Tag Archives: Fraud

Ethics Group Asks SEC to Probe Musk Claims About ‘Gruesome’ Neuralink Monkey Trials

“It seems obvious to everyone but Elon Musk that Neuralink’s device is unsafe,” said one critic. “Now he is deliberately misleading investors and the public by outright lying about the company’s monkey experiments.”

By Brett Wilkins. Published 9-21-2023 by Common Dreams

After obtaining records showing a dozen monkeys were euthanized in “gruesome” trials, a national physicians group on Wednesday asked the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission to investigate claims made by Elon Musk, owner of the biotech firm Neuralink, about the company’s experimental brain implants.

Physicians Committee for Responsible Medicine (PCRM) requested an SEC probe into possible securities fraud committed by Musk when he claimed that “no monkey has died as a result of a Neuralink implant” during testing of the company’s implantable brain-computer interfaces (BCI), and that the animals who died were all already terminally ill when chosen for experiments.

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‘Straight Up Fraud’: Data Confirms Private Insurers Use Medicare Advantage to Steal Billions

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“The move to privatize Medicare,” said one expert, has “been very profitable, in part because insurers are good at making their patients seem sicker.”

By Kenny Stancil Published 10=9-2022 by Common Dreams

Photo: K Whiteford/Public domain

Insurance giants are exploiting Medicare Advantage—a corporate-managed program that threatens to result in the complete privatization of traditional Medicare—to capture billions of dollars in extra profits, Saturday reporting by The New York Times confirmed.

The newspaper’s analysis of dozens of lawsuits, inspector general reports, and watchdog investigations found that overbilling by Medicare Advantage (MA) providers is so pervasive it exceeds the budgets of entire federal agencies, prompting journalist Ryan Cooper to call the program “a straight up fraud scheme.” Continue reading →

Pentagon Contractors in Afghanistan Pocketed $108 Billion Over 20 Years

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Military contracting “obscures where and how taxpayer money flows,” and “makes it difficult to know how many people are employed, injured, and killed,” said the Costs of War Project report’s author.

By Jessica Corbett Published 8-9-2022 by Common Dreams

Contractors from the Bagram Air Field Retrosort Yard load a water tank onto a contracted transportation truck. (Photo: 1st Lt. Henry Chan, 18th Combat Sustainment Support Battalion Public Affairs/U.S. Army)

Pentagon contractors operating in Afghanistan over the past two decades raked in nearly $108 billion—funds that “were distributed and spent with a significant lack of transparency,” according to a report published Tuesday.

“These contracts show the shadowy ‘camo economy’ at work in Afghanistan,” said report author Heidi Peltier, director of programs for the Costs of War Project at Brown Univesity’s Watson Institute for International and Public Affairs. Continue reading →

Think Dishonest Politics and Dark Money Elections Bad Now? Court Ruling Opens Floodgates for ‘Scam PACs’

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The ruling, said one expert, “will embolden scam PACs to trade on the names of candidates to raise money for their own ends from unknowing citizens.”

By Jake Johnson, staff writer for Common Dreams. Published 3-22-2019

“This is unfortunate. It will lead to confusion in the political marketplace. It provides a wide opening for scam PACs to exploit,” FEC chair Ellen Weintraub said of the ruling.. Photo: Fibonacci Blue/flickr

A federal judge on Thursday struck down FEC regulations barring unauthorized political action committees from using a candidate’s name to mislead voters and attract donations, a ruling critics warned could lead to the proliferation of “scam PACs.”

Paul S. Ryan, vice president for policy and litigation with Common Cause, said the ruling “will embolden scam PACs to trade on the names of candidates to raise money for their own ends from unknowing citizens.” Continue reading →

Haiti 5 Years After the Earthquake: Where Has All the Money Gone?

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On January 12, 2010, Haiti experienced the worst earthquake in their history; a massive 7.0 magnitude with an epicenter near the town of Léogâne (Ouest Department), approximately 25 kilometres (16 mi) west of Port-au-Prince, Haiti’s capital. Estimates of the total lives lost range from 230,000 people to 316,000, with an additional 300,000 injured and 1.5 million displaced as a result of the disaster. As of September, 2014, 85,432 displaced people remain in 123 sites.

Haiti refugee camp. Photo by Jonathan M. Katz

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Tag Archives: Fraud

Pentagon Contractors in Afghanistan Pocketed $108 Billion Over 20 Years

Military contracting “obscures where and how taxpayer money flows,” and “makes it difficult to know how many people are employed, injured, and killed,” said the Costs of War Project report’s author.