Good day all. Do you recall one of Obama’s bigger boondoggles, the so called “Obamaphones?” These were free cellphones with service plans given to welfare recipients. While these people were screaming Free Phones!” we all know who was actually paying for them.
Now, a new report has been released on this program and to the surprise of no one, was loaded with fraud. Here are the details from the Washington Times:
The controversial “Obamaphone” program, which pays for cellphones for the poor, is rife with fraud, according to a new government report released Thursday that found more than a third of enrollees may not even be qualified. Known officially as the Lifeline Program, the phone giveaway became a symbol of government waste in the previous administration. Now a new report from the Government Accountability Office bears out those concerns.
The report, requested by Sen. Claire McCaskill, Missouri Democrat, also says the program has stashed some $9 billion in assets in private bank accounts rather than with the federal treasury, further increasing risks and depriving taxpayers of the full benefit of that money.
Translation: These morons got caught, and we want our money back. Oh, the treasury? The taxpayers? Screw them! This is My money and I will decide how to spend it!
“A complete lack of oversight is causing this program to fail the American taxpayer — everything that could go wrong is going wrong,” said Mrs. McCaskill, ranking Democrat on the Senate’s chief oversight committee and who is a former state auditor in Missouri.
“We’re currently letting phone companies cash a government check every month with little more than the honor system to hold them accountable, and that simply can’t continue,” she said.
Now this program does predate Der Fubar’s maladministration, but he is the one who started handing out taxpayer’s money to the deadbeat brigades by the truckload.
Some 10.6 million people have an Obamaphone, but 36 percent of them may not qualify, investigators said after sampling the population and finding a huge chunk of people couldn’t prove they were eligible.
Probably because they weren’t. As for the mobile service companies? Yeah, they weren’t to eager to check on the eligibility. Why? Would you want to shut down a near guaranteed revenue stream?
Investigators also submitted fraudulent applications to see what would happen, and 12 of the 19 phone carriers they applied to approved a phone.
Thursday’s report is just the latest warning from the GAO, which is the government’s chief watchdog. Previous reports had warned the Obama administration the program was susceptible to double-dipping, and that the FCC didn’t even have a good yardstick to measure whether the program was meeting its goals.
And the response from King Putt’s court of jesters? It was about what you would expect from that den of thieves and miscreants.
The FCC had promised to make changes, but the new report says those have fallen short.
GAO investigators questioned whether the program is even needed anymore. The price of phones and service on many plans have dropped dramatically, making them affordable for nearly everyone, the GAO says. Investigators also found that without the free government phone, many recipients would gladly pay for the services on their own anyway.
Would you care to hazard a guess what I pay for my mobile service? It’s rarely gone above $30/month and averages about $21/month. This month, I may not pay more than $17, since I’m not using my phone that much. My biggest expense was my phone, and it’s 2 years old. I also have no planes to replace it anytime soon since I don’t need to. It’s time to shut this worthless program down once and for all, and end the tax we have to pay each month. I’m tired of providing free phone service to Wanda the Welfare Wench, and I’m not alone. Wanda can buy her own phone.
Thatisall
~The Angry Webmaster~
[yasr_visitor_votes size=”large”]
