Tag: Regulatory Capture

Wednesday Open: Don’t believe a word the Gov or Chaney says….

Folks I’m afraid our Gov and Insurance Commissioner are still wholly owned subsidiaries of State Farm. Last election they both supported a Policyholder Bill of Rights and here we are four years later with zilch, zip and nada so I wouldn’t hang my hat on anything Bryant or Chaney has to say about actually helping the people that elect ’em down here on the coast.

Next up is SRHS as now each case that was removed to Federal Court has been remanded:

SRHS cases headed back to Chancery ~ Anita Lee

Rumor holds the fight in Chancery court is shaping up to be a nasty one, which happens to be Slabbed’s favorite variety.

Next up from Diamondhead and a full contact POA meeting:

Former DH POA President Elton Marshall Kyger found guilty of assault ~ Dwayne Bremer

I end with this:

What right do you have to an opinion about anything? ~ Library Chronicles Continue reading “Wednesday Open: Don’t believe a word the Gov or Chaney says….”

Commission on Marine Resources again overrules DMR Scientific staff

This is what happens when, by design, the oversight board for an agency is structured to be captured out of the gate and people with an economic interest in specific outcomes allow their personal financial interests to trump the public interest:

CMR to allow limited oyster dredging season ~ Steve Phillips

Of course the people with the economic interest in specific outcomes were the same people who brought the public Billy Walker and his reign of thievery.  That said there is one person on the CMR who is actually looking out for more than just himself:

Those same concerns were echoed by DMR scientists, as the CMR considered a limited dredging season this year.

“The areas where there’s a high recruitment and a good spat set, I think we need to look at limiting those,” said the DMR’s chief scientific officer, Dr. Kelly Lucas.

Commissioner Ernie Zimmerman said he couldn’t go against that recommendation.

“What scares me to death is letting these fishermen go make a dollar today and take two dollars out of their pocket next year,” said Commissioner Zimmerman.

And those that are only looking out for themselves: Continue reading “Commission on Marine Resources again overrules DMR Scientific staff”

Guest Post: Regulatory changes at Mississippi DMR not good for the fisheries or the little people

The DMR has been in the news lately concerning the tendency for connected, influential people to get special treatment or special opportunities. After extensive federal and state investigations there have been turnovers of some personnel and the promise that things would change for the better.

The recent rule changes that the Commission on Marine Resources and that the DMR staff have worked on lately to put more fish in the hands of fewer people, suggest that the DMR is still looking to make marine resources more available to some and to make the resource less available to unconnected, “little” people.

Increasing the speckled trout quota so that more speckled trout are funneled into the sea food markets which are better-connected and more influential than the “little” people who go out on public piers to try to catch something or go out in boats on weekends is funneling the resource into fewer hands.

Changing the hook and line license so that those who can’t or won’t produce at least 10% of their income off the sale of fish is cutting out those struggling to live on retirements and who appreciated supplementing their income by 5% or even 9%. Leaving the hook and line rule so that anyone who is determined enough, skilled enough or desperate enough to catch hundreds of pounds of speckled trout, for example, in a single day while others are limited to 15 per person or in the case of redfish 3 per person, is seeing to it that those more favored individuals get a bigger piece of the pie than the average “little” person. If the DMR had changed, they would have fixed the bad rule that said recreational people have daily limits while the hook and line license holder can catch the entire yearly allotment of a species in a single day if a rod and reel had that capability. Continue reading “Guest Post: Regulatory changes at Mississippi DMR not good for the fisheries or the little people”

Tuesday Twofer: Ask not what Good Government Citizen groups can do for you……..

Ask what you can do for Good Government Citizen Groups.

FEMA is out of touch ~ Tommy Elkins

StopFemaNow is a group of concerned citizens, who have not only been effected by Super Storm Sandy, but who have been impacted on varying levels by the implications of the new FEMA flood maps. The decision to adopt these maps is premature and requires additional consideration. We want to, quite simply, Stop Fema Now!

Our goal is to create community awareness as the adoption of these maps will heavily impact many communities across this country. These maps will tear many from their homes, force many to make harsh decisions about their futures with no real place to turn and ultimately change our lives. The financial implications alone are frightening!

We are faced with many unanswered questions and very little direction. StopFemaNow intends to provide a fact based argument as to how and why we can rebuild stronger and more resilient with a more “realistic” approach. Together we will prevail!

Get on the wire to every squadron around the world………

Attention politicians that did not read the Biggert-Waters Flood Insurance Reform Act of 2012 before voting for it.

Federal flood insurance reform demands a renaissance of reason ~ Steve and Peggy Nicosia

Here is what you don’t hear in the mainstream media outlets like the New York Times:

(3) 40 percent of premium dollars going to the NFIP and private insurance companies for program administration, (4) adjusters who wrongly attribute wind damage to the flood program, and (5) 40 percent of federally backed mortgages required to carry insurance do not carry it — have led to premium increases of up to 3,000 percent and much more. Policies now costing $500 can increase to more than $20,000 when rates are fully phased in because structures are deemed out of compliance by Biggert-Waters.

True NFIP reform means clearing the rats off the money, not bankrupting your own people so insurance companies based in Illinois can make a fortune. And that’s the bottom line……..

Jimbo the clown joins Mike Chaney on the Biggert-Waters NFIP disaster front. Now we’re all truly screwed.

Biggert-Waters premium increases threaten Louisiana’s working coast, insurance commissioner says ~ Lauren McGaughy

What can I add when the post title says it all? Absolutely nothing.

Congressman Steven Palazzo: Ignorant of the bills upon which he votes

Maybe if he spent a little less time counting the campaign ca$h he get$ from $tate Farm executive$, the Congressman could spend more time representing the people in the 4th district.

Flood insurance measure heads to Senate ~ Da Noose

I love these snakes taking credit for throwing a scrap back to the populace after letting their insurance benefactors loot the NFIP dry, sticking the bill for the massive fraud on the little people in the process. Say what you want about Gene Taylor folks but he never put the interest of millionaire insurance executives from Illinois above the interest of his constituents.

OK folks time to tackle this DMR Executive Director thing part 1: Three Candidates went to Gov Phil…..

Allow me to share a bit of a Slabbed back story to kick off this post and that would involve the Goatherderian fleecing of the Atlantic Canada Opportunities Agency as outlined in these two excellent rural delivery articles found here and here. Part of that saga, well chronicled on these pages, involved the untimely deaths of 3 ACOA employees involved in the loan.  It was a twist I did not emphasize because I could never find a direct salience between the events but it exists as part of that story’s lore.  I’m very hesitant to trample the deceased in order to report a story.

Along those lines I was drug kicking and screaming to the suicide of Michaela Hill even though it occurred, according to local lore, there at the Bolton Building last Summer.  I am in fact reticent to this topic but then the emails started coming after the unfortunate events surrounding State Rep Jessica Upshaw’s untimely demise last weekend at the home of a former colleague in Mendenhall bubbled up.  Here is a sampling of those reader emails:

Three finalist of the DMR director fiasco included Jessica Upshaw, who supposedly committed suicide Sunday in the garage of her boyfriend in Mendenhall……….

That brings the death total to three folks who have died, two by suicide and one by drowning, who have a history with the DMR.

Mrs. Hill being the first, then attorney and marine expert, Ricky Hembre, and now Upshaw…..attorney and oil spill legislator assigned to oversee the disaster and relief; also on the Conservation Committee of the House…..

After knowing the qualifications of the other two applicants, both successful women…

Let’s call that data point number 1. Here is data point number 2 from a source unconnected to data point 1 source: Continue reading “OK folks time to tackle this DMR Executive Director thing part 1: Three Candidates went to Gov Phil…..”

USA Ex Rel Rigsby v State Farm False Claims Act Update: State Farm sends out its PR astroturfers

And this time it isn’t Rossie at the Insurance coverage (denied) blog as Lecky King testified yesterday that Hurricane Katrina was a special type of Hurricane: the windless variety. And per Anita Lee’s latest update to the trial, Lecky King again overstated the amount of flooding at the McIntosh residence saying it had 5 and a half feet of water, around 3 feet more than official measurements indicated. She also admitted she substituted her judgment of damage from the Ivory Tower for the engineers and adjusters State Farm actually had on the ground.

Fact of the matter is State Farm and the rest of the insurers adjusted their post Katrina claims a curious way here after the storm by maxing out taxpayer paid flood coverage with a promise to later adjust the related wind claim, such promise later broken.  The effect was the insurers dumped their contractual obligations to pay for wind damage on the National Flood Insurance Program, whose use of private insurers as flood adjusters results in an “inherent conflict of interest“.

But that is OK folks because Mississippians evidently did not get enough abuse from State Farm after Katrina so they elected an Ed Rust shoe shine boy for their congressman. Remember it was not that long ago Steven Palazzo was touting that he was an integral part of reforming the National Flood Insurance Program.  That reform was the insurance industry version of the bill, which Palazzo supported.  Today?

Dramatic flood insurance increases could force residents to flee the coast, restoration officials say ~ Mark Schleifstein

That’s OK folks because South Mississippi’s Fluffer Congressman, a sometime deficit hawk that denies disaster relief to others parts of the country is on it.

As NFIP Faces Deepening Debt, Some Call for More Subsidies and Lower Rates ~ Arthur Postal

More specifically:

Palazzo proposes flood insurance relief ~ WLOX State Farm TeeVee

So how is that firing Pelosi thing working out for everyone down here, especially you peeps that received MDA grants to fix flooded out houses now with covenants on your land requiring NFIP coverage?

Not long ago on Slabbed, Longshanks said the American people were in reality slaves…

And when you read the Rolling Stones article on Wall Street being completely above the law you’ll understand why you see names like Brooksley Born, Judge Jed Rakoff, AIG and crooked CEO John Mack in our archives. And sadly, I’ve concluded Longshanks is probably right, we are becoming economic slaves to financial interests and that the sheeple are too self-absorbed and ignorant to understand that basic fact. It also explains why I have little respect for sham regulators like Jim Donelon and Mike Chaney or the rest of the corporate do bitches that populate the Republican party. The Democrats aren’t any better though their rhetoric doesn’t come across as quite so clueless.

Perhaps this is why discriminating bloggers call folks like House Speaker John Boehner a dumb fuck for talking about repealing the weak financial re-regulation bill that passed last year. Meantime the Hollow One, $tung by critici$m about being too hard in Wall Street, is now genuflecting before CEOs like John Mack $pit $hining their $kin flute$.  Ain’t 2 party politics swell!

Hat tip to Editilla and Dambala.

sop