The former head USAID Andrew Natsios, interviewed in Newsweek, claims that the Coalition Provisional Authority, which ruled Iraq after Saddam’s fall, was not prepared for the rebuilding of Iraq and let “ill-qualified or corrupt contractors” dominate the rebuilding process. “They didn't have [monitoring] systems set up. They were very dismissive of these processes,” he stated. Others are speaking out on contractor fraud and corruption including the watchdog group Transparency International, which claimed that the contractor fraud could become “the biggest corruption scandal in history.” Rep. Chris Shays (R-CT), who has investigated fraud allegations states, “The administration seems to have a deaf ear to this issue … When you have men and women dying on the battlefield and you have corruption, then you've got a problem.” The Defense Department refused to send auditors to Iraq until numerous pleas and corrupt practices brought them to send a team to Qatar, a thousand miles away from Baghdad. The Inspector General at the Pentagon oversaw the auditing practice of rewarding and monitoring contracts – until he left his position to take a job with Blackwater USA, one of the top Pentagon contractors in Iraq.
Continue readingMorning News:
- The DC restaurant industry is not happy with congressional efforts to prohibit lobbyists from treating lawmakers and their staff to meals, according to the Los Angeles Times. In response to this attempt at reforming lobbying the restaurant industry has dispatched its own team of lobbyists to lobby Congress to allow lobbyists to be able to spend freely for lawmakers’ meals.
- What happens when you violate safety laws, don’t pay fines, and oppose increased oversight? The Hill reports that you get tax breaks: “After fatal mining accidents this year, the mining industry is on the verge of winning tax breaks to help pay for new safety technologies as it lobbies against government-imposed safety requirements.” Back in January the Washington Post reported that, “the Bush administration abandoned or delayed implementation of 18 proposed safety rules that were in the federal Mine Safety and Health Administration's regulatory pipeline in early 2001”.
- President Bush’s Faith and Community Based Initiative is directing millions of dollars into organizations run by his religious right supporters, according to the Washington Post. Rep. Mark Souter (R-IN) says that the program has “gone political” and Rep. Chet Edwards (D-TX) asserts, “I believe ultimately this will be seen as one of the largest patronage programs in American history.” Outspoken televangelist Pat Robertson’s Operation Blessing received tens of millions of dollars; “local antiabortion and crisis pregnancy centers have received well over $60 million in grants for abstinence education and other programs;” Shepherd Smith, the strategist for Robertson’s 1988 presidential bid, received $7.5 million; many of the recipients of federal grants were “influential supporters of Bush's presidential campaigns.”
- Prosecutors in the Tom DeLay (R-TX) money laundering case are trying to get two charges reinstated against the troubled former Majority Leader, according to the Associated Press. Meanwhile, the Houston Chronicle reports that DeLay believes that the charges are just political theater and prosecutor Ronnie Earle will throw out the charges after the 2006 midterm elections.
Education Official Moving to House Education Committee; Former Lobbyist:
A former lobbyist for the for-profit online University of Phoenix is moving from her post at the Education Department to work for the new House Education and Workforce Committee chairman Buck McKeon (R-CA), according to the New York Times. Buck McKeon has been an ally of for-profit universities like his predecessor John Boehner (R-OH). A few months ago, “the committee for the first time permitted institutions that teach more than half their courses online to receive federal student aid, a boon to for-profit institutions like the University of Phoenix.” Stroup was instrumental in pushing for these rule changes as she oversaw a program that judged whether the 50% rule should be waived. The Education Department Inspector General wrote that her 2003 report to Congress “contained unsupported, incomplete and inaccurate statements.” In 2004 the Chronicle of Higher Education documented the campaign contributions that for-profit universities had funneled into the pockets of McKeon and Boehner. McKeon received $126,000 from these universities from 2003-2004.
Continue readingFederal Fines go Unpaid; White Collar Criminals the Most Delinquent:
The federal government is owed $35 billion in fines from criminals and from civil cases, the majority of which comes from white collar criminals, who only pay 7 percent of restitution. According to the Associated Press, this amount is five times higher then it was a decade ago. Much of the uncollected money comes from violations of federal regulations, such as violations of mine safety laws. In most cases the federal government has waived the fines in favor of compliance, such as in the case of violations at nuclear facilities throughout the country. Anti-nuclear activist Greg Mello calls this, “kind of an exercise in absurdity.” The Government Accountability Office, an independent investigative office, has warned that the failure to enforce penalties and fines will undermine the effectiveness of enforcement agencies. Of course, this 2004 Denver Post story may shed some light on why the federal government is failing to take punitive action against violators.
Continue readingContractor Tier System Wasting Taxpayer Money:
Rebuilding New Orleans and the Gulf Coast region is proving especially costly thanks to a dysfunctional contracting system. To understand how taxpayer money is wasted Reuters asks the key question, “How many contractors does it take to haul a pile of tree branches?” The answer: “at least four: a contractor, his subcontractor, the subcontractor's subcontractor, and finally, the local man with a truck and chainsaw.” If you want to get a roof patched you are going to need to get six contractors: “At the bottom tier is a Spanish-speaking crew making less than 10 cents for every square foot of tarpaulin installed. At the top, the prime contractor bills the government 15 times as much for the same job.” Watchdog groups and the Government Accountability Office have criticized the process claiming that it has cost taxpayers tens of millions of dollars while the smaller subcontractors are being cheated by the large contractors.
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