A lot of folks have noticed the eerie silence here in recent weeks. Is it the usual calm before the storm or something more ominous? Or is it simply a natural phenomenon in the scorching heat of summer?<\/p>\n
At the same time, I can\u2019t place my finger on a haunting and persistent echo at dusk. Or has my imagination gone on overdrive?<\/p>\n
Meanwhile, some 75,000 illegal kids enter the country\u2019s southern border monthly. Yet the lamestream media\u2019s manufactured crisis blames Trump for the separation of kids and parents. Trump has done something about it to rectify current laws approved by Democrats.<\/p>\n
Anyway, let\u2019s share preliminary views on relevant issues here before the raucous slugfest picks up speed and decibels.<\/p>\n
Number 80!<\/strong> It\u2019s hard pinning down decent rationale why the powers-that-be raised their salaries by 80 percent while ditching nearly 15,000 employees literally struggling with poverty income level and below. It must be a show of unhinged arrogance and greed!<\/p>\n The new increase raises the governor\u2019s from $70,000 to $120,000 while legislators (with all perks included) $70,000 to $106,000 per year. And they threw 5 percent breadcrumbs at civil servants.<\/p>\n Closer scrutiny shows the huge difference in salaries between the elected elite against everybody else. If you\u2019re a civil service employee earning $24,600 per year, you\u2019re looking at a $30,000 gap. It\u2019s oceans apart! <\/p>\n This action slides into what\u2019s known as income \u201cinequality\u201d that slams its ugly face into the term corruption! Despicably pathetic! Voters can say their piece this November when they send the foggy minded incompetent bunch permanently into the sunset.<\/p>\n Feud:<\/strong> My source said Republicans are struggling in a three-way feud over control of the party this election year. Understood the struggle in who commands the troops. It\u2019s all about \u201cAre you da boss of me?\u201d<\/p>\n Meanwhile, Democrats and independent have formalized unity recently. The mood is a stark difference versus the GOP in the level of enthusiasm and fellowship. There\u2019s that determination to upset the apple cart at all cost. It has the natural narrative to slam its nemesis at will, rain or shine!<\/p>\n Anyway, it\u2019s the nature of the beast. The exhausted GOP isn\u2019t sure it could navigate the rough seas of self-inflicted arrogance and greed.<\/p>\n Necessity:<\/strong> As the Babauta-Sablan tandem firms up plans to visit the campaign trail, Raffy and Arnie are dazed and deeply troubled by the obvious: 80-percent salary hike that openly skips poverty income employees. What could Raffy do to mend the fatal oversight on the dire need to improve the buying power of thousands of families it ignored with four months before the election?<\/p>\n Collusion?<\/strong> Whatever happened to your oath of office to uphold the laws of the land? Or did you lose your coconuts because Biktot Hokog is from the same political party? Has Gov. Raffy asked his lieutenant to pay back the $400,000? <\/p>\n Have any of the Republican members of the Legislature insisted that this corrupt expropriation of taxpayers\u2019 money is repaid forthwith? Or have you guys gotten \u201ccollusion\u201d down to an art?<\/p>\n Maanee:<\/strong> Meanwhile, I understand there\u2019s about $20 million in the so-called Marianas Chest. Would this be used for another pay off of Ulithi, oops, utility bills like they did four years ago? <\/p>\n Fed law:<\/strong> Took a quick glimpse into what\u2019s known as the Hobbs Act as it relates to bribery and public corruption. It\u2019s written in plain English and I\u2019d like to share it verbatim for your own benefit. Well, ignorance of the law isn\u2019t an excuse. It\u2019s good to know what you\u2019re up against both in terms of local and federal law. Be guided accordingly.<\/p>\n \u201cMost public corruption cases involve allegations that a public official solicited or received a bribe, kickback, or gratuity \u201cin return for\u201d or \u201cin connection with\u201d some official action, or that a person offered or gave such a bribe, kickback or gratuity to the public official \u201cin return for\u201d or \u201cin connection with an official act.\u201d \u201cA bribe or gratuity does not have to be given or received\u2014the promise alone is usually enough to constitute a crime.<\/p>\n \u201cEven if a public official corruptly accepts money for an act he would have taken anyway, he still may be guilty under federal bribery and public corruption statutes. The intricacies of these\u00a0federal public corruption statutes, and the subtle\u00a0defenses available through U.S. Supreme Court case law\u00a0require sophisticated legal representation at the earliest possible stage.\u201d Review this law even if it means reading it all over well into the wee hours of dawn.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" A lot of folks have noticed the eerie silence here in recent weeks. Is it…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":7,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[141,163,190,223],"class_list":["post-278632","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-opinion","tag-gop","tag-kids","tag-natural","tag-party"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/278632","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/7"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=278632"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/278632\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=278632"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=278632"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=278632"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}