No-account governance

A compilation of recent examples from Glenn Reynolds' "accountability is for the little people" file:

More than a month after he was put on leave when a video surfaced showing him joking about the lavish spending at a taxpayer-funded General Services Administration (GSA) $823,000 conference in Las Vegas, a top official at the agency has quietly returned to his job.

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Legislators in the California Assembly have approved on a 68-0 vote a bill that would exempt multiple categories of state and local government employees from having their names disclosed in public property records, according to Steven Greenhut.

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ObamaCare is set to take effect in 2014. Overseeing the program will be the Health and Human Services Department.  Here's another reason to worry: an independent auditor discovered discrepancies of nearly $10 billion between last year's HHS financial statement and an audit by a major accounting firm.

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Typical Rangel: Laws don’t apply to him.
Just as they didn’t apply to any of the 11 counts of ethical violations, many first uncovered by The Post, that led the House to censure him.  Even his colleagues, it seems, couldn’t ignore that sleaze: Failing to pay taxes on his villa in the Dominican Republic. Failing to report hundreds of thousands in assets on financial-disclosure forms. Using official letterhead to solicit donations, including from firms with business before Congress, for a school named after him . . .

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A county official driving a county government issued vehicle was arrested after being clocked for allegedly going more than 100 miles an hour in a 55 mile an hour zone.
Prince George's County police pulled County Councilwoman Karen Toles over along the Capital Beltway near Branch Avenue last week. The officer cited and fined her for an improper lane change, but she only received a warning for the alleged speeding violation.

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...and these privileged individuals can even say "rule of law" with a straight face! Mad enough yet?