EPA’s CIA fraud to be sentenced

@5-Well, I suppose there are exceptions to every rule, and thank God for that. I still believe in the conspiracy theory that a lobotomy is required to rise above middle management rank in government, however. 🙂

@5 You received a different kind of training, some bureaucrats actually have to get some work done brother….not all of them are incompetent, but man the number has to be double or triple what we see in the private sector.

We dealt with an issue at a web printing plant I ran years ago with the EPA wanting an extensive chemical breakdown of the drying powder we were running on the one sheet fed press we had. I explained it was corn starch, the granularity of the corn starch kept the paper sheets from contacting each other and allowed air to pass between and cure the ink. Until I was able to produce a readout from a Lab that showed it was just corn and nothing else I was threatened with shutdowns and massive fines….what we ultimately discovered was that the person in charge of inspecting and working with the print industry in our area had no formal training or knowledge of any print industry practices. So all she saw was a mysterious powdery substance and assumed it was a deadly poison we were liberally exposing ourselves to purposely every day….when she was promoted her replacement was and RIT trained print professional and we never had another issue….

On topic, it’s nice to see another crook finding his way into the penal system….where he will learn a lot more about the penile system…

My best government bureaucrat story-I used to live in a place about ten miles from the heart of Silicon Valley. It was pretty high elevation for Bay Area, a couple of thousand feet. We had an awesome view, being able to see everything from San Francisco to south of San Jose from our living room. The place was in the middle of a redwood/introduced Douglas fir forest (cheapest real estate in the Bay Area because it’s away from the heart of things, and also the most beautiful IMHO). Anyway, the California law is that if a tree goes above hip height, you have to get a permit to remove it. The permit process has to go by the planning commissions, takes weeks, and you have to submit a form FOR EACH TREE YOU WANT TO REMOVE. Well, understandably, there were some folks who tried to do the job themselves to save money, time, and brain cells. Woe betide them. We had a guy cut down a five-foot high Douglas Fir in his front yard (note; these are an invasive species in this part of CA), and some bureaucrat who was there to approve a larger project the guy wanted to do (build a playground for his kids) noticed it. The man was fined a few hundred bucks.

About six months after this went down, our dick neighbors decided to use an unlicensed contractor to build a massive (and highly illegal) viewing deck in their back yard that encroached on our land, required the cutting of dozens of trees they undoubtedly didn’t have permits for, and impeded our view. We complained to the planning commission about it, and in eight months of complaining, we weren’t even able to get someone up there to look into it. Go figure. Eventually, we ended up moving, so that’s someone else’s problem. Still, that experience with government has turned me into a lifelong tea-party conservative.

According to NBC News: Sullivan said he doubted Beale’s fraud could occur at any federal agency other than the EPA. “There’s a certain culture here at the EPA where the mission is the most important thing,” he said. “They don’t think like criminal investigators. They tend to be very trusting and accepting.”

Half a million dollars in unauthorized travel and nobody blinked an eye? Even if his buddy was stamping his vouchers, somebody didn’t question his absences or make a simple call to the CIA? When I do official travel for the Army, at least two officials must approve my travel voucher with authorization documents referenced. I once got smacked for putting gas in a rental because I wasn’t the one who was paying for the car. The EPA needs to go through the exact same embarrassment the GSA did last year.