School test cheating scandals are often uncovered when investigators follow-up on statistically implausible results. Well, the FBI is apparently batting a thousand, by its own calculation, in the justifiability of agent-involved shootings. And, consistent with the self-protective institutionalization the FBI has so often demonstrated (see FBI Labs, Ruby Ridge, Sentinel), the agency offers several self-congratulatory reasons for its perfect batting average. We’ll see but methinks warts are hidden in that perfect profile. .
Makers vs. Fakers?
So this fellow, and others like him, allegedly found ways to fudge the London Interbank Offered Rate, one of many widgets in the global financial system. LIBOR, however, acts as a base rate for such a multitude of financial products that its manipulation could inflate a bank’s profit at the expense of its lenders, as the bank passed on illusory “increased borrowing costs.” Such illusions are enabled by the financial sector’s thick web of extremely complex financial instruments whose hidden, often unintended, levers await discovery and manipulation by ambitious functionaries looking to make a name, and a bonus, for themselves. There was less room for this when we had our economy centered on making things.
Federal IG Roots Out Nepotism
An Energy Department official fast-tracked three of his children into internships and then sent two to a high-level training course where they took up seats intended for career employees, not interns. The IG put a stop to this unfair favoritism. Read the details here. Or delve into the actual report linked at the bottom of the linked page.
10 Cents on the Dollar
Municipal and county money pits are becoming a theme. Detroit’s fiscal hole is so deep–as much as 17 billion and counting–that the state-appointed emergency manager proposes a 90% haircut for bondholders and other investors. If they demur, bankruptcy court looms, a likely seismic event for municipal bond markets.
Shell Games All Around
More on the flirtation with bankruptcy by Jefferson County, Alabama (which includes the state capital, Birmingham). Officials there had bedazzled bond-buying investors for years with rosy financial projections of the county’s water/sewer operations; Wall Street firms, in turn, bedazzled county officials with prospects of lower interest rates achieved though interconnected financial instruments of almost unfathomable complexity, instead of the straightforward long term bonds the county had been issuing. Knowingly or not, everyone dove right in to what appeared to be fine water, now turned into a sludge-filled money pit.
Reverse Esprit de Corps!
Goodness. Much of the command staff of the Boston Fire Department threatening litigation–against each other! Read: Boston fire chief threatens to sue command staff if they continue “defamatory” attacks. And, for an update, look:http://bcove.me/ei86h0uu
Ably Disabled? Thanks, Doc!
Retiring as a public employee? You’ll usually get a better deal, and earlier, if disability is the reason. The Long Island Railroad (LIRR) in metropolitan New York has had extraordinarily high disability retirement rates–in some years over 90%–among employees who worked in an alternative universe where relatively low-intensity jobs occupationally incapacitated just about everybody. Not surprisingly, retirement-enabling diagnoses were easy to get from doctors like Peter Ajemian, whose fraudulent work-ups just earned him forced retirement to federal prison.
Charity Begins at Home
The politician/non-profit nexus–again. Theft, alleges the federal prosecutor; sloppy bookkeeping regarding pay well-deserved, says the defense attorney. Whatever! Cases, alleged and proven, of politicians pillaging non-profits just keep on coming.
Law-Abiding Murderers
The New Orleans homicide rate leads the country, but the city does much better, relative to its big city peers, with other felony crimes. Some think this doesn’t compute.
The Art of Double-Dipping
So, how do you grab a respite from the 24 hour firefighter shift you’re getting paid for? 1) Throw a buddy a few bucks to cover for you for several hours; 2) Spend those hours at another job. Thirteen indicted Cleveland firefighters, prosecutors allege, had this down to a science