Palin Sues U.S. Government

The Interior Department decided that because federal scientists' findings that polar bears were endangered, they should be added to the endangered species list. The then Alaska Governor, Sarah Palin, subsequently sued the federal government to keep polar bears from being listed. This is in spite of the fact that scientists in her own administration agreed with the feds. She claimed that scientific evidence showed that polar bears were not endangered, but that turned out to be untrue. Rick Steiner, a marine conservation specialist and University of Alaska professor explains the entire situation.

Video Length 10 min 30 sec

Did the Federal Government Orchestrate the 2008 Financial Meltdown?

Why does anyone care about the private sex life of a public official? Why did the Feds spend so much time and effort to simply find out that Eliot Spitzer was involved with prostitutes? Why should they care? Because Spitzer was trying to force federal agencies to stop the careless credit excesses that, we now know, were a major factor in the financial crisis of 2008? There seems to have been a carefully orchestrated agenda to discredit and bring him down because he was gaining nationwide support to stop the madness and for his aggressive attempt to protect consumers in what turns out to be a $700 billion giveaway to Wall Street. This shocking video lays out the case.

Video Length 7 min 33 sec

Passion Parties at The Minerals Management Service

From Democracy Now: An internal probe has uncovered a major bribery, sex and drug abuse scandal at the Department of Interior. Government officials were found to have collected lavish gifts from the oil companies they were supposed to be regulating. Some officials engaged in sex and drug use with oil industry executives. Inspector General Earl Devaney says the Bush administration-era Interior Department has had “a culture of ethical failure.” From 2002 to 2006, one-third of fifty-five staffers at the Denver office of the Mineral Management Service accepted bribes from oil companies. 

Is there a too-cozy relationship between top administrators in the Interior Department and the Justice Department?  Even though two low-level employees have been charged and have plead guilty, the Interior Department's Inspector General Devaney recommended that, in addition, two high-level administrators also be charged.  Ignoring his recommendation, the Justice Department chose to let both off the hook.

From Mother Jones Magazine:"The Minerals Management Service is the arm of the Interior Department charged with collecting some $10 billion a year in royalties from oil and gas companies. The IG tells us about two MMS oil marketers, Stacy Leyshon and Crystel Edler, who became known among oil executives as the "MMS Chicks." Between 2002 and 2006, each received more than $2,700 in gifts on more than 60 occasions from oil companies, including meals, booze, lodging, and golf outings. Leyshon, who slept with two oil company employees, operated a sex toys side business known as "Passion Parties" (think Tupperware parties, but with dildos) and bragged that it paid more than her day job at MMS.

Lucy Querques Denett, the former associate director of the minerals revenue management department, was eager to look out for her aides. Oil royalty auditor Bobby Maxwell, who gained national attention in 2006 for his $50 million False Claims Act case against the department and oil company Kerr-McGee, told me he had wanted to audit contracts signed between oil companies and the department's problem-plagued Royalty In Kind division, which collects $4 billion a year in oil and gas instead of cash royalties. But in 2002 the RIK department refused to hand over the contracts, Maxwell says, and Denett told him, "Leave it alone." He says she never explained why RIK couldn't be audited.

For more see: Consumerist and Pogo

Video Length 2 min 38 sec