Previous bank closure information vanishes

Feds remove complete search list

It’s been a while since we visited the failed bank list. But bank closures in Scottsdale and Gold Canyon within weeks of one another are worthy of note.

Central Arizona Bank (click link for troubled asset ratio) was closed days ago by the Arizona Department of Financial Institutions, which appointed the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation (FDIC) as receiver. To protect the depositors, the FDIC entered into a purchase and assumption agreement with Western State Bank, Devils Lake, North Dakota, to assume all of the deposits of Central Arizona Bank. Presto! The Central Arizona Bank reopened as a branch of Western State Bank

Gold Canyon Bank failed on April 5, 2013. It was acquired by First Scottsdale Bank. 

The failed bank list for 2013, as of mid May (13), 2012 (50), 2011 (92), and 2010 (157).  The number of failures for each year are in parentheses. Arizona banks have appeared on three of the four lists.  The information is made available via an independent investigative reporting network.

Of significance is the fact that the list previously displayed all bank closures since October 1, 2000. The vast majority of bank failures have taken place since Barack Obama assumed office, January 2008. Interestingly, the list  no longer reflects years prior to 2010. Now the search goes back to 1934, but you need specifics which no one has in order to discover information.

On September 5, 2009 we noted the number of bank failures that year stood at 89 after regulators shut down banks in Missouri, Illinois, Iowa and Arizona the previous day. Such information has mysteriously disappeared. All data has been scrubbed.

Anyone with a bank account has heard of the FDIC, but have you ever wondered who runs it and how they were put in their positions?  Scroll down this lengthy list for names and titles. While detailed information is difficult to locate, the FDIC proudly proclaims its Mission, Vision and Values along with its 2013 Diversity and Inclusion Strategic Plan which “addresses the goals of President Obama’s executive order calling for federal agencies to develop and implement a more comprehensive, integrated, and strategic focus on diversity and inclusion” — an “important priority.”

All we wanted was the back list of bank closures going back to 2000. Apparently that information is not as important as “workplace diversity and sustainability.” Who’da guessed?

The FDIC is managed by a five-person Board of Directors, all of whom are appointed by the President and confirmed by the Senate, with no more than three being from the same political party. Wanna hazzard a guess at which party controls the majority votes?

“Allah Akbar” again

Depravity in London

Despite being told there is no war on  terror, once again, here is proof positive that such madness exists.

Two Islamic fanatics wielding meat cleavers butchered an off-duty  British soldier, taking their war on the West to a new level of horror. The men were arrested after savagely stabbing and attempting to behead their victim who they executed at the midday scene, witnessed by dozens of passers-by. Throughout the frenzied attack they shouted ‘Allah Akbar’ — Arabic for ‘God is great’ — demanding horrified witnesses film them as they issued threats.

‘We swear by Almighty Allah we will never stop fighting you. The only reasons we have done this is because Muslims are dying every day. You people will never be safe. An eye for an eye, a tooth for a tooth’

“This British soldier is an eye for an eye a tooth for tooth,” they declared. We apologize that women had to see this today, but in our lands our women have to see the same. You people will never be safe. Remove your government. They don’t care about you. You think David Cameron is going to get caught in the street when we start busting our guns? You think your politicians are going to die? No, it’s going to be the average guy like you – and your children.”

This unspeakable horror, including photos and video is reported by the UK’s Daily Mail.

‘Allah Akbar,” the same praise of Allah accompanying depraved acts of murder was uttered by the mother of the two Boston bombers.  Nidal Malik Hasan, the jihadist U.S. Army major and psychiatrist, who did not want to be deployed to fight Muslims, shouted “Allah Akbar” before killing 13 people and injuring 32 others at Fort Hood in November 2009. Although FBI and congressional investigations found the shootings to be an act of terrorism, the Obama administration categorized the attack as “workplace violence.” He continues to draw $278000 in salary while awaiting trial.

Janet Napolitano preferred to think that “Right-wing extremists” posed the greatest national security threats.   In January 2008, immediately after his first election, Obama’s administration sanitized our language, putting words such as “Islamist” and “jihadist” off limits. “Global War on Terror” was replaced by the phrase “Global Struggle for Security and Progress.” This was accomplished through the edition of “Terminology to Define Terrorists,” a nine-page, “Official Use Only” memo written in conjunction with Muslim advisers. Associated Press has joined in word policing.

Political correctness will be our undoing, but the left prefers to silence truth.

Turbulent career of Dennis Burke hits wall

USAToday runs a brief exposé on former Arizona federal prosecutor Dennis Burke, the beleaguered Janet Napolitano toady, who hitched his wagon to her star, though ultimately crashing and burning. The news article, IG: Prosecutor improperly leaked ‘Fast and Furious’ memo, can be read here.

Burke had been at Janet Napolitano’s side for years, serving as her Chief-of-Staff when she was Governor and as Chief Assistant Attorney General, during her term as Attorney General. When Napolitano was Arizona’s U.S. Attorney, it was Burke who was at her right hand. Then he joined Napolitano in positioning himself on the Obama team. It all paid off — until it didn’t.

Now he appears to be in a heap ‘o trouble. Will Janet don her red cape and swoop in for a rescue? We’re not laying odds on that happening. Napolitano is no Clark Kent, and we’ve heard the warning that you don’t tug on superman’s cape.

Seeing Red AZ has tracked Dennis Burke’s bouncy career ride:

June 16, 2009: Napolitano crony likely Obama pick for U.S. Attorney

September 16, 2009: Dennis Burke confirmed as U.S. Attorney: What a surprise

October 11, 2010:  Dennis Burke: AZ U.S. Attorney’s office “open for (special) business”

July 2, 2012:  Dennis Burke exposed

August 30th, 2011: Dennis Burke, AZ US Attorney forced to resign amid scandal, cover-up

AZ Conservative Coalition: Newest legislator ratings

The Arizona Conservative Coalition’s (ACC) most recent legislator ratings, reflecting legislative actions as of 5/21/2013 is now available. Click here for the updated report.

Legislators are assigned to a group based on their latest rating. Bills used in the evaluation along with the summary of criteria used to weight bills can be seen here. There is also an excellent, concise analysis of each bill considered.

Check out the FAQs section, which answers the question, “Why is a particular legislator rated better or worse then I would have expected?”

Be sure to take time to review Howard Levine’s informative weekly narrative, which provides background on the tracking process.  

The folks at ACC provide individual grades for Arizona’s Republican Representatives and Senators. There is quite a variation. This week the Senate ratings range from a high of 92.4 down to the bottom-dragging RINO category of 38.5.

In the House of Representatives the top scorer received a 95.1 with the bottom of the list rating a weak RINO rating of 47.8.

Just days ago we witnessed a disgraceful act of Republican treachery, with 6 GOP state Senators colluding with and voting in tandem with the cohesive Democrats to endorse Arizona’s ObamaCare Medicaid Expansion, irresponsibly being pushed by Gov. Jan Brewer.

The Senate’s 13 Democrats hung together supporting the costly and unsustainable scheme. The 6 Republican collaborators voting with them are Rich Crandall (LD-16), Adam Driggs (LD-28), John McComish (LD18), Steve Pierce (LD-1), Michele Reagan (LD-23) and Bob Worsley (LD-25).

Remember their names when the upcoming elections roll around. Not one of these defectors is worthy of conservative support.

Obama’s IRS target list, headaches, continue to grow

Fox News reports that the Internal Revenue Service scandal involving the unjustified targeting of conservative groups also had conservative Hispanics in its sights. The list continues to grow and the excuses get weaker. Meanwhile, six-figure bonuses and promotions are the order of the day for the henchmen behind this outrageous focus and denial of tax exempt status requests for conservative and faith based groups.

Sarah Hall Ingram, the IRS commissioner overseeing the tax exempt division when it began targeting Tea Party, evangelical and pro-Israel groups for harassment has been promoted. Ingram is now the director for implementing ObamaCare. She received $103,390 in bonuses while she was harassing patriotic American organizations.

Meanwhile, during a House Committee hearing delving into this malicious mistreatment, Rep. Aaron Schock (R-Illinois) grilled outgoing IRS commissioner Steven Miller about the targeting of the Coalition for Life, a pro-life group in Iowa. Unbelievably, the IRS specifically asked about the content of the members prayers. Watch the shocking video by clicking here.

Then watch as Rep. Mike Kelly (R-PA) receives a standing ovation after this blasting interrogation of outgoing acting IRS commissioner Steven Miller:

AZ Senate RINOs cave on OBrewerCare expansion

In a state budget vote taken Thursday night in the Arizona Senate, the focal point was the expansion of Medicaid — a key element of ObamaCare, oddly prioritized and embraced by Republican Gov. Jan Brewer.

The issue has been divisive, firmly placing those who ran and were elected as Republicans in the Democrat camp. Republican Majority Leader John McComish (LD-18) was instrumental in ensuring the Medicaid expansion was added onto the $8.8 billion budget bill.

Senate President Andy Biggs (LD-12) and other conservative opponents offered numerous amendments to the expansion, which Brewer claims will bring Arizona $1.6 billion in “federal money” [read: taxpayer dollars]. Included was an amendment to block an unconscionable hospital bed tax, to pay the state’s costs of providing coverage to an additional 300,000 low-income and uninsured Arizonans. The expansion would stretch the coverage beyond the state’s income threshold to 133 percent of the poverty level, or $30,675 for a family of four.

As we have previously seen, the Senate’s 13 Democrats hung together supporting the costly scheme with six Republicans, including John McComish jumping ship to join them.  The other collaborators voting with the Dems are Rich Crandall (LD-16), Adam Driggs (LD-28), Steve Pierce (LD-1), Michele Reagan (LD-23) and Bob Worsley (LD-25).  Remember their names when election season rolls around.

In the end, the final vote ended up rolling the conservative leadership. The Majority Leader and Majority Whip violated their responsibility as part of the leadership team by voting against amendments presented by the Senate President. This level of treachery has not occurred in the state legislature since the notorious Randall Gnant, who brokered a deal with the Democrats against his own caucus in 2000 in order to become Senate President. A historical note that should be remembered is that Gnant was never elected to any other office in this state as a result of his treachery.

The Arizona House will take up the bill next week. Contact your Representatives (House roster here) and let them know of your strong opposition to OBrewerCare and those who vote for it.

A poll conducted last month by Magellan Strategies reveals public cynicism aimed at Brewer’s relentless push for Obama’s cornerstone program in Arizona. Although 49% had a “favorable” opinion of Gov. Brewer, and all but 2% were familiar with her, the percentage opposing her full implementation of Medicaid expansion skyrocketed to 58%. Equally significant is the fact that state legislators who joined with her are less likely to be retained by the voters within their districts by a whopping 43% — compared to only 30% who would be more likely to support them. 

Statewide, GOP legislative districts have been outspoken in their opposition to this governmental overreach.

For more information on this costly and ultimately unsustainable issue, the Heritage Foundation’s Alyene Senger has written 10 Myths About the ObamaCare Medicaid Expansion.

Transparency tales from Obama regime

“The way to make government responsible is to hold it accountable. And the way to make government accountable is to make it transparent so the American people can know exactly what decisions are being made, how they are being made and whether their interests are being well served.”  — Barack Obama

 

“To seize this moment we have to use technology to open up our democracy. It’s no coincidence that one of the most secretive administrations in our history has favored special interests and pursued  policies that could not stand up to the sunlight. As president, I’m going to change that. We will put government data online in universally accessible formats. I’ll let citizens track federal grants, contracts, earmarks and lobbying contracts.  I’ll let you participate in government forums, ask questions in real time, offer suggestions that will be reviewed before decisions are made and let you comment on legislation before it is signed.  And to ensure that every government agency is meeting 21^st century standards, I will appoint the nation’s first chief technology officer to coordinate and make certain that we are always at the forefront of technology and that we are incorporating it into every decision that we make.”

Obama implodes: Feds stop at nothing to silence critics

Scandals, Benghazi, IRS scrutiny, phone taps = “I” word

MyWay News reports the Justice Department secretly obtained two months of telephone records of reporters and editors for The Associated Press in what the news cooperative’s top executive called a “massive and unprecedented intrusion” into how news organizations gather the news. When an agency clearly favorable to the Obama administration is under siege by the very regime they helped put in place, the impact of now seeing them bite the hand that fed them is monumental.

The Washington Post writes that Internal Revenue Service (IRS) officials at the agency’s Washington headquarters and at least two other offices were involved with investigating conservative and tea party affiliated groups seeking tax-exempt status, making clear that the effort reached well beyond the branch in Cincinnati that was initially blamed.

Breitbart News reveals Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell’s assertions regarding “the Obama effort to shut up opponents isn’t limited to the IRS. It applies to the FCC [Federal Communications Commission], SEC [Securities and Exchange Commission], FEC [Federal Elections Commission], HHS [Department of Health and Human Services”

The Wall Street Journal exposes the IRS’s scrutiny of conservative groups went beyond those with “tea party” or “patriot” in their names — as the agency admitted Friday — to also include ones worried about government spending, debt or taxes, and even ones that lobbied to “make America a better place to live,” according to new details of a government probe.

The UK’s Daily Mail includes this threatening 11-page IRS questionnaire sent out to the Richmond Tea Party after it applied for tax-exempt status.

The Benghazi cover up alone has reached a level of either incompetence or deceit that makes Watergate — the senate hearings which began 40 years ago this week May 17, 1973 — resemble chump change.

Former Arkansas Gov. Mike Huckabee said on his radio show this week, “I believe that before it’s all over, this president will not fill out his full term. As bad as Watergate was because it broke the trust between the president and the people, no one died. This is more serious because four Americans did in fact die. And President Obama has yet to explain why did they did.”

No wonder Sen. James Inhofe the top Republican on the Senate Armed Services Committee  told broadcaster Rusty Humphries that President Barack Obama could be impeached over the growing White House cover-up following last year’s attack in Benghazi, Libya. Inhofe accused Obama of overseeing “the most egregious cover-up in American history.”

But the ubiquitous John McCain wants none of it.  No siree.

Although McCain told ABC’s Martha Raddatz that he believes the Obama administration’s response to the terrorist attacks in Benghazi on Sept. 11, 2012, constituted a “cover-up” because “there was willful removal of information, which was obvious” — he has also defended his friend Obama against impeachment, saying, “I do not believe that the president has committed impeachable offenses — that’s high crimes.”

McCain might think covering up the Obama administration’s malfeasance, is not a high crime.  But even Señor Juan McCain should agree that illegally tapping the phones of reporters and the illegal targeting of conservative groups by the IRS do rise to the impeachable level:

“He has, acting personally and through his subordinates and agents, endeavored to ….cause, in violation of the constitutional rights of citizens, income tax audits or other income tax investigations to be initiated or conducted in a discriminatory manner.”

— Article II, Section 1, Articles of Impeachment against then-President Richard M. Nixon, adopted by the House Judiciary Committee, July 29, 1974.

Puerto Rico: Obama’s perfect 51st state

Poverty, government reliance make welfare island liberal ideal

Last November 6, in a non-binding statehood referendum, a majority of Puerto Rican voters — 61% — indicated they want the island to become the 51st U.S. state.

And the Obama administration is all too happy to comply. In fact, White House spokesman Jay Carney called on lawmakers to take action. “Congress should now study the results closely, and provide the people of Puerto Rico with a clear path forward that lays out the means by which Puerto Ricans themselves can determine their own status,” Carney said after the vote.

More than 809,000 predominately Spanish speaking Puerto Ricans said they want the commonwealth to become a U.S. state. And why not? According to this report from CNS News THIRTY-SEVEN PERCENT of the island’s population already receive over $2 billion in food stamps — courtesy of U.S. taxpayers!  Previous elections indicated the Latin American nation supported independence from the United States. A poll released last month, conducted jointly by Suffolk University and the Puerto Rican University of Turabo shows 70% now favor statehood.

What’s changed?

Puerto Rico has a yearly median household income of $19,122, with the current unemployment rate exceeding 14 percent. Instead of operating the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP), Puerto Rico administers untraceable block grants, within which 25 percent of a person’s benefit can be paid in cash, making it impossible to track how the generous American money gift is spent.

A law passed in 1917 made Puerto Ricans U.S. citizens. But the Caribbean island’s approximately 4 million residents cannot vote for president. Under its status as a commonwealth, residents are exempt from paying federal taxes. Puerto Rico sends Pedro R. Pierluisi, a nonvoting representative known as a resident commissioner in Congress.

During the 2012 election a new Governor was chosen. In an exhibition of erratic behavior the incumbent, pro-statehood Gov. Luis Furtuno of the “New Progressive Party” was ousted by Alejandro Garcia Padilla a member of the “Popular Democratic Party.” The party names tell the rest of the story.

The name by which Puerto Ricans identify the island on which they live is “Borinquen” — often  referred to as la isla del encanto, meaning “the island of enchantment.”

There’s no disputing the feeling of “enchantment” knowing that this impoverished, Obama supporting island is costing us a fortune and now wants statehood.

We urge you to read this older but fact-filled report from the Economist, detailing the widespread dependency it refers to as “Crutch Disease.”  Pass on it if you already have elevated blood pressure.  This information could bring on “the big one.”

 NOTICE:

In response to those who have inquired, Seeing Red AZ took the unusual step of closing comments to this post late Monday night because the arena for normal discourse had been hijacked by a rabid intruder who had written countless comments, jamming the inbox. The section is now open and the comments sent by that person will not appear again.

Lack of Benghazi coverage? It’s a family matter!

NewsBusters busts the political maneuvering behind embassy terrorist attack and cover-up

Foreign policy consultant and media commentator Richard Grenell appeared on Saturday’s Fox News Watch with host Jon Scott and exposed the familial relationships that thread from the highest ranking network honchos all the way to the White House.

Grenell stated, “CBS News President David Rhodes and ABC News President Ben Sherwood, both of them have siblings that not only work at the White House, that not only work for President Obama, but they work at the NSC (National Security Council) on foreign policy issues directly related to Benghazi.”

Read Noel Sheppard’s illuminating report — including the transcript and commentary — here.