Rick
Santorum (R-VA), lover of all things wholesome, is defrauding a public school district for tens of thousands of dollars and openly violating the Constitution of the United States. Let's start with
theft from a public school:
The Penn Hills School District asked Sen. Rick Santorum a $38,000 question. That is whether his children are residents of the municipality to the point that their educations should be paid for by Penn Hills taxpayers.
On Wednesday he gave his answer and it was no.(...)
Five Santorum children have been home-schooled at their house in Leesburg, Va., through the Pennsylvania Cyber Charter School, an education paid for by the Penn Hills district to the tune of $38,000 a year, until it became apparent recently that they don't live in Penn Hills.
The senator's office issued a statement two days ago saying he and his wife, Karen, are withdrawing their children from the cyber school.
The only reason the Santorums stopped stealing from taxpayers and the school district was because they were caught doing it. This probably frustrates them to no end, since ripping off a school district to the tune of $38,000 was merely Santorum's personal contribution to "starving the beast."
But let's back up a second--why weren't the Santorum children living in the school district where Santorum's Pennsylvania house is located?
The two-bedroom house that the Santorum children called home for education purposes and that gives Mr. and Mrs. Santorum the right to vote in Pennsylvania lacks an occupancy permit. And the property tax break from the homestead exemption claimed by the Santorums on the Penn Hills house is allowed under law only if the dwelling is their "permanent home."
Ahh. The reason the Santorum children do not live in the school district is because no one legally resides in the house the Santorums own in Penn Hills. Without the occupancy permit, not only were the Santorums clearly defrauding taxpayers, they are not legal residents of Pennsylvania at all. This presents another legal problem, namely Article I, Section 3, Clause 3 of the
Unites States Constitution:
Clause 3: No Person shall be a Senator who shall not have attained to the Age of thirty Years, and been nine Years a Citizen of the United States, and who shall not, when elected, be an Inhabitant of that State for which he shall be chosen.
If Rick Santorum (R-VA) admits that he and his children are not residents of the Penn Hills school district, it is difficult to figure out how Santorum is a legal resident of Pennsylvania. There are people living in his Pennsylvania house and claiming residency from that address, but they are not the Santorums:
Sure, he and his wife pay taxes on the house. They also use the address for voter registration, but so do two other people. When a Post-Gazette reporter visited the house last Friday, a young man came to the door and declined to comment. He wasn't Rick Santorum.
This not only means that he illegally defrauded a taxpayer funded public school district of 38K, but that his Constitutional status as a legal Senator form Pennsylvania is in serious doubt. Maybe Congressional Republicans can change the law to prevent a member of their leadership from continually breaking it,
like they are doing for Tom DeLay:
House Republicans plan to change their rules in order to allow members indicted by state prosecutors to remain in a leadership post, a move designed to benefit Majority Leader Tom DeLay (R-Tex.) in case he is charged by a Texas grand jury that has indicted three of his political associates, GOP leaders said today.
The rules change, which leaders said is likely to be adopted Wednesday, comes as House Republicans return to Washington indebted to DeLay for the enhanced majority they won in this month's elections. DeLay led an aggressive redistricting effort in Texas last year that resulted in five Democratic House members retiring or losing reelection. It also triggered the grand jury inquiry into fundraising efforts related to the state legislature's redistricting actions.
Of course, changing the Constitution is a little more difficult than changing House Ethics Rules, even though Republicans have no problem being completely loose with both. The hypocrisy of Republicans in the case of both DeLay and Santorum is stunning, even by Republican standards.
DeLay in 1993:
House Republicans in 1993 -- trying to underscore the ethics problems of Dan Rostenkowski (D-Ill.), then-chairman of the Ways and Means Committee -- adopted the rule that requires a party leader to surrender his or her post if indicted by any grand jury, federal or state.
Santorum in 1990:
In his initial House race against Rep. Doug Walgren in 1990, challenger Santorum attacked the incumbent from Mt. Lebanon for buying a house and raising his children in McLean, Va. Now Rick Santorum of Leesburg, Va., is saying that he is and he isn't a resident of Pennsylvania.
Corruption runs wild in among Republicans in Washington. Perhaps this is part of their war against modernity.
