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Study: State governments at high risk for corruption:

The person that wrote these headlines sound like someone that just came out of the dark ages. Corruption is as old as politics and probably older. A good majority of the bad boys and girls in these rackets are sitting behind some desk in governmental office building.

If every politician that had their hand out was put in jail the State of New Jersey would have to be completely leveled to build one big prison to house them all. It all starts at the top.

When reading some of these corruption fields below a person would think that they are reading a newspaper from the 1920’s & 1930’s when Scarface and the rest of the bums ran the city halls and county halls in the “Windy City”.

I don’t know if there is an actual account of all the expenses involved trying keep these criminals in check or sent to jail but it has to be in the billions a year throughout the country

Corruption

Corruption in different fields Political corruption •Police corruption •Corporate corruption •Corruption in local government

Index Corruption Perceptions Index

Institutions dealing with political corruption Transparency International •Global Witness •Group of States Against Corruption •Independent Commission Against Corruption •Commission for the Prevention of Corruption throughout the world

Anti-corruption laws and enforcement Freedom of information legislation •Whistle-blower protection • Integrity and Prevention of Corruption Act

International anti-corruption instruments and efforts United Nations Convention against Corruption •International asset recovery

Forms or aspects of corruption Baksheesh •Crony capitalism •Electoral fraud •Honest services fraud •Political scandal •Professional courtesy •Systemic corruption

Other Collusion – Black mail money – Tax havens – Kickbacks- Briber

Take Jimmy Di Mora from Cleveland for an example. This guy started out at the very bottom working in a waste water treatment plant in Cleveland. Eventually he maneuvered his way up through the ranks and finally got into the political arena by “hook or crook”. He even became the Mayor of Bedford Hts., Ohio and had the City Hall named after him. They are now trying to take his name off the front of the building.

Reading his resume you would think that this person is sitting on the top of the world with his toes facing the sun; instead he is sitting in a Federal jail in Akron, Ohio where he doesn’t have to worry about what number sun screen to use.

Jimmy Dimora – Commissioner, Vice President , Commissioner Jimmy Dimora, a lifelong resident of Cuyahoga County, has dedicated thirty-five years to public service as a city employee, city councilman, mayor, and county commissioner. Commissioner Dimora began serving in elected office as a two-term councilman in the City of Bedford Heights. In November 1981 he was elected to the first of five consecutive terms as the city’s mayor, serving for a total of seventeen years. In 2000, The Jimmy Dimora Community Center in Bedford Heights was named in his honor. First elected a Cuyahoga County Commissioner in 1998, he was re-elected in 2002 and again in 2006. Commissioner Dimora and his colleagues on the Board of County Commissioners oversee more than 8,500 employees and a $1.4 billion budget that provides a safety net for our most fragile citizens while also contributing to the region’s economic and workforce development needs.

Commissioner Dimora has held a number of leadership positions throughout our community, including every position in the county Mayors and City Managers Association. He is a former member of the Cuyahoga County Board of Elections, the University Hospitals Health System, Bedford Medical Center Board of Trustees, and is active in many charitable and community organizations. In 1994, he was elected to lead the Cuyahoga County Democratic Party and is currently in his fourth term as chairman. Commissioner Dimora has served three times as the President and three times as Vice President of the Board of County Commissioners. He is chairman of the Cuyahoga County Investment Advisory Committee, the Cuyahoga County Planning Commission and the Cuyahoga County Solid Waste Policy Committee.

Shall we call him a big wolf in sheep’s clothing or should we say that he became part of the system of modern day politics. Let us just say he had the world by the ass and didn’t know it.

Recently DiMora was convicted of 33 of the 34 counts against him which included bribery, conspiracy and racketeering. When he is sentenced in a month he will get enough time behind bars hotel where he will never again have to worry about which high class eatery he and the boys will eat in that day and who they are going to shake down to pick up their tab.

Jimmy is just one fish in the ocean of “would be/wanna be’s” racketeers that lost touch with reality in their successful lives that thought they were above the law and untouchable.

A couple of years ago when the criminal charges were initially brought against Jimmy he got on TV and bad mouthed anyone and everyone involved including the FBI, local news stations, local police and all investigating units. Through the delusion he was living under he thought that the authorities could not touch him.

From the beginning Jimmy denied any wrong doing and stated the “he didn’t do anything that everyone else does”. That is like Jeffery Dahmer saying that Charlie Manson did the same thing he did only he didn’t eat any of his victims. That was Jimmy’s biggest problem. The best thing he could have done was act like Sgt. Schultz on Hogan’s heroes and say “I know nothing”. It is called diarrhea of the mouth. It became comical watching him expounding on his innocents.

The Cuyahoga County investigation was said to be one of the biggest shake ups in the United States history. The number of contractors, judges, politicians and make believe mobsters that were involved was enormous.

Everyone that had dirty hands in shake up came out and showed their true identity by the using the reverse of “Omerta”. They sang more songs then Mario Lanza did at the Metropolitan Opera. The majority of all the gangsters looked like the crew of the Costa Concordia as they began throwing anchors to each other as the ship was sinking instead of life preservers. So much for the old mobster cliche “honor among thieves”.

A good majority of the people that were involved in the massive corruption scheme were very successful people in their own right and did not have to resort to illegal activities. Their biggest problem, just like in most of the corrupt mobsters around was one word, ”GREED”.

It is no big secret that lunches and dinners are bought daily, golf games are set up for business a little help here and a little help there; you scratch my back I’ll scratch yours; that is how business is done all over the world but what eventually happens in most cases, their lust for power and control overpowers them and turns into greed. They never have enough.

First comes the driveway they have put in for free, than the pool and finally they want a bigger house to go with it. Unfortunately; before some of these people are caught and put in the slams, some of them become very powerful and step on a lot of good citizens toes that are trying to live by the rules because they are not “one of the boys”.

If you take a little crust off the pie once and awhile no one will ever notice; if you take the whole pie at once that is when the red flags go up.

The real victims in these situations are the kids of the criminals that have to live with the shame and dishonor their father has brought upon them; not to mention having to lose their homes, their cars and just about everything they own being taken away for restitution to the people they scammed.

For all of you wise guys out there with your collars up; remember “Big Brother is watching you”. Give it up. In the long run it is not worth an extended vacation in the “cross bar hotel”. I now, it’s in your blood.