The Phoenix New Times reports that Rep. Rick Renzi’s current corruption charges now include evidence that he allegedly extorted money from his insurance clients to run for Congress. Renzi operated an insurance brokerage firm and is charged for allegedly taking his clients money to fund his campaign for Congressman.
We don’t know exactly which clients’ premiums were embezzled (Renzi’s lawyer didn’t return calls for comment), but records from the Arizona Department of Insurance suggest that they included nearly a dozen local agencies ? pregnancy clinics from Tucson to Flagstaff, a Boys & Girls Club in Sierra Vista, and even Arizona Right-to-Life were left temporarily uninsured. So Renzi was vowing to represent right-to-life interests in Washington even as he allegedly swiped money from the very groups that help pregnant women who choose life in Arizona.
Check out Renzi’s YouTube address to March for Life.I have to say that I would never scam the mentally delusional. I mean, come on, where is the sport in that. It’s like Cheney hunting on a farm where they drive cars out to shoot flightless birds. Peter Nuhn
Good thing he’s a Christian. All he has to do is ask for forgivness and all will be better and he will still be welcomed into heaven.
I’ve gotten to the point where nothing these people do surprises me.
just want to mention Mr. David Silverman is mentioned on cnn.ocm’s “living” section under a art. called “when god goes to the office”-about religion @ workplace and praying @ work…worthless:)
12 kids? how is having 12 kids at all responsible…..theres only so many humans this planet can support….we already have to dig up grandma to make room for junior….
Somewhat on topic…Vatican lists “new sins,” including pollution….Wow….the pope is telling us to be careful where we poop at the same time he’s telling us to make more poopers by not using condoms…great
peter if this is a line into debate on abortion well lets fire it up.
something is wrong with our society that so many choose to abort healthy babies.what does this also say about our public policy for preventing unwanted pregnancy.what can we as atheists bring positive to this debate.
Renzi’s no different than the rest of them. The almighty $$ trumps tiny baby jesus.
From the you tube clip: “Donate generously to your pregnancy resource clinics! They need your money!”(so I can skim it off and use it for myself, cos I had those 12 damn kids ya know)
I think the best thing we can do, as atheist, in this debate is to bring it to a secular perspective.
we get caught up in opposing the fundie perspective that it amounts to murder (it doesn’t) and get sidetracked.
I think we can all agree that it would be better if women just didn’t get pregnant when they don’t want children, so we should agree that abortion is indicative of a problem and approach that problem from a positive, secular perspective.
It doesn’t help that fundies tend to shoot down our solutions. (sex ed, birth control)
Dealing with the minds of fundies is frustrating to say the least, but here is a ray of sunshine for a change.
I didn’t commend SEEKER for his excellent Elephant story at the time, but thought it was terrific.
I took the liberty of copying it and sending it on to my atheist daughter (who loved it), and she sent it on to a good friend, a devout Baptist.
Guess what. The friend loved it. She admitted that she can see why my daughter isn’t a believer, said the elephant does make religion sound a little kooky, and has begun making little elephant references – such as, “Let’s see, what would the Elephant do?” This leads me to believe that reason and logic may be struggling to surface in her Jesus-saturated brain.
Perhaps SEEKER has the right idea. They don’t respond to logic, but an elephant got through.
It wasn’t meant as a leeway into the abortion debate, reason. It was meant to show just another crooked politician who was capable of conducting a huge scam of the anti-abortion groups.
Peter
isn’t it sad that you can honestly write ‘just another crooked politician’.for all the money spent on elections we sure aren’t getting a good return on the investment.i want a refund.
Slightly off topic:
Talk about irony, I actually live in Sierra Vista (mentioned in the article) and this is the first I’ve heard about the Boys & Girl’s Club thing, had to come here to hear that. LOL.
I was peripherally aware of Renzi’s ‘legal problems’ but he isn’t my rep and Phoenix is hundreds of miles away so I haven’t been paying much attention. I’ve heard more about him on NPR than any local news source.
Aridzona has lots of interesting politicians and scandals, remember the Keating Five, of which John McCain was one? And we impeached Gov. Meacham for corruption of some sort.