Sanders Campaign Raises Money For Coronavirus Victims

Regular readers of this blog will know I did not support Senator Bernie Sanders for the Democratic presidential nomination. I support his progressive views, but did not think he would be able to beat Trump in the general election.

I do admire his latest action though. He has put his progressive view and morality into real action. Instead of asking his supporters for more money for his campaign, he has asked them to donate money for charity -- specifically charities to help the victims of the Coronavirus.

And his supporters rose to the occasion. They have donated over $2 million dollars, and more is expected in the future.

On this, I have nothing but praise and respect for Senator Sanders, and for his supporters who answered the call to help.

The charities that will receive the money are:

Meals on Wheels
No Kid Hungry
Restaurant Workers' Community Foundation
COVID-19 Emergency Relief Fund
One Fair Wage Emergency Fund
National Domestic Workers Alliance

Trump's "Charity" Was Just A Slush Fund To Avoid Taxes

(Cartoon image is by Robert Ariail in The State.)

The federal government doesn't make charities pay taxes. That's because the funds donated to those charities are supposed to be used for the good of people who need help. But that doesn't seem to have been a goal of the Trump Foundation. It was set up as a "charity" to avoid taxes, but it did not use its funds for charitable purposes. Instead, it operated as a piggy bank for the Trump family -- paying their personal expenses, and in violation of campaign laws, even donating money to Trump's presidential campaign.

Trump may have thought he was being smart in doing that, but it has caught up with him. The New York Attorney General has filed suit, demanding the Trump Foundation be disbanded and pay huge financial penalties for the wrongdoing. The trial is expected to start shortly before the mid-term elections.

Here is part of an article on this by Adam Davidson in The New Yorker:

Barring an unexpected change, the Donald J. Trump Foundation will be defending itself in a New York courtroom shortly before this fall’s midterm elections. The proceedings seem unlikely to go well for the institution and its leadership; President Trump and his elder children, Ivanka, Donald, Jr., and Eric, are being sued by New York’s attorney general, Barbara Underwood, for using the charity to enrich and benefit the Trump family. On Tuesday, the judge in the case, Saliann Scarpulla, made a series of comments and rulings from the bench that hinted—well, all but screamed—that she believes the Trump family has done some very bad things.

The judge seemed frustrated, even confused, that the Trumps were fighting the case at all. At one point, she told a lawyer for the Trump children that they should just settle out of court and voluntarily agree to one of the sanctions: a demand by the Attorney General that they not serve on the boards of any nonprofits for one year. (The case will be tried in civil court, and the Trumps aren’t facing any criminal charges.) That’s far from the worst sort of punishment, but to accede to it would be a public embarrassment and an acknowledgement that the family did, indeed, use the foundation as something of a private slush fund to enrich themselves and reward their cronies. Judge Scarpulla made clear that she felt the children should agree to the sanction now, and that, if they don’t, she will probably impose a similar restriction “with or without your agreement.”

The case against the Trumps appears damning. Charitable foundations are governed by a crucial compromise: they can operate without paying taxes on the condition that their leadership insures that all money spent is spent in pursuit of the public good. The case brought by Attorney General Underwood shows that the Trump Foundation was neither well-managed nor focussed on what would generally be considered the public good. Its operations were shockingly sloppy; at least one of the organization’s official board members said that he had no idea he was on the board and that the board had never met, to his knowledge. No surprise, then, that the other controls that normally govern nonprofits were absent. As David Fahrenthold, of the Washington Post, exposed in a series of stories in 2016, the Foundation did virtually none of the charitable things it claimed to be doing.

In recent years, the only “contributions” to the charity seem to have been payments from business partners, not from the Trumps or the Trump Organization. The charity’s spending appears to have benefitted the Trumps themselves, not the public welfare. The organization had been operating this way for years, but, according to Underwood, in 2016 the Trump Foundation became an arm of the Trump political campaign, cutting checks to Trump’s political allies in key states just before the election. If true, this would mean that the Trump Foundation evolved from a mere tax-avoidance scheme into an instrument for carrying out potential acts of campaign-finance fraud. The Attorney General made clear that her evidence could support criminal cases against the Trumps, but she has no jurisdiction to bring such charges, since tax and campaign fraud are federal matters. She referred the case to federal officials, though it seems unlikely that the I.R.S. or the Federal Election Commission would choose to prosecute a sitting President or his children.

During Tuesday’s hearing, the Trump Foundation’s lawyer, Alan Futerfas, asked that the trial not commence in October, because it was so close to the midterms. Judge Scarpulla laughed in response, did not change the trial date, and hinted that she is likely to require the President to testify. It is not clear, however, that such a trial would dramatically change how people vote; it was clear during the 2016 Presidential election, thanks to Fahrenthold’s reporting, that the Trump Foundation was almost certainly engaged in systematic fraud.

NY Attorney General Files Suit Against Trump Foundation

The Trump Foundation is supposed to be a charity. It's not. It's just another scam by Trump to fleece the public (like his fraudulent Trump University). The board governing the foundation has not met for years, and no Trump has donated to it for many years. And while the foundation donated little (if any) to real charities, Trump and his family used it as a personal piggy bank.

The Attorney General of New York (Barbara Underwood) has had enough. She has filed suit against the foundation and the Trump family. She is alleging that the foundation violates state and federal charity laws, and had an illegal connection to the Trump campaign. She is asking that the foundation be dissolved, and $2.8 be paid in restitution, plus other money as penalties for the illegal activity.

Good! This was long overdue.

Trump's Greed: Taking Money From A Kid's Cancer Charity

(This caricature of a greedy Donald Trump is by DonkeyHotey.)

It should come as no surprise that Donald Trump is a very greedy individual. It was so during his time as a private citizen, and he is now using his elected office to enrich himself.

But we now learn there is no limit to his greed. He is so greedy that he would take money raised to go to a charity for cancer-stricken children (and how can anyone go lower than that).

Since about 2010, Trump's son Eric has held a golf tournament to raise money for St. Jude's Children's Research Hospital. It's a  good cause, and Eric Trump should be proud of raising money for that cause.

Eric Trump advertised the golf tournament as debt-free for the charity -- since it's held at his father's golf course and other expenses are also donated. He claims that all of the money therefore goes to the charity.

That's the way it operated for the first few years -- until Donald Trump began to see how much money was being raised, and decided that a chunk of that money should go into his own pocket. He instructed the golf club to stop allowing the tournament (and dinner) to be held for free. He told them to charge his son's charity for all expenses. The last tournament paid Trump over $300,000 for expenses. Since there's no way the tournament could cost that much, it seems that Trump is taking a bit extra for his own benefit (instead of letting the money simply go to the charity).

And that's not all. It seems that another $500,000 was held back from the designated charity, and given to other charities of the Trump family. Charities that also hold golf tournaments at Donald Trump's golf course -- putting more money into Trump's own pocket.

The whole story is explained in an article in Forbes Magazine. I urge you to read the whole thing. If it doesn't make you mad, then you are a die-hard (and heartless) trumpista.

Trump (& Giuliani) Are LYING About The Clinton Foundation

You can tell that the Trump campaign is getting desperate by the number and volume of the lies told about his opponent. The latest one concerns the Clinton Foundation. Donald Trump (and his lap dog Rudy Giuliani) have lately been saying that Hillary Clinton, to enrich herself while Secretary of State, sold access to her office for donations to the foundation. Let me be clear:

THAT IS AN OUTRAGEOUS LIE!!!!!

None of the money raised raised for the Clinton Foundation has gone into the pockets (or bank accounts) of Bill or Hillary Clinton -- not a single penny. In fact, CharityWatch (which investigates how charities use the money they raise) gave the Clinton Foundation an "A" rating (the highest rating they give).

That's because the Clinton Foundation spends 87.2% of funds received to help millions of people around the world (a larger percentage than most other charities spend on their stated missions). About 8.6% is spent on employee salaries and other operating expenses, and 3.7% is spent on fundraising. The other 0.5% is to provide for uncollectible pledges. Frankly, those are numbers that all charities should aspire to have.

One of the things Trump (and some in the media) are crowing about is the fact that some donors to the foundation also were able to meet with Clinton while she was Secretary of State. That is true. I would have been surprised if it wasn't true. But there is absolutely NO proof that the donations were a quid pro quo for meeting with Clinton. Those people would likely have been able to meet with Clinton anyway -- just like many people did who did not donate to the foundation.

This is just Donald Trump's latest effort to label Clinton as a "crook". But the truth is that she's one of the cleanest politicians around. She's been investigated by her enemies for over a quarter of a century now, and no one has been able to find even the smallest illegal or immoral act she has committed. Can anyone say the same about Donald Trump?

Colbert "Spends" His PAC Funds

As you may know, comedian (and presidential candidate) Stephen Colbert started his own political PAC during the last campaign -- and his fans donated hundreds of thousands of dollars to the PAC. After the election, the PAC was left with $773,804.83 left in it. Some wondered what was going to happen to all that money. Now we have the answer. In a rather humorous letter sent to those on his e-mail list, Colbert tells everyone that the money has been donated to various charities, including several who are helping Hurricane Sandy victims. Here is his letter:

My Dearest Email List,

Last month, my friend Ham Rove passed away in a very unsuspicious fashion. On the same day, Colbert Super PAC's money, $773,704.83, was squirreled away in a fashion that was extremely suspicious, but entirely legal. I thought that's the last I'd hear from Ham Rove, particularly because a dog ate him.

But Ham Rove had plans beyond his death, and I was recently surprised to find myself on the board of the Ham Rove Memorial Foundation. I was equally surprised to learn we received a $773,704.83 donation. Where did that very specific amount of money come from? There's simply no way to know.

Tonight, I am honored to announce First and Final Annual Charitable Donations by the Ham Rove Memorial Fund.

Hurricane Sandy was much like Ham Rove: Cold, cruel, salty, and the cause of untold devastation. In his honor, Donors Choose, Team Rubicon, and Habitat For Humanity will each receive $125,000 to assist with their Sandy relief efforts.

We'll also be donating $125,000 to the Yellow Ribbon Fund, which serves wounded soldiers and their families. My attempts to get a matching donation to the Blue Ribbon Fund, which serves me frosty cans of PBR, were not successful.

The remaining money will be split between two pro-transparency groups who fight against the corrupting influence of outside money in politics. Luckily, they were both fine with the corrupting influence of outside money in their offices. As per his wishes, the Center for Responsive Politics has officially renamed their meeting space "The Colbert Super Pac Memorial Conference Room." And the Campaign Legal Center will, from here on out, be home to "The Ham Rove Memorial Conference Room."

It is the highest compliment that I can pay when I say I miss Ham Rove almost as much as I miss that money. I wish he could have stayed with us a little longer. Because now I have to plan a whole new Christmas dinner.

Yours Givingly,

Stephen Colbert
Accidental Chairman, The Ham Rove Memorial Fund

A Church Is Not A Charity

There was an article in my hometown newspaper yesterday (from the Associated Press) that was titled: Less Religious States Give Less To Charity. Since I am not a religious person, I'll admit that headline bothered me a bit. Are less religious people really less caring about their fellow citizens who are hurting? I didn't think so, so I read the article.

It turns out that the parts of the country that are more religious do seem to give more to "charity" than do the states that are less religious, according to charitable deductions reported by the IRS. For instance, the less religious states of the Northeast gave an average of 4.1% of their discretionary income to charities while the more religious states in the South gave an average of 5.2% of their discretionary income. And the state of Utah gave the most, coming in at about 10.6% of discretionary income.

That last statistic, the one from Utah, should give you a real clue as to what is going on here. The mormon church demands a tithe of 10% from its members -- and this survey of "charitable" giving includes money given to churches. Once you know that, it only makes sense that the more religious states would be giving more. They are not giving more to real charities, but to the churches they attend.

This brings up a question -- are churches really charities, or are they businesses supporting a religious view? I know some of you will chime in that churches do charitable work in the community, and I'll admit that some of them do some of that. But most of their money (listed in the survey as charitable giving) is not spent on real charitable efforts at all. It is spent on church salaries, church buildings, utilities for the church, missionary work, advertising, and church functions. That is not charitable spending, but spending to further the business of religion.

A real charity is one where almost all of the funds received are spent on charitable efforts -- like feeding the hungry, clothing and housing the poor, researching the causes of serious illnesses, providing help for the disabled, helping pay for medical treatment and medicines for those who cannot pay themselves, etc.

And by that standard, churches are not charities. They may (or may not) spend a little for charitable purposes, but the great bulk of their spending goes to promote their business -- religion. They have the right to spend their money any way they wish, but we should not be classifying the promoting of religion to be a charitable work.

I'll bet when you subtract giving to churches, the less religious states would be equal (or even ahead) of the more religious states in real charitable giving.

Candidate Taxes And Charitable Giving

A couple of the prime beliefs of Republicans, including the presidential candidates, are that the rich are taxed too much and the federal government should not be helping poor people. They believe it is through private charities that the poor should be helped. Those kind of beliefs open them up to examination, to see if they live up to their words -- and that is just what The Washington Post has done. They took the candidate tax returns and pulled from it the income, the taxes paid, and the charitable donations made. Here is what they found:

MITT AND ANN ROMNEY
adjusted gross income -- $21,646,507
taxes paid -- $3,009,766
tax rate -- 13.90%
charitable donations -- $2,983,974
charitable percentage -- 13.79%

RICK AND KAREN SANTORUM
adjusted gross income -- $923,411
taxes paid -- $263,442
tax rate -- 28.53%
charitable donations -- $16,289
charitable percentage -- 1.76%

NEWT AND CALLISTA GINGRICH
adjusted gross income -- $3,142,066
taxes paid -- $994,708
tax rate -- 31.66%
charitable donations -- $81,133
charitable percentage -- 2.58%

RON PAUL has still refused to release his tax returns. He is still trying to hide his income, tax rate, and charitable donations from the voters. I was going to say he should be ashamed of trying to hide these, but maybe he is ashamed -- of how much he made and how little he paid in taxes and gave in charitable donations.

The Romneys come out looking pretty good in how much they gave in charitable donations. About 13.79% is not bad. Where they fall down is in the tax rate they paid. Paying only a 13.90% tax rate after making over $21 million is pathetic.

It is just the opposite for the Santorums and Gingrichs. They paid a decent tax rate, but their charitable giving left a lot to be desired (especially since they think private charities should be the only ones to help the poor). Neither one gave as much as 3%.

Naturally this brings up the question of how these Republican candidates compare to President Barack Obama and his wife Michelle. Actually the Obamas come out looking best of all -- paying a decent tax rate and giving a good percentage to charity. Here are their figures:

BARACK AND MICHELLE OBAMA
adjusted gross income -- $1,728,096
taxes paid -- $453,770
tax rate -- 26.26%
charitable donations -- $245,075
charitable percentage -- 14.18%

This So-Called "Charity" Is Just A Scam

The state police in the state of Texas are called the Department of Public Safety, and the brave men and women who work the highways and byways of the state to keep the citizens safe are called troopers. But to many Texans these DPS troopers are simply the "Highway Patrol". Unfortunately, for the last few years there is an unscrupulous group of people who have latched on to that name to bilk the citizens of Texas in a fraudulent charity scheme.

This organization calls itself the Texas Highway Patrol Association (THPA), and claim they are raising money to help the families of DPS troopers who have been killed in the line of duty. But the THPA is NOT associated with the Department of Public Safety in any way, and in fact, the Texas Department of Public Safety has disavowed them many times in the past. Even worse, most of the money raised by the group does not go to help trooper's families.

It is generally considered that any group that can legitimately call itself a charity must use at least 60% of the money they raise for the purpose they claim is it being raised (and personally I think that percentage should be even higher). But the THPA doesn't come anywhere near the 60% mark. Here are the figures for the money they raised and the money that went to trooper's families for a six-year period. You decide if this is a charity or a scam.

2009
Money raised by the THPA: $2,230,251
Money donated to families: $0
Percentage: 0%

2008
Money raised by the THPA: $1,843,354
Money donated to families: $10,000
Percentage: 0.54%

2007
Money raised by the THPA: $1,720,235
Money donated to families: $10,000
Percentage: 0.58%

2006
Money raised by the THPA: $1,853,647
Money donated to families: $20,000
Percentage: 1.08%

2005
Money raised by the THPA: $2,396,355
Money donated to families: $0
Percentage: 0%

2004
Money raised by the THPA: $1,929,385
Money donated to families: $10,000
Percentage: 0.52%

I don't know about you, but these figures don't add up to a viable charity to me. It looks far more like a scam to use the families of slain troopers to just make money for the people running this organization (and I'll bet they pay themselves a pretty nice salary). There is not a single year where the payout to trooper's families (which is supposed to be the reason for their existence) came to more than 1.08% of revenues raised, and most years it does not even come up to the 1% mark.

If this group calls you and asks for a donation, do NOT give them a dime. They are not connected to the Department of Public Safety in any way, and they will not use the money for the purpose they claim to be raising it for.

Thanks goes to the great Texas blog Grits for Breakfast for bringing this to our attention.

Salvation Army Is Throwing Away Donated Toys

I think most of us would agree that this time of year, whatever you call it, is a special time of year for children.   But it can be a sad time for poverty-stricken children, and with this never-ending recession the number of children whose families are poverty-stricken has multiplied immensely.   Fortunately, there are a lot of people in this country who go out of their way to buy and donate toys for underprivileged children (and many of these good people go without things for themselves to make this donation).

This unselfish act by good people is one of the things that makes me think there may be hope for the human race.   And of course we all hope and expect that these donated toys find their way to a home where they make some child very happy on December 25th.   Unfortunately, they may not be happening.

It seems the Salvation Army may once again be letting their rather odd beliefs get in the way of helping children and honoring the wishes of those who donate toys.   Last year at this time we learned the Salvation Army was refusing to give donated toys to children of undocumented immigrants (as though those children were not deserving of a little happiness).   Happily, the bad publicity the organization received over this mean-spirited action forced them to abandon that practice.

But this year the Salvation Army is once again letting its beliefs get in the way of the charitable efforts of their donors.   This year the Salvation Army has decided that certain toys are not compatible with their religious beliefs -- such as toys based on the Harry Potter and Twilight movies (popular toys that many children would love to have).   Captain Pam Goodyear of the Salvation Army said,   "The Salvation Army is based on christian principles, so these things are not in line with those."

Now one would think the Salvation Army would tell the donors so they could take the toys to another charity (or forward these toys to another charity themselves), but they don't.   They accept them and then throw them away (although it seems that plastic M-16s and other war toys are Ok and compatible with their beliefs).   This is just wrong on more than one level -- it shows no respect for the charity of donors and it deprives children of toys they would love.

This is the kind of thing that makes me happy I don't toss money into their red kettles or make any other kind of donation to the Salvation Army.   Their strange beliefs get in the way of their charity efforts far too often.

I don't want to discourage anyone from donating toys, but I do urge you to do that with an organization that respects your efforts and the happiness of children.   There are many, but my recommendation is the Toys for Tots Program done each year by the United States Marine Corp.   They'll make sure every toy finds a home with a happy child.

Sean Hannity - A Real Con Man

While right-wing whackos like Glen Beck, Rush Limbaugh and Sarah Palin have been getting all the headlines recently, some others like Sean Hannity have been sort of flying under the radar. Now it turns out that Hannity may be the biggest con man of them all -- a real con man bilking his fans out of millions of dollars in a fake charity.

Hannity created a charity called Freedom Alliance. According to Hannity, this charity was to help soldiers who had been injured in Iraq and Afghanistan and to help pay for college for their children. To fund the charity, he held "Freedom concerts" across the country where the entertainers performed for nothing (and even paid their own way to get to the venue). He also sent out form letters asking for donations, and those letters promised that 100% of the money raised would be used to help the soldiers and their children.

To their credit, Hannity's right-wing fans fed millions of dollars into the charity through the concerts and the donations. There was only one problem. Very little of the money was getting to the military victims of the wars and their children. For a charity to be valid, at least 75% of the money raised must go toward helping the intended charity recipients (and most of the better charities do even better than that). But the intended recipients of Hannity's charity didn't receive anything even close to 75% of donations.

The great bulk of the donated money was spent on staff, advisors, form letters, postage, etc. At least $200,000 of the money raised at each concert was spent to fly Hannity, his family and friends to the concerts, rent limousines to ferry them around, and rooms at expensive hotels for them to stay in. Here are the figures for donations and money given to intended recipients according to the charity's tax forms:

2006

$10,822,785 in donations received

3.68% went to intended recipients

2007

$12,459,317 in donations received

7.19% went to intended recipients

2008

$8,781,431 in donations received

12.07% went to intended recipients

Folks, this is not a charity. This is a SCAM! While a few wounded soldiers and their children received a pittance, Hannity and his employees and advisors have been living high on the hog off the rest. How can this qualify as a charity when, at most, only 12% of donations actually went to the intended purpose?

Now some of you may be thinking this is just another left-wing attack on that great patriot Sean Hannity. Not so! The investigation that exposed Hannity's con game was done by right-wing columnist and blogger Debbie Schlussel. I invite you to go to her web site, where she has much more on Hannity's scam.

Schlussel puts it well when she says:

"You’ve heard the saying, 'Patriotism is the last refuge of a scoundrel.' I love patriotism, but in this case, Sean Hannity’s “Freedom Concerts” and the Freedom Alliance are Exhibit A of that saying. But they’re not really patriots. Not even close. Their only patriotism is to the faces they see in their mirrors."