By Dan DeWitt, Times Columnist
Tuesday, September 21, 2010
Maybe, you Pasco County residents have seen the ads in your subdivision newsletter. Maybe on the Internet.
And maybe, if you don't trust national politicians and you're easily swayed by exclamation marks and capital letters, they might sound like something you need to see, these seminars, these bold, new exposes of waste and dishonesty that go by the name of Government Gone Wild — excuse me, GOVERNMENT GONE WILD! — and that promise to tell you "what the federal government does not want you to know!!''
Because "ADMISSION IS FREE'' and they are scheduled in Pasco for "ONLY 3 NIGHTS!!'' you better "RESERVE NOW!!''
None of this is new to Hernando County, home of GOVERNMENT GONE WILD! star Blaise Ingoglia, who is identified on the governmentgonewild.org website as a motivational speaker, which is one of several titles by which he goes. Professional poker player is another. So is chairman of the Hernando County Republican Executive Committee, which casts doubt on the claim that these seminars, the first of them scheduled for Thursday night at the Word of Life Auditorium in Hudson, really are "NON-PARTISAN.''
Another of Ingoglia's jobs the website doesn't mention is his main one: building houses — more than 400 in both Hernando and Citrus counties — mostly for speculators.
He first teamed with a real estate company that touted Florida real estate as a can't-miss deal. Then Ingoglia did the touting himself and did it until at least March 2007, when he told potential buyers at a "Real Estate and Wealth Expo'' in Los Angeles that they could clear $25,000 by reselling before their homes were even finished.
His claims were backed by appraisals that local Realtors and statewide appraisal experts said were highly inflated, if not downright phony. He sold a home to one buyer without ever mentioning the fact that it was on a lime rock road. Though Ingoglia says otherwise, that the woman bought the lot from a separate Realtor, she produced a letter from Ingoglia's company saying "your lot and subdivision will be chosen for you.''
Of course I'd understand if Ingoglia's exploitation of the speculative market is something he DOES NOT WANT YOU TO KNOW!! Because once you do, you might notice that Ingoglia especially likes to attack spending that might not have happened if not for people like him.
In his first seminars, in 2007, he roasted Hernando County government for the huge bump in property tax revenue, created mostly by the huge bump in property values, created by what? Speculation.
In the anti-federal government "TEA PARTY EDITION'' of the seminars, which debuted in June, he slammed the bailouts and economic stimulus that were needed because of … yes, speculation.
Of course, builders such as Ingoglia had lots of company in creating our economic meltdown — bankers, Realtors, mortgage brokers, lax regulators, etc. And, to Ingoglia's credit, his June seminar wasn't exclusively partisan. Republican President George W. Bush, for example, took some heat for the surging federal deficit.
Still, this is my advice to our neighbors to the south who might be thinking of going to one of Ingoglia's productions: STEER CLEAR!!!''