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In May 2006, it was discovered that had Reid accepted free ringside tickets from the Nevada Athletic Commission to three professional boxing matches while that state agency was trying to influence him on federal regulation of boxing. He took the free seats for Las Vegas fights between 2003 and 2005 as he was pressing legislation to increase government oversight of the sport, including the creation of a federal boxing commission that Nevada’s agency feared might usurp its authority.

He defended the gifts, saying that they would never influence his position on the bill and he was simply trying to learn how his legislation might affect an important home state industry.

“Anyone from Nevada would say I’m glad he is there taking care of the state’s number one businesses,” he said. “I love the fights anyways, so it wasn’t like being punished,” added the senator, a former boxer and boxing judge.

Senate ethics rules generally allow lawmakers to accept gifts from federal, state or local governments, but specifically warn against taking such gifts, particularly on multiple occasions, when they might be connected to efforts to influence official actions. Two senators who joined Reid for fights with the complimentary tickets took markedly differently steps.

Senator John McCain of Arizona insisted on paying $1,400 for the tickets he shared with Reid for a 2004 championship fight. Senator Ensign accepted free tickets to another fight with Reid but already recused himself from Reid’s federal boxing legislation because his father was an executive for a Las Vegas hotel that hosts fights.

Reid defended his decisions to accept the tickets and to take several actions benefiting former lobbyist Jack Abramoff’s clients and partners as they donated to him.

“I’m not (a) goodie two shoes, I just feel these events are nothing I did wrong,” Reid said.

On September 4, 2008, a Washington court found Abramoff guilty of trading expensive gifts, meals and sports trips in exchange for political favors, and U.S. District Judge Ellen Segal Huvelle sentenced him to a four-year term in prison, to be served concurrently with his previous sentences. Abramoff cooperated in a bribery investigation leading to 21 people either pleading guilty or being found guilty, including White House officials J. Steven Griles and David Safavian, U.S. Representative Bob Ney, and nine other lobbyists and Congressional aides.

Reid, who voted in support of the 2003 invasion of Iraq, had changed his mind by March 2007, when he voted in favor of “redeploying US troops out of Iraq by March 2008”.

Reid said on April 19, 2007, “I believe, myself that the secretary of state, secretary of defense, and — you have to make your own decisions as to what the president knows — this war is lost and the surge is not accomplishing anything as indicated by the extreme violence in Iraq yesterday.”

He also said, “As long as we follow the President’s path in Iraq, the war is lost.”

A year later, while speaking about Senator Obama as a presidential candidate, Reid stated that Obama was a viable candidate because he was “light skinned” and had “no negro dialect unless he wanted one.” Although Republican leaders called for his resignation, Reid apologized to President Obama and African-American leaders and remained in power.

In July of 2012, Reid was interviewed by the Huffington Post. In that interview, he asserted that he had been contacted by a source whom he found to be credible and told that Mitt Romney had not paid taxes for a ten year time period while he was employed at Bain Capital.

Reid also stated that Romney’s father would be ashamed at the fact that his son had released only two years of tax returns as compared to his father’s decision to release 12 years when he ran for President.

Senator Reid continued by stating that a person who used to work at Bain capital had contacted him and stated that Governor Romney did not pay taxes for at least a 10 year span while working at Bain.

“His poor father must be so embarrassed about his son,” reports the Huffington Post. (His source called and told him) … Harry, he didn’t pay any taxes for 10 years. He didn’t pay taxes for 10 years! Now, do I know that that’s true? Well, I’m not certain. But obviously he can’t release those tax returns. How would it look?”

Reid adds, “You guys have said his wealth is $250 million. Not a chance in the world. It’s a lot more than that. I mean, you do pretty well if you don’t pay taxes for 10 years when you’re making millions and millions of dollars.”

The interview caused a media problem for Reid, so he spoke on the Senate floor on August 2, 2012 about the matter, reapplying his opinion.

“When we’re talking about trust, we need to look no farther than my friend the Republican Leader wants to be president of the United States,” Reid said. “He’s refused to release his tax returns, as we know. If a person coming before this body wanted to be a cabinet officer, he couldn’t be if he did the same refusal Mitt Romney does about tax returns.”

“So the word’s out that he hasn’t paid any taxes for ten years,” Reid continued. “Let him prove that he has paid taxes, because he hasn’t. We already know from one partial tax return that he gave us, he has money hidden in Bermuda, the Cayman Islands and a Swiss bank account. Not making that up, that’s in the partial year that he gave us.”

Meanwhile, Reid is busy rewriting both Nevada and U.S. history. When asked about renaming Las Vegas’ McCarran International Airport during a ceremony in August 2012, at the airport’s new Terminal Three, he said he was for it — but that’s not all he had to say.

“Pat McCarran was one of the most anti-Semitic — some of you might know my wife’s Jewish — one of the most anti-black, one of the most prejudiced people who has ever served in the Senate,” said Reid, “It’s not a decision I’m going to make, but if you ask me to give my opinion, I don’t think his name should be on anything.”

McCarran was a United States Senator from Nevada from 1933 until his death in 1954. He was also Nevada Chief Justice, chairman of the Nevada State Board of Parole Commissioners, chairman of the Nevada State Board of Bar Examiners and district attorney for Nye County.

The only thing he was “anti-” on was Communism — which he hated with a passion.

This is the second time Reid has attacked a deceased Nevada politician. In 2009, he released his biography, “The Good Fight,” a play on words referring to his boxing background, claiming Nevada U.S. Congressman Walter Baring told him President John Kennedy’s assassination was “a good thing.”

The book comes with pictures. They fall between pages 116 and 117.

One of the photographs shows Reid in his Capitol policeman uniform, next to the Nevada Cherry Blossom Princess. Next to her is Nevada’s Democrat Congressman Walter Baring.

Baring was Nevada’s only Congressman at the time. Reid claims that on the day President John F. Kennedy was assassinated Baring told him it was good thing as JFK was leading the U.S. into Communism.

“There is no way my dad would have said anything like that, much less to Harry Reid,” said Jeff Baring, son of former Congressman Walter Baring, “Simply, no way.”

Then in April 2013, Reid nominated Las Vegas attorney Jennifer Dorsey to become a federal judge, however two senior partners at the law firm where Dorsey works made large contributions to the political action committee ‘Majority PAC’ founded by Reid to electing Democratic Senate candidates.

Records show Will Kemp made a $100,000 contribution, while J. Randall Jones made a $50,000 contribution. Critics are now questioning whether Reid’s support was “bought” with the law partners’ donations.

Dorsey donated $2,500 to Reid’s PAC in March 2012 after mentioning her interest in becoming a judge. That donation was also reportedly returned by Reid and his office took her name into consideration, according to the Las Vegas Review Journal: “Dorsey’s personal contribution to Reid’s campaign was returned as the senator weighed her possible nomination and wanted to avoid an appearance of conflict,” said Reid spokeswoman, Kristen Orthman.

The Senate Judiciary Committee approved Dorsey along a party-line vote after the Federal Elections Committee determined the donations didn’t violate any laws. She received her commission on July 9, 2013.

Lastly, there are rumors that Reid is suffering from a mental illness, saying something, then denying it. If he is not mentally ill, then as one national radio talk show host put it, “Senator Reid is a liar.”

“We heard about the evils of Obamacare,” Reid stated from the Senate Floor in late February 2014, “about the lives it’s ruining in Republicans’ stump speeches and in ads paid for by oil magnates, the Koch brothers. But in those tales, turned out to be just that: tales, stories made up from whole cloth, lies distorted by the Republicans to grab headlines or make political advertisements…There’s plenty of horror stories being told. All of them are untrue, but they’re being told all over America.”

However, by late March of this year, Reid, again from the Senate Floor claimed he didn’t call anyone a liar.

“I have never come to the floor, to my recollection, I’ve never said a word about examples that Republicans have given regarding Obamacare and how it’s not very good,” said Reid. “Mr. President, the junior senator from Wyoming has come to the floor several times recently talking about the fact that examples that he and others Republicans have given dealing with Obamacare, examples that are bad, I’ve called lies. Mr. President, that is simply untrue…”

Either way, Reid has remained unscathed through all of this.

Over the course of 2001 through 2005, Reid collected nearly $68,000 in contributions from Jack Abramoff’s lobbying partners and clients. Reid took actions to support positions on issues that Abramoff promoted as a paid lobbyist.

Reid received money from Abramoff associates after opposing a minimum wage law in the Marianas which was defeated in the Senate. He also wrote letters and spoke out against the creation of Native American casinos which would have competed with casinos that Jack Abramoff represented.

Reid received money from these casinos at around the same time

Abramoff is a former businessman and con man who was convicted of both defrauding Native American Casinos and trading gifts, meals, sports events tickets, and trips for political favors. He was sentenced to a four year prison term for these actions, which was served concurrently for his convictions of defrauding Native American casinos.

These casinos include: Michigan’s Saginaw Chippewas, California’s Agua Caliente, the Mississippi Choctaws, and the Louisiana Coushattas. The charges against Abramoff included schemes where he would lobby certain laws which would hurt the casino’s business, and thus increase the demand for his services to defeat the legislation or proposal.

Abramoff was the top lobbyist for the Preston Gates & Ellis and Greenberg Traurig firms and a director of the National Center for Public Policy Research, a conservative think tank, and Toward Tradition. Abramoff also worked for the Commonwealth of the Northern Mariana Islands from 1995 to 2001.

Although Reid and Abramoff never personally met and Abramoff never directly contributed to Senator Reid’s campaign, there was a great deal of contact between aides of the two offices and Abramoff did ask for donations to be made by the institutions that employed him as a lobbyist. According to documents and those familiar with the Abramoff team’s methods, the lobbyists devised lengthy lists of lawmakers to whom the customers should donate and then delivered the lists to the customers.

The entities, in turn, wrote checks to the recommended campaign committees and in the amounts the lobbyists prescribed. Much of the contact between Abramoff’s lobbying company and Reid’s office dealt with the Marianas Islands.

The Marianas, U.S. territorial islands in the Pacific Ocean, were one of Abramoff’s highest-paying clients and were trying to keep their textile industry exempt from most U.S. laws on immigration, labor and pay, including the minimum wage. Many Democrats have long accused the islands of running garment sweatshops. The islands in 2001 had their own minimum wage of $3.05 an hour, and were exempt from the U.S. minimum of $5.15.

In February 2001, Senator Ted Kennedy introduced a bill that would have raised the U.S. hourly minimum to $6.65 and would have covered the Marianas. The legislation, which eventually failed, would have given the islands an initial break by setting its minimum at just $3.5, nearly $3 lower than any other territory or state, and then gradually increasing it.

Within a month, Ronald Platt — an Abramoff deputy — began billing for routine contacts and meetings with Reid’s staff, starting with a March 26, 2001, contact with Reid chief of staff Susan McCue to “discuss timing and status of minimum wage legislation,” the billing records say.

In all, Platt and a fellow lobbyist reported 21 contacts in 2001 with Reid’s office, mostly with McCue and Reid’s Senate counsel Jim Ryan. One of the Marianas contacts, listed for May 30, 2001, was with Edward Ayoob, Reid’s legislative counsel.

Within a year, Ayoob had left Reid’s office to work for Abramoff’s firm, registering specifically to lobby for the islands as well as several tribes. Reid spokesman Jim Manley confirmed Ayoob had subsequent lobbying contacts with Reid’s office.

Manley cast doubt on some of the contacts recorded in the billing records, saying Reid Chief of Staff Susan McCue was out of Washington for a couple of the dates. But he acknowledged the contacts could have occurred by cell phone.

Reid himself, along with Ryan, met with Abramoff deputy Ronald Platt on June 5, 2001, “to discuss timing on minimum wage bill” that affected the Marianas, according to a bill that Greenberg Traurig, Abramoff’s firm, sent the Marianas.

Three weeks before the meeting, Greenberg Traurig’s political action committee donated $1,000 to Reid’s Senate re-election committee. Three weeks after the meeting, Platt himself donated $1,000 to Reid.

Manley said Reid’s official calendar doesn’t list a meeting on June 5, with Platt, but he also said he couldn’t say for sure the contact didn’t occur. Manley confirmed Platt had regular contacts with Reid’s office, calling them part of the “routine checking in” by lobbyists who work Capitol Hill.

As for the timing of donations, Manley said, “There is no connection. This is just a typical part of lawful fundraising.”

In January 2002, McCue took a free trip, valued at $7,000, to Malaysia with several other congressional aides. The trip, cleared by Senate ethics officials, was underwritten by the U.S. Malaysia Exchange Association, a group trying to foster better relations between the United States and Malaysia.

The trips were part of a broader lobbying strategy by Malaysia, which consulted with Abramoff and paid $300,000 to a company connected to him, according to documents released by Senate investigators. The arrangements included a trip by then-House Majority Leader Tom DeLay and his wife to Malaysia in October 2001.

While Abramoff worked behind the scenes, the Alexander Strategy Group run by two former DeLay aides, Ed Buckham and Tony Rudy, publicly registered to lobby for the U.S. Malaysia Exchange Association.

Rudy, who was cited in Abramoff’s court case, had worked temporarily for Abramoff before joining Buckham at Alexander Strategy, and the three men were friendly. In January 2002, Alexander Strategy arranged two congressional trips to Malaysia underwritten by the association.

One trip took a delegation of Republican congressmen. A Democratic consultant hired by Alexander Strategy, former Clinton White House aide Joel Johnson, invited McCue and went on the second trip with congressional staffers.

Johnson said he invited McCue on behalf of Alexander Strategy and went on the trip with her but said he knew of no connections to Abramoff. “My interest was in getting Democrats to travel to the country and to learn more about Malaysia,” Johnson said.

On March 5, 2002, Reid sent a letter to the Interior Department pressing the agency to reject a proposed casino by the Jena band of Choctaw Indians in Louisiana. Fellow Nevada Senator, John Ensign, also signed.

The Jena’s proposed casino would have rivaled one already in operation in Louisiana run by the Coushattas, and Abramoff was lobbying to block the Jena. The day after Reid’s letter, the Coushattas wrote a $5,000 check to Reid’s Searchlight group at Abramoff’s suggestion.

Reid and Ensign later wrote the Senate Ethics Committee to say their letter had nothing to do with Abramoff or the donation and instead reflected their interest in protecting Las Vegas’ gambling establishments. Reid authored the law legalizing casinos on reservations, and has long argued it does not allow tribal gambling off reservations.

“As senators for the state with the largest nontribal gaming industry in the nation, we have long opposed the growth of off-reservation tribal gaming throughout the United States,” Ensign and Reid wrote.

On November 8, 2002, Reid signed a letter with California Senator Dianne Feinstein urging Interior Secretary Gale Norton to reject a proposal by the Cuyapaipe Band of Mission Indians to convert land for a health clinic into a casino in southern California. The casino would have competed with the Palm Springs gambling establishment run by the Agua Caliente, one of Abramoff’s tribes.

Two weeks later, Reid went to the Senate floor to oppose fellow Senator Debbie Stabenow’s effort to win congressional approval for a Michigan casino for the Bay Mills Indians, which would have rivaled one already operating by the Saginaw Chippewa represented by Abramoff.

“The legislation is fundamentally flawed,” Reid argued, successfully leading the opposition to Stabenow’s proposal.

The next month, Reid joined six other Democratic senators in asking President Bush in mid-December 2002 to spend an additional $30 million for Indian school construction. Several Abramoff tribes, including the Saginaw and the Mississippi Choctaw, were seeking federal money for school building. Six weeks after that letter, three Abramoff partners, including Platt and Ayoob, donated a total of $4,000 to Reid’s Senate re-election campaign.

Later in 2003, the Agua Caliente contributed $13,500 to Reid’s political groups while the Saginaw chipped in $9,000. Reid ten sent a fourth letter on April 30, 2003, joining Ensign a second time to urge Interior to reject the Jena casino.

Two months later, Abramoff’s firm threw a fundraiser for Reid at its Washington office that netted the Nevada senator several more donations from Greenberg Traurig lobbyists and their spouses. Ayoob was instrumental in staging the event, Reid’s office said.

Reid had separate meetings in June 2003 in his Senate offices with two Abramoff tribal clients and Edward Ayoob, a former staff member who went to work with Abramoff.

It appears ‘WordPress’ is abridging my freedom of speech and that of other users.

Last night I posted an article and was met with ‘Invalid key [4]. Back.  After some research I found out that it means ‘Contents of this topic are hidden until it has been reviewed by a staff member.’ And there is no one available to talk to about this.

Maybe it’s time to find a new blogging platform.

A native Nevadan is one of the sixteen soldiers wounded in the deadly shooting at Fort Hood. U.S. Army Private Deon Josephs of Las Vegas remains in the hospital, after being shot in the back.

“Deon made it through surgery the bullet is out of his neck with no complications from the surgery,” Deon’s brother, Darren Josephs posted, adding “He is very strong.”

Family members say Deon dreamed of joining the Army since he was a child, finishing boot camp and going active duty in November. He was planning on being a career officer.

Authorities say Ivan Lopez was upset after a being refused a leave of absence form. He then killed three people and injured 16 others before turning the gun on himself.

Lopez and Deon were friends and were assigned to the same unit.

The family is hoping to raise $50,000 at gofundme.com to help pay for the long-term stay they expect to endure as Deon recovers. Meanwhile a memorial service at Fort Hood is scheduled for Wednesday.

A year and a half later, Reid and the Nevada delegation tried again, inserting language moving the power corridor to the west side of the highway into a public land bill for Lincoln County. This time, Whittemore had to compensate the government on the basis of “fair market value,” but that was defined in such a way that would have required him to pay only about $160,000.

Drawing criticism, Reid and the delegation changed the cost provision to say government appraisers should figure what Whittemore had to pay, $10.4 million as it turned out. The bill became law in November 2004.

Jus’ before that bill was passed, Whittemore announced a deal with Westwood-based Pardee Homes to become Coyote Springs’ main residential developer. He also announced that Jack Nicklaus would design a set of golf courses to be known as the Bear Trail.

As the effort to clear a path for Coyote Springs moved forward, Whittemore showed his appreciation for the help Nevada politicians in Washington were giving him, especially Reid. Senator John Ensign and others got contributions, but much less than those given to Reid.

By the spring of 2005, only one step remained: securing a permit to deal with the stream beds and washes. That process, handled by the Army Corps of Engineers, seemed routine, but in late July trouble struck.

Alexis Strauss, an official in the Environmental Protection Agency’s regional office that oversees Nevada, notified the Corps of Engineers that her office had concerns.

“We respectfully object to the issuance of a permit for the proposed project,” Strauss wrote, “because the authorization may result in substantial and unacceptable impacts to aquatic resources of national importance.”

The phrase, “aquatic resources of national importance,” was a designation that gave regional EPA officials leverage to press for environmental concessions.

As it happened, by the time Reid and Ensign had their conversation with the head of the EPA, Whittemore’s permit problem was all but over. On Sept. 16, Whittemore, Leif Reid and others had met with EPA and other federal officials at the site and the atmosphere became conciliatory.

Coyote Springs agreed to leave several washes untouched, reduced the number of acres of waterways to be filled in and pledged to make environmental improvements on 19 acres of other wash land. And Whittemore promised not to disturb the Pahranagat Wash, which runs through the site.

Since Pahranagat is subject to flash flooding, development there was impractical, but Whittemore made its protected status official.

“They took our concerns seriously,” Vendlinski said.

For their part, the regional officials were not looking for a fight. Whittemore had demonstrated that he could bring Reid and Ensign into the game. Privately, some regional EPA officials said they knew their superiors in Washington would not support a hard-line on aquatic resources.

The regional officials not only withdrew their objections, but in April 2006 they also gave Whittemore’s project an award for “environmentally sensitive improvements” in its plans. A smiling Leif Reid accepted the award.

“One year and $1 million in consulting fees later, we got our permit,” Whittemore said ruefully in an interview in May. “It is the right thing to do,” he said, “and there is an economic incentive in making the project proceed.”

As Coyote Springs grows onto the Lincoln County part of the site, more permits will be needed. But Whittemore’s dream is on its way to coming true.

Looking back, he expresses pride in the achievement, and in how far he went to meet environmental and other concerns.

“The final product is the most environmentally friendly development ever proposed in Nevada,” Whittemore said. “I want people to understand that I am the platinum standard.”

Since 2000, Whittemore, his wife and the Coyote Springs company have given Reid’s senatorial campaign and political action committees at least $45,000. That included $35,000 for Reid’s leadership PAC, the Searchlight Leadership Fund, which helped him advance as a Senate leader.

Most of that money was contributed in 2002 shortly after Reid introduced the Clark County land bill.

In 2000, Whittemore gave an additional $20,000 to the Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee, which Reid promoted as a party leader. Prior to 2000, the Whittemores had given Reid and his Senate campaign committee a total of $6,500, plus $5,000 for his leadership PAC.

Whittemore also helped Reid’s sons, all of whom at various times have worked for the law firm in which he is a senior partner, Lionel, Sawyer and Collins. Rory Reid is a partner in the firm.

When he ran successfully for the Clark County Board of Commissioners, Whittemore contributed $5,000. He also gave Josh Reid $5,000 for an unsuccessful bid for a seat on the city council in Cottonwood Heights, Utah. Rory and Josh Reid have been active in Democratic politics.

Jon Summers, an aide to Reid, said, “Harvey Whittemore has a history of giving money to political candidates far and wide — and to both political parties. However, as a registered Democrat, it is only logical that he would give a larger percentage to Democratic candidates and committees.”

In 2001, the senator’s office established a rule that family members could lobby his office but could not get special treatment. In 2002, responding to questions by The Times, the rule was changed to prohibit any lobbying of Reid’s office by his family.

“For the last four years, our office has had a policy that Reid family members are not to lobby the office on business matters, even if those matters benefit Nevada,” Susan McCue, Reid’s chief of stated. “Leif is not a lobbyist, but he should not have called our office. I have reminded Leif of this policy to prevent future calls.”

Leif Reid did not respond to questions. The contacts by Leif Reid and others “were not an attempt to have Reid’s office direct the outcome of the federal permitting process,” Whittemore said.

Reid owns a great deal of land near Bullhead City, Arizona. In 2006, he sponsored an earmark to provide $18 million in funding to build a bridge to connect Laughlin, Nevada and Bullhead City, Arizona. This bridge is near the property he owns and will undoubtedly increase the value of that land.

More than 20 years ago Reid purchased 100 acres of land roughly 3-5 miles from Bullhead City, Arizona for a price of $150,000. His longtime friend, Clair Haycock bought the remaining 60 acres for $90,000.

In the early 1990’s Californians bought the property from the two for $1.3-million. Those investors defaulted and the land was returned to Senator Reid.

In early 2002, Haycock sold out to Reid for $10,000, or about $166 an acre. At the time, the Mohave County assessor valued the entire parcel at $339,620, or more than $2,000 an acre.

In 2006, after the announcement of the bridge, a businessman bought land near Reid’s at a rate of $6,396 an acre. From 2001 to 2005, Reid disclosed that the property was worth $500,000 to 1,000,000.

Then, in 2006, after the earmark for the bridge went into effect, he indicated that the entire 160-acre property was worth only $150,000. In 2007 and 2008, Reid valued the asset at $250,000 to 500,000.

The proposed bridge between Laughlin and Bullhead City was not on the priority list sent to local members of Congress by either the Nevada or Arizona transportation agencies. But beginning in 2003, local supporters of the bridge, which would be the second span connecting the two towns, found a receptive audience when they approached some members of the Nevada and Arizona congressional delegations.

Civic leaders argued that an additional bridge was needed because traffic on the existing connector bridge, on the northern edge of Bullhead City, had become overwhelming Laughlin consists mainly of casinos and hotels, and has little housing or shopping.

Most of the casino workers live across the river in Bullhead City, which also has shopping and a hospital. Elected officials say both communities would benefit from a second bridge. Acting on a request from the town of Laughlin, Reid, a member of the Senate Appropriations Committee’s transportation subcommittee, in 2003 secured $500,000 for preliminary studies.

Initially, Rep. Jon Porter, supported by Rep. Trent Franks, got $2 million for the bridge inserted into the House version of the transportation bill. By the time Congress approved the $286-billion transportation bill, $18 million more in bridge funding had been added.

Reid took credit in a news release for securing money that would kick the project into high gear. The bridge, still in the planning stages, is projected to cost $30 million to $40 million.

Arizona’s two Republican senators voted against the entire transportation bill as pure pork. Meanwhile, city and county officials say that land values have risen in Bullhead City as developers and speculators discover the area.

Steve Ellis, vice president of Taxpayers for Common Sense, a watchdog that tracks congressional spending said, “Unwittingly, the taxpayer may have helped inflate the value” of Reid’s property.

Finally, in March 2014, a sign promoting a future Interstate 11 from Las Vegas to Phoenix was unveiled at the stateliness of Nevada and Arizona at the Hoover Dam. The proposed roadway plan currently runs jus’ east of Bullhead City.

For several years, Reid donated funds from his re-election campaign to an employee holiday fund for the employees of the building where he resides. Although this appears to be in violation of federal election law and Senator Reid has reimbursed his campaign fund with his own money, Reid insists the use of the money was legal.

Federal election law permits campaigns to provide “gifts of nominal value” but prohibits candidates from using political donations for personal expenses, such as mortgage, rent or utilities for “any part of any personal residence.” The law specifically defines prohibited personal use expenses as any “obligation or expense of any person that would exist irrespective of the candidate’s campaign or duties as a federal officeholder.”

Reid and his wife live at Ritz-Carlton in Washington where they purchased a condo at the hotel for $750,000 in March of 2001. The residents of the hotel can give money for the holiday bonuses of the employees there through the Residents Executive Committee Holiday Fund.

The fund has been in existence for many years.

Reid gave the following donations to the holiday fund: $600 in 2002, $1200 in 2004 and $1500 in 2005 For two of those years, the donations are listed as campaign “salary” and one year, they are listed as a contribution.

When asked about the donations, Senator Reid stated: “These donations were made to thank the men and women who work in the building for the extra work they do as a result of my political activities, and for helping the security officers assigned to me because of my Senate position.:

Larry Noble, the Federal Election Commission’s former chief enforcement lawyer, said Reid’s explanation is aimed at a “gray area” in the law by suggesting the donations were tied to his official Senate and political work.

“What makes this harder for the senator is that this is his personal residence,” adds Noble, “and this looks like an event that everybody else at the residence is taking out of their personal money as they’re living there.”

A friend emailed this to me and I liked it so much it made me want to share it with you…

A young man was getting ready to graduate from college. For many months he had admired a beautiful sports car in a dealer’s showroom, and knowing his father could well afford it, he told him that was all he wanted.

As Graduation Day approached, the young man awaited signs that his father had purchased the car. Finally, on the morning of his graduation, his father called him into his private study and told him how proud he was to have such a fine son, and how much he loved him.

He handed him a beautifully wrapped gift box. Curious, but somewhat disappointed, the young man opened the box and found a lovely, leather-bound Bible, with his name embossed in gold.

Angrily, he raised his voice to his father and said, “With all your money you give me a Bible?”

He stormed out of the house, leaving the Bible behind.

Many years passed and the young man was very successful in business. He had a beautiful home and wonderful family, but realized his father was very old.

He thought perhaps he should go to him. He had not seen him since that graduation day.

But before he could make arrangements, he received a telegram telling him his father had passed away, and willed all of his possessions to him. He needed to come home immediately and take care of things.

When he arrived at his father’s house, sadness and regret filled his heart. He began to search through his father’s important documents and saw the Bible, new, just as he had left it years ago.

With tears, he opened the Bible and began to turn the pages. His father had carefully underlined a verse, Matt 7:11, “And if ye, being evil, know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more shall your Heavenly Father which is in Heaven, give to those who ask Him?”

As he read those words, a car key dropped from the back of the Bible. It had a tag with the dealer’s name, the same dealer who had the sports car he had desired. On the tag was the date of his graduation, and the words – “paid in full.”

This is a four-part expose’ looking at a number of scandals involving Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, Democrat, Nevada.

Playing the role of “aggrieved grandfather,” Senator Harry Reid is promising to reimburse his campaign the full sum he paid out. Nevada political reporter Jon Ralston discovered Reid’s campaign paid out an additional $14,000 to Ryan Elisabeth Reid’s jewelry company for “holiday gifts” for staff and campaign donors.

“My granddaughter has been the target of harassing phone calls, strangers tracking her down and knocking on her door and negative, unwanted attention on the internet,” complained Reid. “This has gone too far and it needs to stop now. I deeply regret any role I had in creating this situation but now, as a grandparent, I say enough is enough.”

Originally, the total was thought to be approximately $17,000.

This is the same sort of situation former Reid financier Harvey Whittmore is facing jail time over. Whittemore is convicted of contributing more than $100,000 illegally to Reid’s campaign in 2007.

He became the target of an FBI probe for making “conduit contributions”: indirect payments in which an individual asks a friend or family member to make a donation in return for reimbursement. Whittemore used his wife, sister, five children, and some spouses of those children in the scheme.

During open testimony, Whittimore says he was approached by Reid, who asked him to raise $150,000, and that “he studied the law and decided that he could legally take out a loan, distribute the funds as gifts, and ask the recipients to support Reid’s campaign.

This isn’t the first ‘scandal ridden’ dealings Reid and Whittmore ventured into. In the 1990s, Whittemore came across the site for Coyote Springs and recognized it’s potential.

It is 5 miles wide and stretches 13 miles along the east side of U.S. 93 between parallel mountain ranges. Equally important, the site was in private hands , rare in a state where the federal government owns 87% of the land.

Nothing remotely as large and well-located might come on the market again. There was just one catch: for all its possibilities, the land had serious obstacles to development that only the federal government could remove.

First, Congress had created a mile-wide power line corridor covering 10,500 acres and running the length of the property close to the highway. No power lines had been built, but development inside the corridor seemed to be precluded.

A second problem was that ancient stream beds and washes crisscrossed the site. Though dry most of the year, as part of the valley’s ecosystem they could not be bulldozed or otherwise altered without federal permits.

In addition, while the private owner controlled all 42,842 acres, the federal government had retained title to almost a third of those acres to maintain a preserve for the desert tortoise, Nevada’s state reptile, which is shielded by the Endangered Species Act.

The tortoise’s habitat was concentrated in a wedge-shaped area in the middle of the site. Here too, development seemed to be prohibited.

But it was the exigencies of national security that put Coyote Springs in play. In 1988, Congress turned the land over to defense contractor Aerojet-General Corp. to test rockets.

The southern third of the land is in Clark County, which includes Las Vegas, and the rest is in Lincoln County. The rocket range was never created and the land remained essentially untouched until 1998, when Whittemore paid Aerojet-General at least $15 million for title to the privately owned portion of the site and for the rights under a rent-free government lease of the tortoise habitat.

Soon afterward, Whittemore reduced his financial exposure by selling the rights to 7,500 acre-feet of groundwater and a well to the Southern Nevada Water Authority for $25 million. But he retained other water rights at Coyote Springs and has agreements with Lincoln County and its private water company partner to buy more for the development.

Almost immediately, Whittemore began to push for the title to, and unrestricted use of, the tortoise habitat in the middle of the site. He argued that moving the tortoise preserve to the eastern edge of the site, where it would abut federal land, would help the desert tortoise and remove an impediment to his project.

In 1999, regional officials of the Interior Department refused, saying that only Congress could approve moving the preserve. Over the next five years, Whittemore bombarded the government with proposals.

Finally, in 2004, the Bureau of Land Management agreed to give him title to nearly 10,000 acres of tortoise land in the middle of his site in exchange for equal acreage along the fringes. They called the swap a “minor” boundary adjustment.

No federal appraisal was made to determine whether the land the government got was equal in value to the land it gave up, and some public land experts say the exchange may have been illegal.

“The law clearly wouldn’t allow a ‘boundary adjustment’ of 10,000 acres,” said Janine Blaeloch of the Western Lands Project, a group that advocates for public lands. “Congress drew the map of the leased lands. Congress would have to change it.”

The bureau said it agreed to the land swap because the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service said moving the preserve would be good for the tortoise. Neither Sen. Reid nor Leif Reid played a role in getting the tortoise preserve relocated, Whittemore said.

In 2002, Reid went to work on removing the power line corridor. First, he and others in Nevada’s congressional delegation tucked an obscurely worded provision into a huge land bill to benefit a wide range of interests in Clark County.

The provision shifted the power corridor off Whittemore’s land and onto federal land along the west side of U.S. 93. The land west of the highway had been earmarked for “wilderness study,” but a separate section of the bill reclassified the land to allow power lines.

As drafted, the bill would have done Whittemore a large financial favor: It required him to pay nothing for getting the power corridor moved to the west side of the highway, even though it increased the value of his 10,500 acres on the east side by clearing it for development. The giveaway prompted questions from the Bureau of Land Management and the Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee.

With the legislative clock running out, Reid and his Nevada colleagues backed off, removing from the bill the provision moving the power line corridor. But another provision, one that reclassified the status of the land on the west side so that it eventually could accommodate a power line corridor, survived, and President Bush signed the bill in November 2002.

The battle over keeping the Klamath River wild has been an ongoing battle, fought for nearly a century as California Proposition 11 was on the November 4, 1924 ballot as an initiated state statute. The ballot reads in part:

“Klamath River Fish and Game District. Initiative measures Creates Klamath River Fish and Game District consisting of Klamath River and waters thereof following its meanderings from confluence of Klamath and Shasta Rivers in Siskiyou County to mouth of Klamath River in Del Norte County. Prohibits the construction or maintenance of any dam or other artificial obstruction in waters of said district, prescribes penalties therefor (sic), and declares any such artificial obstruction to be a nuisance.”

The argument for the measure was penned by J. A. Ager, Chairman, Board of Supervisors, Siskiyou County and Frank M. Newbert, President Fish and Game Commission of California. The argument against the bill was written by R.J Wade, Secretary, Eureka Chamber of Commerce and Fred M. Kay, County Clerk, Humboldt County.

The measure was approved.

“As we begin debate on this aid and sanctions package, I also hope that Republicans who stopped action on this legislation prior to the break have considered how their obstruction affects United States’ national security as well as the people of Ukraine,” says Reid. “Since a few Republicans blocked these important sanctions last work period, Russian lawmakers voted to annex Crimea and Russian forces have taken over Ukrainian military bases.”

Reid’s charge comes despite widespread support among Republicans and Democrats in Congress for providing Ukraine with much-needed economic assistance and hitting Russian President Vladimir Putin’s government with sanctions. Meanwhile, Senate aides note the House passed different legislation, meaning the Senate bill could not have become law before recess anyhow.

He adds, “It’s impossible to know whether events would have unfolded differently if the United States had responded to Russian aggression with a strong, unified voice. When a few extremist Republicans blocked action on this robust bill reported with strong, bipartisan support by the Foreign Relations Committee, it sent a dangerous message to Russian leaders.”

His comments came just a few hours before senators voted 78 to 17 to proceed with debate on a $1 billion aid package to the new Ukrainian government. All the votes in opposition came from Republicans, most of who are concerned that the package includes changes to how the U.S. provides money for the International Monetary Fund.

Reid announced the only way to provide Ukraine with economic assistance quickly was to remove the IMF provision from a Senate aid package, which he did. However, it doesn’t stop Russia from collecting around $3 million off the top from the U.S. aid package because of a previous agreement between Ukraine and Russia made in late December 2013.

If anything, Reid should be blaming the Obama Administration for the invasion of the Crimea. Remember the February 7th leaked conversation between Assistant Secretary of State Victoria Nuland and U.S. Ambassador to Ukraine Geoffrey Pyatt?

In that tapped telephone call Nuland is quoted, “…fuck the EU.”

Furthermore in the same call, Nuland and Pyatt discussed who they wanted to promote and prevent from entering the Ukrainian government, which is evidence the U.S. government had been meddling in Ukrainian internal affairs before the take-over. They also talked about getting the United Nations involved in the Ukrainian mess.

Reid’s partisan attacks and lies are getting old and worn out — jus’ like his hold on the Senate.

Former President Jimmy Carter thinks the National Security Agency’s is reading his email. In an interview with NBC’s Andrea Mitchell, Carter says he has found away around the snooping, though.

“And when I want to communicate with a foreign leader privately,” admits Carter, “I type or write the letter myself, put it in the post office, and mail it.”

“Old fashioned snail mail?” Mitchell laughs.

“Yeah, because I believe if I send an email, it will be monitored,” Carter answered.

The former Commander-in-Chief never feinted indignity and Mitchell never followed up on his comment.