I’m sure the hundreds of multi-millionaires slithering through the halls of Congress are looking out for the best interests of the common man. They are the status quo working on behalf of the status quo. Click the link below if you want the details about Issa, Feinstein, Pelosi, Rockefeller, and the rest of the snakes in Congress.
Issa tops The Hill’s 50 Wealthiest
The chief inquisitor of President Obama’s White House is now Congress’s richest man.
House Oversight Committee Chairman Darrell Issa (R-Calif.) saw his fortune rise to at least $355 million in 2012, enough to take the crown on The Hill’s 50 Wealthiest list.
Issa, who made his riches with the Viper car security system, snatched the No. 1 spot away from Rep. Michael McCaul (R-Texas), who came in second with a net worth of at least $101 million.
Thirty-seven of the lawmakers on the list are from the House, with the remaining 13 coming from the Senate.
While several high-profile lawmakers are among the wealthiest — including Rep. Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) and Sen. Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) — most of the leading contenders for the White House in 2016 missed the top 50.
Rep. Paul Ryan (R-Wis.), the GOP’s vice presidential candidate in 2012, reported a minimum net worth of $2.3 million, while conservative star Sen. Ted Cruz (R-Texas) posted wealth of $1.5 million.
Two other rising GOP stars, Sens. Rand Paul (Ky.) and Marco Rubio (Fla.), reported more modest financial means. While Paul’s wealth stood at about $455,000, Rubio was in the red with a negative net worth of roughly $190,000.
On the Democratic side, Sen. Mark Warner (Va.) stood out among possible 2016 hopefuls with a minimum net worth of $88.5 million, good enough for third place on The Hill’s list.
Two other Democrats in the 2016 discussion, Sens. Elizabeth Warren (Mass.) and Kirsten Gillibrand (N.Y.), fell on opposite ends of the financial spectrum. While Warren reported a portfolio worth at least $3.9 million, Gillibrand was barely in the black with a net worth of $166,000.
The Hill’s Wealthiest list bid farewell to some familiar faces this year.
John Kerry — a perennial contender for richest lawmaker thanks to his wife’s ties to the Heinz ketchup fortune — left the Senate this year to serve as President Obama’s secretary of State.
Ex-Sen. Herb Kohl (D-Wis.), owner of the NBA’s Milwaukee Bucks and another regular on the list, decided to retire after last year’s election.
And the late Sen. Frank Lautenberg (D-N.J.), who was the first full-time salesman for the payroll processing company Automatic Data Processing, died in 2013.
Taking their place are several lawmakers who are serving their first terms on Capitol Hill.
Among the new additions is Rep. Joseph Kennedy (D-Mass.), whose $15.2 million showing continues the tradition of having a wealthy member of the Kennedy clan in Congress.
Other first-timers include Rep. Suzan DelBene (D-Wash.), a former Microsoft executive with wealth of at least $23.9 million; Rep. Chris Collins (R-N.Y.), a former businessman with $22.3 million; and Rep. Steve Daines (R-Mont.), a former tech entrepreneur with at least $9.2 million.
Other lawmakers earned a spot on the list after their assets climbed skyward.
Rep. Jim Cooper (D-Tenn.) saw his share in Kentucky and Tennessee farmland and real estate spike, helping to give him a net worth of $8.2 million. Rep. John Fleming’s (R-La.) wealth was $10.7 million in 2012 after his holdings in franchise development and properties soared in value.
But it’s Issa who stands as king of Capitol Hill, thanks in no small part to the removal of $100 million in liabilities from his balance sheet on his 2012 form.
Issa listed several investment funds among his assets, including some that are worth more than $50 million each. He also has properties valued in the millions of dollars.
Before coming to Congress, Issa was a successful chief executive who founded Directed Electronics and served as chairman of the Consumer Electronics Association.
The runner-up on the list, McCaul, owes much of his wealth to family trusts. His wife, Linda, is the daughter of Clear Channel Communications founder Lowry Mays.
To come up with its rankings, The Hill used financial disclosure forms covering the 2012 calendar year. The reports are not perfect, because they provide value ranges instead of exact figures.
The Hill adds up the low figures in each value range for every asset and liability. Then, the sum of a lawmaker’s liabilities is deducted from the sum of his or her assets to calculate a minimum net worth.
Some lawmakers provide lengthy bank statements or investment reports with their annual financial statements. The Hill uses exact figures when possible.
The methodology is designed to provide a conservative estimate of a lawmaker’s worth, and it’s likely that many lawmakers, such as Issa and McCaul, are wealthier than their reports indicate.
Read more: http://thehill.com/business-a-lobbying/317429-the-hills-50-wealthiest-lawmakers-#ixzz2cWbdZAwZ Follow us: @thehill on Twitter | TheHill on Facebook
The federal bureaucracy is too far gone to save. We need to repeal ObamaCare, but instead we’re going to get a government shutdown. January 2014 is when the job market goes the way of the housing market, after that, the dollar will collapse as our debt driven consumer economy can expand no further.
I don’t expect we’ll make it through next summer without civil unrest and turmoil, the likes which haven’t been seen since the last Great Depression.That’s why DHS is staging military gear and equipment around the country. It isn’t to provide relief to 280 million Americans, it’s to implement martial law. Then we’ll see neo-liberalism and neo-feudalism were the same thing, and begin asking ourselves, how do we break the bonds of oppression?
The answer today is the Tea Party and the Occupy Movement. November 2014 will be a critical election to get free thinking candidates elected to office who aren’t too afraid to stand up to the status quo. The left and the right, have a common enemy, it’s the status quo, and it doesn’t care who’s in power. They’ve got their bases covered in both parties. Status quo should be challenged at both the state and federal levels, because the current status is unsustainable.
Nonanonymous – The American populace was a much more respectful, kind and generous peoples during the great depression. And one of the greatest things to come out of the Great Depression was a nation of mostly thrifty, hard working savers ! That generation BUILT most of everything we take for granted today. Most importantly that generation built REAL WEALTH – not debt induced hokus pocus smoke and mirrors paper shenanigans. I do not know about your observations / views but as I look around my environment I see a mostly fat, cell phone / facebook addicted, easily angered, pierced and tattooed up populace that wouldn’t make it for one week without Dunkin Donuts / Micky D’s / internet or cell phone connection / debit / credit cards or their weekly paycheck (if they are lucky enough to have a weekly pay check). And the people that I know well are tired of working their ass’s off to try and get ahead while constantly being bombarded with new taxes, and state and federal regulations – in short, they are angry ! When the SHTF these easily angered massed are going to tear this country apart ! SOMETHING WICKED THIS WAY COMES !
Skinbag, agreed something wicked, and that something is the enemy of god, who is Satan and the Devil.
History teaches us what has happened in the past. Never before in the history of man has so much information been available to so many people. We have the internet, the modern tower of babel. The original tower was a planetarium, although I’m not sure how that would enable the dawn of civilization to “be able to do anything” or why the devil was allowed to cause them to lose their ability to understand one another, the idiom of permission. The printing press brought about the protestant revolution by putting God’s Word in the hand of everyman.
People will generally do what is right. The difficulty is they don’t know what is right, and when they are told, they’re disobedient. We have the example of the people of Israel. I expect no different from this generation, so I tend to agree we are in for a shit storm. However, hope resides in the knowledge of God and the truth of his word. We cannot destroy the Devil, but we can destroy his works,
“The reason the Son of God appeared was to destroy the works of the devil.” (1 John 3:8b, ESV)
Jesus Christ exposed the kingdom of the Devil. He cast out devil spirits, and they adapted their ways. Prior to Christ, the Israelites were required to ceremonially wash their pots and pans, and not eat certain things to maintain the spiritual purity of the household. We live under the law of grace, not the law of sin, so that any man can come to God through the sacrifice of his son, Jesus Christ.
Wickedness has always been in the world. The 20th century was a century of war. Technology has enabled warfare to reach the point where there are three super powers. We don’t have any influence in those countries, but we can influence the US. Right now, the US is collaborating with China and Russia to divide up the spoils of the world, retaining power while subjugating their people. It requires the destruction of the american people, and perhaps rightly so, given our carbon footprint. We can look to the people of Russia, or China and understand that no American would trade the freedom they have today for residence in either of those countries. Russia is a thugocracy, and China is a party run state. We’re closer to China than to Russia’s politics, since the fall of the soviet union. It should be noted that central planning doesn’t work, anywhere, where decentralization is key to free market economies. This is not laissez faire, but leveling the playing field. The opposite of what occurred under Clinton/Bush.
While we can’t control what happens elsewhere in the world, we can influence politics here. The tea party has the most effective strategy, thus far. One can read their core beliefs at http://www.teaparty.org/about-us/ and except for a few minor points, who would disagree except those committed to the destruction of the country, and apparently rebuilding it in their image? Is our struggle simply one of cultural identity? No, because what the US stood for is individual freedom. This is being replaced by a fascist state before our very eyes, underlining the critical necessity of electing freedom minded candidates who will uphold the constitutional rights of individuals and stand against the tyranny of the federal bureaucracy. It is either the destruction of this bureaucracy or the destruction of the american people. We cannot co-exist.
I regret that I have but one Thumbs Down to give to the above post.