Sooner Be Blue

Dang, I hate it when the crooks are Democrats!

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Another US military contractor overbilling scandal in Iraq. Ah well, you fight a war with the corrupt, criminal thugs you have, not the ones  you wish you had.

If there's one thing we've learned about the Bush administration and Iraq, it's don't mess with Dick Cheney's corporate buddies at Halliburton and KBR. If you do, you end up like this poor guy, a former Army contract official who had the nerve to question $1 billion dollars worth of questionable charges by KBR back in 2004.

From the New York Times:
"Army Overseer Tells of Ouster Over KBR Stir
By JAMES RISEN Published: June 17, 2008
WASHINGTON — The Army official who managed the Pentagon’s largest contract in Iraq says he was ousted from his job when he refused to approve paying more than $1 billion in questionable charges to KBR, the Houston-based company that has provided food, housing and other services to American troops.

.....He is giving his account just as the Pentagon has recently awarded KBR part of a 10-year, $150 billion contract in Iraq. [..]"

http://www.nytimes.com/2008/06/17/washington/17contractor.html

Ain't this something! A private firm holds our troops hostage by threatening to cut off food, water and services, and DoD can't find anything else to do but pay the ransom?

This is even more scandalous than simple corruption, obviously KBR has "good connections". It means that we have outsourced absolutely critical functions to private companies, companies which, unlike military personnel, can threaten to stop doing their jobs without facing courts-martial.

Shouldn't it be considered a threat to national security to have our military so completely dependent on a single private corporation? Because how "secure" is a nation who is this dependent on civilian contractors?

Once upon a time our military provided their own "food, fuel, and potable water along with critical services ranging from complex engineering to cleaning out the port-o-potties."

Just another reason to end the war. We are being blackmailed, hijacked, and ransomed by our own greedy corporate giants.

You know, war profiteering used to be taboo...not so much anymore. Can you recall any sitting Vice president, who kept a financial interest in the companies he formerly controlled as CEO, ever having such an influence over how government contracts were awarded and managed for the benefit of his friends?

And has any White House in history ever done more to cover up the corruption and outright theft of public funds?

Hopefully, President Obama will have investigations into the fraud and abuse which occurred during the Bush years. Not only has abuse, corruption and cronyism been rampant, KBR knows it's playing with a stacked deck, in a rigged game...they can do anything they damn well please, because without them, the army's between Iraq and a hard place.