But then they gave in to the tune of $1.33 billion. This is more than double the air traffic controllers expenses recently "fixed" by Congress. And the total will probably rise, and could top $4.4 billion. It sure feels like a political payout to groups (Hispanics and women) that the Democrats are courting. Oh yeah - law firms. And the article supports my gut feeling.
In something of a surprise to me, since the New York Times certainly leans left, their analysis was blunt. My favorite quote is "“You couldn't have designed it worse if you had tried.” But below are more. It's a long article, please read it, but below are some highlights. Italics are mine for emphasis, and words in brackets are added for clarification. Note that some of the quotes concern the earlier case where African-American farmers had claimed and won bias.
the Obama administration’s political appointees at the Justice and Agriculture Departments engineered a stunning turnabout: they committed $1.33 billion to compensate not just the 91 plaintiffs but thousands of Hispanic and female farmers who had never claimed bias in court.
despite the vehement objections — until now undisclosed — of career lawyers and agency officials who had argued that there was no credible evidence of widespread discrimination. What is more, some protested, the template for the deal — the $50,000 payouts to black farmers — had proved a magnet for fraud.
an examination by The New York Times shows that it became a runaway train, driven by racial politics, pressure from influential members of Congress and law firms that stand to gain more than $130 million in fees
Agriculture Department reviewers found reams of suspicious claims, from nursery-school-age children and pockets of urban dwellers, sometimes in the same handwriting with nearly identical accounts of discrimination.
Delton Wright, a Pine Bluff justice of the peace, recalled what happened after word of the settlement reached his impoverished region: “It just went wild. Some people took the money who didn’t even have a garden in the ground.” He added, “They didn’t make it hard at all, and that’s why people jumped on it.”
Claimants described how, at packed meetings, lawyers’ aides would fill out forms for them on the spot, sometimes supplying answers “to keep the line moving,” as one put it.
In 16 ZIP codes in Alabama, Arkansas, Mississippi and North Carolina, the number of successful claimants exceeded the total number of farms operated by people of any race in 1997, the year the lawsuit was filed. Those applicants received nearly $100 million.
nearly everyone in two adjoining apartment buildings had filed
Mr. Boyd said Mr. Obama’s support [of the settlement] led him to throw the backing of his 109,000-member black farmers’ association behind the Obama presidential primary campaign.
[A quote from one government expert, professor Gordon Rausser] "It was simply buying the support of the Native-Americans."Anyway, please read the article and reach your own conclusions. And maybe $4 billion is small potatoes in out immense deficit, but the entire year-long sequester that is causing a lot of grief is only $85 billion.
