Thread: Marta Fox and Columba Bush

htColumba Bush paid a $4,100 fine and was briefly detained by Customs in Atlanta. [Times files]
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Bush: Wife meant to hide shopping spree from me
Mrs. Bush was given two chances to declare the correct amount of tax owed on her Paris purchases.
By JO BECKER

© St. Petersburg Times, published June 22, 1999


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TALLAHASSEE -- Gov. Jeb Bush said Monday that his wife misled U.S. Customs officials about $19,000 in new clothing and jewelry she brought into the country because she didn't want him to know how much she had spent on her five-day Paris shopping trip.

Forced to explain his wife's actions at the Atlanta airport Thursday, Bush said Monday that the episode had disrupted their family life. His wife, Bush said, feels "horrible about this."

"It was a difficult weekend at our house," Bush said.

On Friday, the Bushes disclosed that Columba Bush had paid a $4,100 fine and was briefly detained by Customs agents for failing to declare merchandise when she arrived at Hartsfield International Airport. With that, the low profile enjoyed by the governor's quiet wife ended. "Shop 'til you drop," read a headline Saturday in the Bush's new hometown paper, the Tallahassee Democrat.

In his first public remarks about the Customs fine, Bush on Monday declined to specify exactly what his wife had purchased, and he tried to guard her privacy.

"I love my wife more than life -- she is my comfort and I am very proud of her. . . . What she does with our money is our business -- she can deal with that with me," Bush told reporters before signing into law the education reform package that is the biggest achievement of his first year in office.

The U.S. Customs Service, meantime, disclosed that Mrs. Bush had been given two chances to truthfully identify the amount of federal duty she owed on her purchases.

On a mandatory declaration form handed out Thursday on her Delta flight from France to Atlanta, Mrs. Bush falsely stated she had purchased $500 worth of goods, according to the Bushes and a U.S. Customs service spokesman.

Customs agents then found some shopping receipts in her purse. But Mrs. Bush declined the opportunity to change her declaration, Customs spokesman Patrick Jones said.

After that, Customs agents searched her luggage and found the merchandise. At that point Mrs. Bush confessed to all of her purchases, telling agents she did not answer truthfully at first because she did not want her husband to know how much she had spent, according to Bush spokesman Cory Tilley.

Mrs. Bush's civil fine of $4,100 was three times the duty she owed. She returned home to Tallahassee Thursday evening -- with her purchases.

“I love my wife more than life â€â€

With the legislators in Mexico wanting to investigate Marta Fox's spending habits and concerned that government money is being spent on her "things", I thought it was interesting that Columba Bush has also made news regarding her "things". Trying to sneak through Customs in Atlanta following a shopping spree in Paris....both husbands run to their wive's rescue.

I think both incidents are not just "little husband/wife matters". Both incidents involve short changing their governments on money owed.

Imagine this. Both women have extreme wealth and power at their disposal. In Mexico, with the incredible poverty that exists, and Marta Fox has to fleece the people in order to have more. In the case of Columba Bush, it is essentially the same thing. Both of these people think or thought they were above the law and that they do not have to obey and abide by the law. Both of these stories are appalling. The final chapter is the sweeping under the rug of these stories.

WHO CARES! I DONT CARE. DO YOU CARE? SO, SOME PEOPLE MAKE IT IN THE NEWS. YADDA YADDA YADDA. THESE ARE JUST PIMPS AND PIMPETTES. WHO CARES???