Thoughts 07 Jun 2007 06:45 am
Earmarks and Corruption
According to the NYT:
Coconut Road, is a stretch of pavement near Fort Myers, Fla., that touches five golf clubs on its way to the Gulf of Mexico, is the target of a $10 million earmark that appeared mysteriously in a 2006 transportation bill written by Representative Don Young, Republican of Alaska.
The Republican congressman whose district does include Coconut Road says he did not seek the money. County authorities have twice voted not to use it, until Mr. Young and the district congressman wrote letters warning that a refusal could jeopardize future federal money for the county.
You might recall that Rep. Don Young is the largest provider of pork in the US Gov. He was responsible for Alaska’s “bridge to nowhere.”
When the Democrats won he gave up his committee chair to Daniel Inoye of Hawaii, who is the second largest provider of pork. These two are best friends and call each other brother, so any change in the process would probably send me into shock.
The center of this whole mess seems to be the Aronoff family, who have sponsored fund raisers and are major Republican donors, and who gave more than $200,000 to Republican candidates and political committees in the 2006 election. Their business, the Landon Companies, is best known for building mobile-home parks. But it also operates a real estate development business in Florida.
From A Cracker Boy Looks at Florida:
“The Coconut Road money is a boon, however, to Daniel J. Aronoff, a real estate developer who helped raise $40,000 for Mr. Young at the nearby Hyatt Coconut Point hotel days before he introduced the measure.
Mr. Aronoff owns as much as 4,000 acres along Coconut Road. The $10 million in federal money would pay for the first steps to connect the road to Interstate 75, multiplying the value of Mr. Aronoff’s land.”
Daniel Aronoff has taken over active management of the company from his father, Arnold Y. Aronoff, who had a checkered career in Florida real estate. In 1979, Arnold Aronoff was sentenced to two years in prison after pleading guilty to mail fraud in a scheme to sell Florida swampland at an inflated price.
The press tried to get a statement from Mr. Young, but, when he was approached near the House floor by a reporter, Mr. Young responded with an obscene gesture.
This is why the Democrats won’t keep their promises, and force the changes that would really matter, they would have to give up too much power, and Democrat or Republican, it’s all about the Benjamins.
Crooked politician —redundant