Eye On Boise

Beck: ‘I’m not that weird,’ actuarial report came from Hoffman

Feb. 18, 2010 3:04 p.m. • 5 comments

Former state Sen. Rod Beck just contacted Eye on Boise to say he didn’t just find the fiscal year 2009 PERSI actuarial report on the Internet while cruising Web sites; he got it in an email from Wayne Hoffman, who obtained it through a request to PERSI. “I just was not digging through actuarial reports - I’m not that weird,” Beck said. “The only person I sent it to was those that asked me, and it was Tom Loertscher and Lynn Luker. … Tom told me that he sent it to other members of the committee itself.”

Republicans on the House State Affairs Committee cited the report today as a reason for suddenly, and without notice, overturning yesterday’s 13-5 vote to kill HCR 42, which seeks to block a scheduled 1 percent cost-of-living increase next month for state retirees; instead, today, in a straight party-line vote, the committee sent the measure to the full House with a recommendation that it pass.

Hoffman, head of the Idaho Freedom Foundation, published an “Idaho Pork Report” at the start of the legislative session that decried PERSI retirement benefits as unduly generous. In an article headed, “Work for the state, retire like a king,” Hoffman wrote, “The question for policy makers is whether taxpayers should be forced to continue to subsidize such a generous employee benefits package at the expense of taxpayers.”

Five comments on this post so far. Add yours!

MountainGoat on February 18 at 4:53 p.m.
Wayne “nonpartisan” Hoffman… figures.
WildWest on February 18 at 9:21 p.m.
Hoffmann is pure and simple a paid republican assassin of real world facts in a calculated effort to cloud public opinion and suffocate genuine public debate over real Idaho issues.

Hoffmann’s I.F.F. partner, Heather Lauer was a partner at DCI a major conservative lobbying firm in Washington D.C., her firm who was paid to represent the interests of Burma s military junta, nice..!

Any issue involving Hoffman’s and his phony institute of conservative propagandist’s, should always be a big red flag to everyday Idahoans.

Why is this fake academic institution involved in this issue?

Who funded there work of this GOP propaganda & manipulated facts?

Why is it represented as editorials in newspapers?

Hoffman’s processes:
1. Fake right-wing think tank (Idaho Freedom Foundation) &
his fake media arm (Idaho Reporter) manufacture & tailor
political propaganda to support the conservative agenda.

2. Fake right-wing journalists embed themselves in mainstream
media writing fake articles & editorials to attack a political
issue or opponent.

3. Local mainstream media picks up fake outrage stories and
present the misinformation as fact, giving a sense legitimacy
to there false attack on a political opponent or issue.

4. GOP politicians & fake right-wing think tanks, respond to
main stream media with news releases of calculated
statements of shock & outrage.

5: Manufactured issue willful sway public opinion causes voter
to distrust government and question a politicians ethics
and successfully demonizing the issue.

Beware of anything that Hoffman’s conservative hit-squad publishes in Idaho media.
daremo on February 24 at 8:32 a.m.
Retire like a king??? There are quite a few retirees that would take issue with that (yet another) idiotic comment. Yeah look at my neighbor who retired from Fish and game living in his stately 2 bedroom 1100 sq. ft. home he bought 35 years ago and driving his kingly 1982 truck. Yep, that’s a king in Idaho, I suppose. Note how Hoffman never does his own work - he files public information requests with PERSI, the State Controller, etc., then makes up his spittle of a comment. Hoffman is a former state employee, so maybe he lives in royalty. And didn’t his foundation get some federal grant money (taxpayer money) to develop the “transparency” reports on his website? Would they admit it if they did?
WayneH on February 24 at 8:47 a.m.
IFF neither solicits nor accepts any government money.
slfisher on February 24 at 10:12 a.m.
yet, despite its much vaunted interest in transparency, the IFF has not published its IRS Form 990 so people can see where its money *does* come from.