year in personal earnings (maybe GROSS revenues, but not PERSONAL SALARIES). "Job creators" wouldn't be hurt, just our economy and the government's ability to conduct it's business would be hurt -- by NOT taxing millionaires (like Exxon's CEO Rex W. Tillerson).

But as always, the Republicans use false statistics and outright lies to get their own way. That's why I hate Republicans and the Fox News channel...because so many are millionaires and are just too greedy to pay their fair share.

* Sourced from Fact Check and the Census Bureau