July 13, 2006, - 8:53 am
Dept. of Homeland Lasorda-ty: Hey, ICE, Stop Lying
By
It’s a Lasordid affair.
Yesterday, I reported on in Kansas City, next week. Baseball’s Tommy Lasorda is being paid his $30-$50K fee to be the keynote speaker at a steak dinner, also costing tax payers $50 per steak. Taxpayers are paying for ICE employees to travel there to serve as full-time bartender and photog, too. And there is no real purpose for the event.
So, what does ICE–the federal agency that is supposed to enforce immigration laws–do? Does the agency apologize for the bad PR and cancel the conference? Do they cancel baseball’s Tommy S.? No. None of these things. Instead, predictably, they put their spin machine in overtime. Irate readers of my site (not to mention irate ICE agent readers of my site) are complaining to ICE. So ICE is denying it. They are referring all angry callers and e-mailers to Carl Rusnok, a PR honcho, whom ICE and his tight relationship with “former” Islamic terrorist and FBI award revokee .
Rusnok and ICE are lying to my readers, claiming that Lasorda is speaking for free. But he isn’t. Technically, ICE can claim that b/c Lasorda is donating his speaking fee to charity. But do taxpayers really want $30,000-$50,000 they paid in the name of apprehending and deporting illegal aliens to Tommy Lasorda’s fave charity? Hardly. Let Tommy donate his own money, not ours. Memo to ICE mouthpiece Carl Rusnok: That’s not the definition of “free.” Check your dictionary.
And Rusnok fails to answer the other questions. Even if Lasorda is not being paid–but he is–the conference is still an incredible waste of tens of thousands of ICE money and agents, supposedly for stopping the illegal alien invasion, not a week away from it, pontificating and navel-contemplating.
Why is this conference being held? How will Detention and Removal Operations Field Office Directors–in charge of apprehending and deporting aliens and with years of experience under their belts–learn anything useful to their jobs from ICE officials, like and , who are legacy Customs agents with no immigration experience? They won’t. What will they learn about alien removal from the full-time ICE employee bartender and pics with their boss John Torres? They won’t. They will merely serve as the mannequins and mostly male supermodels in Torres’ image rehab campaign, which is what this event is all about. And your tax dollars are funding it.
Then, there is the ICE agent, who , attacking me (the lone one) and claiming, again falsely, that Lasorda is not being paid (he is). The agent posted this from ICE Headquarters in Washington, during the workday (so glad he/she’s hard at work catching illegal aliens on my website). The agent posted again from his/her home in nearby Alexandria, Virginia.
Here’s what one high-ranking ICE Agent–among many who’ve contacted me with outrage over this silly weeklong party–wrote me (I have removed some information to protect his identity):
Love your website; have been reading it for sometime and enjoy your unabashed pile-driving of this totally dysfunctional agency. After [decades] of service, both in [another law enforcement agency] and ICE, it’s refreshing to see the malfeasance brought to light.
I wanted to take the opportunity to express some of my opinions and observations regarding your recent postings, specifically the article addressing the latest dog-and-pony debacle starring Torres, Tommy “SlimFast” Lasorda, and the rest of the Clowns of Renown. Once again, here’s valuable money and time being wasted on a showboat production when it can be better utilized elsewhere. It ires me to be told that we can’t get new vehicles, upgrade our computers, incarcerate and/or remove aliens, and perform other critical functions because there’s no money. [DS: The agent describes non-working, vital communications equipment] which limits us access to several of the information and processing systems vital to effecting our mission. When we ask for a status update, all we get is the same rhetorical psycho-babble responses with no action. It’s a sad day when I can go home and access whatever I need [to communicate] with light speed but have to wire up my tin cans and string at the office so I can [communicate at work]. What irritates me further is to have these same upper management dweebs make a feeble attempt at insulting my intelligence by thinking I buy off on their BS.
If you would, please keep my name, rank, and such out of the limelight. I’m not in fear of the Beltway; I just don’t need the aggravation of hearing them gripe and threaten me because I called their hand.
Keep up the great work!
[Name Withheld]
Special Agent/ICE
Tags: Alexandria, Brian Moskowitz, Carl Rusnok, communications equipment, Customs Enforcement, Debbie Schlussel It, e-mailers, employee bartender, Federal Bureau of Investigation, Fred Taub, full-time bartender, ICE headquarters, ICE Special Agent, Imad Hamad, John Clark, John Torres, Kansas City, keynote speaker, law enforcement agency, Marcy Forman-Friedman, Michigan, Special Agent, Tommy Lasorda, USD, Virginia, Washington
Even if Lasorda is donating his fee to charity- he still gets the tax benefit of the deduction- so in reality we are paying for his first class travel and up to 50K of his income tax. Swell.
MarySJ on July 13, 2006 at 10:00 am