ISSA AIDE: Sir, we just heard from the New York Post that Census Bureau workers manipulated data into the monthly unemployment report.
DARRELL ISSA: *pauses* Please tell me you're kidding.
ISSA AIDE: I'm not kidding Congressman.
DARRELL ISSA: Hmmm. Well, this is a great opportunity for me to get campaign contributions.
First the Fast & Furious "Scandal"
Then omitting Sandra Fluke from testifying at the contraception coverage and women's health.
Then the Benghazi "Scandal"
Then the IRS "Scandal"
Then hearing on National Parks Service WWII Memorial Barricades
Then leads an "investigation" into the Healthcare.gov website
Now he's going after the U.S. Census Bureau after a report from the New York Post shows employees manipulating data into the "faked" 2012 election jobs report:
http://www.businessinsider.com/...
Rep. Darrell Issa (R-Calif.), the top watchdog in the House of Representatives, wants answers on a New York Post story alleging that Census Bureau workers manipulated data that went into the monthly unemployment report.
Issa, the chair of the House Oversight Committee, sent a letter to Census Bureau Director John Thompson about the report on Tuesday evening, calling the allegations in the Post's story "shocking."
In addition:
http://www.businessinsider.com/...
The article the article painted the picture, citing former employee Julius Buckmon and anonymous sources, that Census employees have manipulated data that has gone into the monthly unemployment report. It claims that employees conducting the household survey (the one that determines the unemployment rate) were pressured by higher-ups to fudge surveys to fill in data gaps when they could not get adequate response rates.
It also hints that one of these reports was an infamous pre-election one from September 2012 that former GE CEO Jack Welch and others claimed was intentionally fudged with.
However, the Washington Post questions New York Post's report with a set of five questions to John Crundele, taking a more cautious approach to the Census Bureau matter:
In the meantime, some questions:
http://www.washingtonpost.com/...
1) Where’s the sourcing?. Crudele is alleging an ongoing case of malfeasance/corruption/wrongdoing at the Census Bureau. What’s more, he claims that this activity “escalated at the time President Obama was seeking reelection.” Such a finding would surely rehabilitate Jack Welch, but what’s it based on? A “knowledgeable source.”
2) Where’s the background? Crudele writes, “By making up survey results — and, essentially, creating people out of thin air and giving them jobs — Buckmon’s actions could have lowered the jobless rate.” OK, but did they actually lower the jobless rate? Another sentence in the article suggests that perhaps it didn’t: Buckmon “was never told how to answer the questions about whether these nonexistent people were employed or not, looking for work, or have given up.”
3) Where’s the official response? Crudele says that last week he’d “offered” to surrender all his information to the Labor Department’s inspector general but has yet to hear back. He also quotes a Labor Department spokesperson as saying, “Yes, absolutely they should have told us. It would be normal procedure to notify us if there is a problem with data collection.”
4) What’s the deal with the IG? Whistleblowers report stuff to the IG. Activists report stuff to the IG. Citizens report stuff to the IG. Contractors report stuff to the IG.
Reporters . . . don’t report stuff to the IG. They publish the results of their findings and report them to the public.
5) Context? Crudele finds a person who claims to have been directed to fake interviews for unemployment reports. That’s a significant bit of reporting. But how much impact could one person have upon the statistics? How many Census foot soldiers are deployed in conducting interviews for the unemployment report?
The U.S. Census Bureau has this statement:
http://www.usatoday.com/...
The U.S. Census Bureau said Tuesday it has asked its inspector general to look into a New York Post report that national employment data ahead of the 2012 election were manipulated.
The bureau says it does not believe any improper conduct was widespread or had any impact on the reported unemployment rate.
"We have no reason to believe that there was a systematic manipulation of the data described in media reports," Census said in a statement. "We carefully cross-check and verify the work of our staff to ensure the data's validity."
Even Huffington Post is not reading into the New York Post too seriously:
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/...
Conservatives are working themselves into a froth about what they believe is the next HUGE OBAMA SCANDAL: allegations that the unemployment numbers were cooked just ahead of the 2012 election.
This scandal may turn out to be just as devastating to the Obama administration as the IRS, Benghazi and Fast & Furious scandals. Not devastating at all, in other words. In fact, this one seems even flimsier than those pseudo-scandals.
New York Post columnist John Crudele, citing one anonymous source, claims that Census Bureau employees have been ordered to make up responses when surveying households for the Labor Department's monthly unemployment report. Crudele claims to have evidence from 2010 that one Census survey-taker was caught making up numbers to meet a quota. Crudele's anonymous source claims there were other incidents of surveyors making up numbers, that Census officials encouraged such shenanigans, and that fake-number generation ramped up ahead of the 2012 election.
This, Crudele suggests in a daring leap of logic, probably explains unemployment's drop to 7.8 percent in September 2012 from 8.1 percent the month before. That drop was reported on Oct. 5, 2012, just a month ahead of Election Day, and immediately seemed suspicious to conservatives like former General Electric CEO Jack Welch, who tweeted:
And look at who just decided to barge in on the conversation!
But as the Huffington Post responds to Clown Cain's Tweet, Cain's argument is much ado about nothing and shows he has a low attention span:
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/...
But sorry, Herman Cain, no. "The employee who did it" does not say that. In fact, there is no such employee in Crudele's report. Crudele cites only an anonymous source who generally claims that numbers were made up. The "employee" who allegedly "did it" is one guy who allegedly made up numbers in 2010, which careful readers will note was two years before the election. That employee was not accused of raising or lowering unemployment figures -- just of making up numbers to meet a quota of households.
Nevertheless, Darrell Issa and others are launching an investigation into the U.S. Census Bureau. Guess who is joining Issa?
Uh oh. It's another fellow clown, Rep. Blake Farenthold of Texas's 27th Congressional District. Joining Issa and Farenthold is Rep. Kevin Brady of Texas's 8th Congressional District. No, Brady has no relationship with the Brady Bunch and did not come out of the TV set.
Here's the letter from Issa, Farenthold and Brady:
http://www.scribd.com/...
And not surprisingly, Issa and Farenthold appear on Sean Hannity without delay to continue to jump on the jobs report "manipulation" as if it's gold to their campaign war chests:
Now if you're getting tired of these guys, well, Rep. Farenthold currently doesn't have a Democratic challenger but Issa does and he's Dave Peiser of Encinitas, CA.
For more information on Darrell Issa's Democratic challenger, Dave Peiser, and voter registration statistics numbers of CA-49, links are below:
Dave Peiser for Congress: http://www.peiserforcongress.com/
Donate:
ActBlue: https://secure.actblue.com/...
Nationbuilder: https://peiserforcongress.nationbuilder.com/...
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/...
Twitter: https://twitter.com/...
Information: info@peiserforcongress.com
Here's the voter registration as of February 2013 by the actual CA-49 Congressional District, which combines parts of San Diego and Orange County. Note the number of Decline-to-State/Independents:
http://www.sos.ca.gov/...
Orange County:
Democrats: 22,239
Republicans: 44,833
Decline-to-State/Independent: 19,077
San Diego County:
Democrats: 84,282
Republicans: 107,221
Decline-to-State/Independent: 70,938
Total:
Democrats: 106,521
Republicans: 152,054
Decline-to-State/Independent: 90,015
Here's the recent polling per PPP showing Darrell Issa vulnerable thanks to the government shutdown:
http://s3.moveon.org/...
Disapproval: 49%
Approval: 43%
If you live in or near California's 49th Congressional District and want a reason to start voter registration drives or take part in them, note that San Diego County Democratic Party has a calendar that keeps track of all activity going on, whether local Democratic club meetings or voter registration drive events:
http://www.sddemocrats.org/...
Start firing up the base in CA-49!