'Fully loaded' SUV puts D.C. Council Chairman Kwame Brown on the spot

[The Northerner]

Several weeks after Kwame R. Brown was elected D.C. Council chairman in November, city officials were asked to order for him a "fully loaded" Lincoln Navigator L with a DVD entertainment system, power moonroof and polished aluminum wheels.

It had to be black - all black, inside and out - and it had to arrive in time for his inauguration on Jan. 2, never mind the District's projected $400 million budget shortfall.

Later, when he was asked on television why taxpayers should foot the $1,900-a-month lease payments, Brown (D) said he had merely requested a black sport-utility vehicle and was driving the vehicle that the District had procured for him.

E-mails written by members of his staff and city officials - and obtained by The Washington Post through the Freedom of Information Act - tell a different story, beginning with a Department of Public Works solicitation in November for a 2011 Lincoln Navigator L series, an extended-wheelbase version of the Navigator. The e-mail specified "Fully Loaded Required" and indicated that the vehicle was being sought at Brown's request.

Read more: http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2011/02/19/AR2011021904613.html

[CaliforniaPeggy]

1. ANOTHER fucking hypocrite!

My God.

Is there no end to these people?

:eyes:

[rfranklin]

2. Probably been watching too many rap videos...

Everybody has to have one of those giant SUVs to get any street cred.

[Turbineguy]

3. He probably didn't want a Bentley

because he might be mistaken for a republican.

[Obamanaut]

4. Damn those greedy, wasteful Repub....er, never mind. nt

[Initech]

5. Is there any wonder why these people are flat-out despised???

[Codeine]

6. Polished aluminum wheels? DVD system?

Fucking tacky. Take it back and buy him a base-model Focus and if he doesn't like it tell him to suck it.

I grow increasingly weary of these assholes.

[cali]

7. asshole.

make that greedy asshole.

[Angry Dragon]

8. If he can't supply his own vehicle then let him walk or take the bus

[tkmorris]

9. DC politics have a history of such people

Marion Barry was not an aberration. He was just spectacularly bad at not getting caught.

[Dappleganger]

12. The Barry School of Economics has many students.

It's both saddening and maddening that they could not come up with someone who is more in tune with the needs of the people FIRST.

[TheWraith]

13. Local politics are almost always the most corrupt.

You'll find mayors and local legislators getting away with things a Congressman would be strung up for.

[GSLevel9]

10. BTW thet lease payment will probably

cover the cost of 2 families home rental per month.

[ProgressiveProfessor]

11. Classic entitled pols

Any party, any stripe...