Government Integrity Project

On May 1, President Obama nominated 11-term Rep. Mel Watt, D-N.C. (in photo), to head the Federal Housing Finance Agency, established in July 2008 to oversee troubled mortgage giants Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac. Watt has a history of making racially-charged statements that are way over the line, even by the standards of the contemporary "civil rights" movement. The two federally-chartered, publicly-traded companies,  under conservatorship for almost as long as FHFA has been around, own or guarantee more than $5 trillion in home mortgages.

As if taxpayers didn’t already have to stomach enough corruption, incompetence and dysfunction in the government's promotion of "green" energy, two past exemplars failure have returned to discharge blame at each other.

Fisker Automotive and A123 Systems are the costly malfunctions that zap you over and over again.

The latest, from a FoxBusiness.com report, reveals that sparks flew between the two as both of the Department of Energy-financed companies plummeted in their production, public profiles and value. According to an anonymous source the network says was “familiar with the situation,” when Fisker announced last fall it would cease production, the manufacturer of the $102,000 plug-in Karma blamed the bankruptcy of its battery manufacturer – A123 – for its downfall. The last of Fisker’s only model was produced in July last year.

Isabel Vincent and Michael Gartland report in the New York Post today:

Embattled state Sen. John Sampson's campaign filings are peppered with missing cash and phantom refunds, The Post has found.

In three cases, money paid by political action committees to Sampson's re-election campaign from 2009 to 2012 does not show up on his records.

After last week’s announcement that Apple would hire former EPA Administrator Lisa Jackson to handle environmental issues, a series of videos released  last week by Duke University were amusingly timed.

The six clips featured interviews with CEO Tim Cook, who succeeded the late, popular Steve Jobs, and were released by his alma mater’s Fuqua School of Business, where he earned his MBA. Cook had returned for a class reunion in April and while there Duke recorded discussions about topics such as inspiration, career planning, intuition, and other aspects of business management.