CNN on Medicare Fraud--Ethics is on the Line!

[Gene Scarborough]

[KeithE]

[Dave Roberts]

The Feds do more ot check the average persons income tax than to check what happens in major banking and brokerage houses where so many billions change hands. Social programs are seldom checked for fraud.

[Gene Scarborough]

[Ed Pettibone]

[Gene Scarborough]

Ed--

You have peaked my interest with your personal experience---THANKS!!

I have often wondered if every program should have a llimited lifetime and then be renewed only if it is productive and honest. Any input there?

A clear example is farm subsidies and rules. They were put in during the Depression and single small family farms. Now in Eastern NC farms are Agribusiness monsters with millions involved in each operation. The tobacco allotments were addressed in recent years and changed so that only if you actually participate in farming the allotment can you draw income from it. It made a lot of people made because they were getting thousands in income without breaking a sweat.

Just one example and I would welcome others you might have.

[Jim]

Then-speaker Pelosi said we’d know what was in Obamacare AFTER the bill was passed. She was right and gradually the mandates are being exposed. To see how the public has been hoodwinked, check this site: . Apparently, the administration believes that laws already in place that govern Social Security and Medicare don’t mean a thing, another way of saying other laws not liked by the White House elitists don’t mean anything, either.

[Dave Roberts]

My specific experience came through my mother who was food stamp administrator for a small VA city. When the program began, there was money to provide for the food stamps that did a great deal of good, but she was only given funds for the thorough checking of only 1 application in three. Part of her job was to spot the most suspicious ones so that income levels and financial holdings could be checked. She could only go after the ones that looked obviously guilty of something.

[Gene Scarborough]

I think the Food Stamp Program is a great example of a lack of ethics among the poor. It makes me mad when I stand in the grocery line to check out my meager basket of chicken and ground beef which I can afford and behind me is a person with all the finest meats and goods weighing 300+ pounds!

Now those same people are coming to our hospital and Physical Therapy Department requesting hip and knee replacements because they are so overweight it's hard to imagine! Diabetes is rampant. It all comes from escess and lack of integrity. The Bible calls it "gluttony!"

I am told many black churches spend the morning in worship on Sunday and the afternoon getting instructions on how to use Welfare to their advantage! What used to be a small building administering such programs in Rocky Mount, NC, is now a renovated large bank building with nice cars parked in the lot because those administrators are paid very well!

I sat on the first Title XX Funds Board in SC back in the mid-70's. Strangely, all the 80% black representation already had their programs typed up to present. Us 2 white men who represented Lee County (near Sumter / Hartsville / Florence) had no clue we were supposed to bring any proposals. Something was amiss in that all we knew was that Lee County of the Santee-Wateree region needed 2 representatives at the meeting.

We were supposed to put all the programs on the table and then, by raise of hand, prioritize them to be funded until the millions allocated ran out. We funded programs which made it attractive to be poor. I told them in the beginning of the meeting that truely poor and hurting people needed help in a society wanting to hide the poor, but anything we did to make anyone want to stay poor and dependent was not wise. It's now almost 40 years and 4 generations into Welfare dependence and just how many are still dependent?

I think we failed miserably!!!! Money DOES NOT change attitudes nor promote dreams, it just turns dreams into nightmares! Racial quotas destroys natural competition and gives an easy ride to people incapable of doing their job well.

[Ed Pettibone]

[Ed Pettibone]

[quote="Gene Scarborough"]A. I think the Food Stamp Program is a great example of a lack of ethics among the poor. It makes me mad when I stand in the grocery line to check out my meager basket of chicken and ground beef which I can afford and behind me is a person with all the finest meats and goods weighing 300+ pounds!

Ed: Gene they aren't allowed to buy Argentine beef nor Canadian Salmon with Food Stamps. That is supposed to protect the American farmers and fishermen. Food Stamp recipients even have to make sure any rice they buy has been produced domestically. Pineapple from Hawaii is OK but not from Australia

B. Now those same people are coming to our hospital and Physical Therapy Department requesting hip and knee replacements because they are so overweight it's hard to imagine! Diabetes is rampant. It all comes from escess and lack of integrity. The Bible calls it "gluttony!"

Ed: When you say " It all comes from escess and lack of integrity. " that os a bit of over kill. I also see folk paying with cash who I would suspect of gluttony.


C. am told many black churches spend the morning in worship on Sunday and the afternoon getting instructions on how to use Welfare to their advantage! What used to be a small building administering such programs in Rocky Mount, NC, is now a renovated large bank building with nice cars parked in the lot because those administrators are paid very well!

Ed: You are told of many such churches, can you confirm it? And what is a "nice car" and just how very well are the folk who work in that office paid?
State and county government workers pay in NC must have escalated since the last professional meeting I attended down in the tar heel state. IS there some reason churches (Balck or Wwhite) should not help folk learn to maximise their resources?

D. I sat on the first Title XX Funds Board in SC back in the mid-70's. Strangely, all the 80% black representation already had their programs typed up to present. Us 2 white men who represented Lee County (near Sumter / Hartsville / Florence) had no clue we were supposed to bring any proposals. Something was amiss in that all we knew was that Lee County of the Santee-Wateree region needed 2 representatives at the meeting.

Ed: As I said before when you brought this up, made you 2 whites look bad didn't it?

E. We were supposed to put all the programs on the table and then, by raise of hand, prioritize them to be funded until the millions allocated ran out. We funded programs which made it attractive to be poor. I told them in the beginning of the meeting that truely poor and hurting people needed help in a society wanting to hide the poor, but anything we did to make anyone want to stay poor and dependent was not wise. It's now almost 40 years and 4 generations into Welfare dependence and just how many are still dependent?

.F.I think we failed miserably!!!! Money DOES NOT change attitudes nor promote dreams, it just turns dreams into nightmares! Racial quotas destroys natural competition and gives an easy ride to people incapable of doing their job well.

Ed: Gene, I can agree that too many families have not not come out of the welfare cycle but I know also that the percentages for whites remaining in that cycle is just as high as for blacks. And I am persuaded that some of what ever race have broken that cycle in part due to government funded programs.
Can the record be improved I believe so. Some of the best administration of social programs in which I was ever involved included hands on activity and input form those indigenous to the neighborhoods being served. And yea I drove top of the line Plymouth's and Dodge Monaco's and a Magnum T-Top.
Never owned a Caddy until after I retired from the State. And as I have often said on these boards most of the the problems come from political appointees who know or care little about the need but use the programs to buy votes. I favor all program development and operations being in the hands of career merit service employees.

[Gene Scarborough]

Ed---

I said what I said and stand by it!!!

The deal over blacks knowing beforehand all the nuances of welfare is a proveable point. Man, I live in eastern NC and many blacks are as griped off at their fellow blacks. I talk with them as we have meals at Hardee's a few blocks from the hood in Rocky Mount. The lady who manages the store is a black preacher's wife and can't abide bums hanging out in her place of business.

What you don't realize in your northern environment is that there is such a thing as "black pride." There is such a thing as blacks with integrity wanting to have just the same opportunity as whites. They certainly have such these days! In fact, it is a reverse prejudice where blacks get things when us white folks don't stand a chance! I put my business in the name of my wife = white female minority---so I have a chance at state and federal contracts!

Let me give you one oee example of how things are done for political purposes: When Title XX funds were first made available, LBJ made a grand trip to Rocky Mount and on to Edgecombe County toward Tarboro. He was going to present the first check to a poor black family there. HIs trip actually insulted them!

They did not consider themselves "deprived." They were poor, but the had their own house and a roof over their heads. They had pride in what they had accomplished despite a tough existence. LBJ's trip was a photo op and they felt used as the example of how Big Government was "helping" them!!!

Nuff said, I think!!!

[Ed Pettibone]

[Gene Scarborough]

Ed--

Every word I write it not meant to demean you in any personal fashion. LIghten up, my brother. I like you even though we are sometimes both "rascals." Isn't that the basis of a good blog discussion anyway?

If you didn't like LBJ, then we are in the same boat. I'm fairly sure he knew what was coming down on JFK and, at the least, rejoiced his life and administration was ended. Johnson was one of the most conniving men ever to serve the public, in my opinion. He could be nice on the surface---and mean as a junkyard dog on the phone when needing support. He would have made a better Wrestler in my opinion---entertaining, but using a razor blade to cut and make his opponent bleed. He was particularly effective if your back was turned for just a moment!