Albany's Times-Union has a really good article on how Verizon is trying to get away with defrauding the state of million dollars in emergency government subsidies it should not have collected from the government after 9/11.

The article outlines it's 'double-dipping' accounting:

Auditors found that Verizon failed to tell the federal government just how much a private insurance settlement paid the company for its emergency 9/11 repairs.

Claims already covered by insurance and non-emergency repairs that didn't qualify for full reimbursement weren't all that state auditors questioned. They also disallowed almost $21 million in expensed straight time pay for employees and about $35 million for other costs that did not meet audit evidence standards.

In all, Verizon claimed more than $230 million more than the plan allowed and, as a result, collected almost $39 million more than it was entitled for emergency repairs, auditors concluded.

The auditors' report also said Verizon delayed or tried to obstruct the audit team's effort to document Verizon's claims. "As the audit progressed, we encountered serious difficulties in obtaining information from Verizon on such key items as labor and insurance proceeds. During the course of the audit, the latter issue developed into the single most significant topic," the auditors wrote in their report.

It would take over a year for the auditors to obtain documentation of Verizon's $825 million insurance settlement for all its 9/11 damages, according to the audit report.

Schumer, who worked to bring federal aid to New York City after 9/11, had no immediate comment on the audit.

The audit report comes at a time when Verizon Chief Executive Ivan G. Seidenberg is being scrutinized by shareholder activists focusing on excessive payments to executives.

I guess Verizon needs all that extra money to pay it's lobbyists so they can give it back to their favorite porkers on Capitol Hill.

A quick look throughout both FollowTheMoney.org and OpenSecrets.org gives us a clue as to how Verizon spent some of that money in Washington and Albany.

Politicians
Verizon is actually a cheapskate when it comes to funding election campaigns in New York State. In the last cycle employees, movers and shakers of Verizon Communications sloughed off the company a paltry $62,325 for the last election cycle --that's out of a total of $2,096,235 spent in political contributions last year.

Still, Verizonites' giving patterns suggest they get all hot and bothered by Republicans in Albany and Capitol Hill; with almost 68% of their campaign contributions going to the party that hates the idea of universal internet access and municipal WiFi utilities:

Image Found at FollowTheMoney.org

OpenSecrets puts the number at 59%.

Their buying investment contributing patterns are rather interesting. Congressman Eliot Engel was the company's sweetheart after both presidential candidates, receiving more than twice what John Sweeney and Vito Fossella received. By the way, they gave to Barack Obama also on that cycle --$10,000.

Now, if you look at 2006, the prime receipient of their monetary love is none other than Hillary Clinton. Ms. Clinton received $50,000 for what was basically an uncontested race --and $22,780 more than what Eliot Engel received that cycle for his political payroll.

[Does Engel get to claim retirement benefits from Verizon?]

Lobbyists
Most of Verizon's political investments don't go directly to politicians. They go to lobyyists --all $13,050,000.

A lot of these companies are marketing firms, like Ernst & Young, which received a none too shabby $320,000 of Verizon's money last year. Yet the top contending lobbying firms are Liebman and Associates, with $640,000 in billables; topped by none other than The Federalist Group, which got $700,000 of your cellular fees and as noted in a Daily Kos diary, is part of the astroturfing mesh that supported Jack Abramoff's wheeling and dealing.

The firm had historically worked as part of the hundreds of lobbying outfits that nurture the military-industrial shrills of the Republican party. Yet in 2005 Ogilvy Worldwide bought it for a reported $60 million dollars and turned it into a bi-partisan division of their government relations division --because, as we all know, money knows no political affiliation.

It's really interesting to see the giving patterns of organizations like Verizon. Here you have them in 2006 giving to a former first lady who's running on an uncontested senatorial campaign AND also spending money of companies like The Federalist Group/Oglivy, which are known for their fake grassroots (astroturfing) campaigns.

Which tells me that to Verizon, Democrats like Hillary Clinton and Eliot Engel seem to be Republican quality democrats and worthy of their money.

Don't you think?

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