Hubris

Elliot Spitzer built a career going after the rich and powerful who thought they were above the law. In the end it turns out he was afflicted with hubris just like his targets. Even the business talking heads on CNBC had to admit that much good had come of Spitzer work as NY AG even though they didn't approve of his techniques. It will all be over for Spitzer this morning but it's far from over. Clients one through eight and ten through whatever can't be sleeping very well. Their names and involvement will eventually see the light of day. The Republican prosecutor may yet regret opening this can of worms. The clients are all going to be the rich and powerful and a majority of the rich and powerful are Republicans.

The continuing air tanker saga

Boeing's loss of the Air Force tanker contract continues to make waves. Perhaps the Northrup Grumman/EADS proposal is better. Perhaps the embarrassment that resulted from Boeing's unethical conduct in 2003 was a factor. That said this could still hurt John McCain:
McCain advisers lobbied for European plane maker

WASHINGTON (AP) -- Top current advisers to Sen. John McCain's presidential campaign last year lobbied for a European plane maker that beat Boeing to a $35 billion Air Force tanker contract, taking sides in a bidding fight that McCain has tried to referee for more than five years.

Two of the advisers gave up their lobbying work when they joined McCain's campaign. A third, former Texas Rep. Tom Loeffler, lobbied for the European Aeronautic Defence and Space Co. while serving as McCain's national finance chairman.

[.....]

"The aesthetics are not good, especially since he is an advocate of reform and transparency," said Richard Aboulafia, an analyst with the aerospace consulting firm Teal Group. "Boeing advocates are going to use this as ammunition."

McCain, a longtime critic of influence peddling and special interest politics, has come under increased scrutiny as a presidential candidate, particularly because he has surrounded himself with advisers who are veteran Washington lobbyists. He has defended his inner circle and has emphatically denied reports last month in The New York Times and The Washington Post that suggested he helped the client of a lobbyist friend nine years ago.

He has also cast himself as a neutral watchdog in the Air Force tanker contract, one of the largest in decades.

And McCain himself is getting some of the blame.

But Boeing supporters already have begun to accuse McCain of damaging Boeing's chances by inserting himself into the tanker deal.

One of them, Rep. Norm Dicks, D-Washington, said the field was "tilted to Airbus" because the Pentagon did not weigh European subsidies for Airbus in its deliberations -- a decision he blamed on McCain. Everett, Wash., is where Boeing would perform much of the tanker work, and Dicks is a senior member of the House Appropriations defense subcommittee.

In December 2006, just weeks before the Air Force was set to release its formal request for proposals, McCain wrote a letter to the incoming defense secretary, Robert Gates, warning that he was "troubled" by the Air Force's draft request for bids.

The United States had filed a complaint with the World Trade Organization alleging that Airbus unfairly benefits from European subsidies. Airbus in turn argued that Boeing also receives government support, mostly as tax breaks.

Under the Air Force proposal, bidders would have been required to explain how financial penalties or other sanctions stemming from the subsidy dispute might affect their ability to execute the contract. The request was widely viewed as hurting the EADS-Northrop Grumman bid.

The proposed bid request "may risk eliminating competition before bids are submitted," McCain wrote in a December 1, 2006, letter to Gates. The Air Force changed the criteria four days later.

Dicks said the removal of the subsidy language was a "game-changer" that favored EADS over Boeing.

This has become an issue for both the right and the left. As Jazz explained here the right is enraged that a defense contract would be given to the French. The left is enraged that good union jobs would be outsourced to France.

Update

It would appear that St John received some cash from EADS after his intervention.

McCain, the presumptive GOP presidential nominee, played a crucial role in blocking the deal to build air tankers from going to U.S.-based Boeing, instead paving the path for EADS to score the loot. He framed his decision as an example of political integrity; Boeing has previously been exposed of contract abuse. But a review of campaign finance donations and lobbying records suggests that money and personal lobbying may have also been in play.

On January 15, 2007, McCain appeared at Alabama Gov. Bob Riley's gubernatorial swearing in ceremony and formally called for multiple bidders in the tanker deal. The push for an open process had only one true beneficiary, however, and that was the Northrop Grumman/EADS consortium, which was poised to be Boeing's sole competitor.

A day after McCain made his proclamation, the contributions began to flow. John Green, a lobbyist for EADS donated $2,100 to the senator's presidential campaign. Ten days after that, Michelle Lammers, the "Chief of Staff" for EADS North America, gave $250 to the McCain campaign. It was her first political contribution ever. Less than a month later, the long-time head of EADS' government affairs program, Samuel Adcock, made a $2,100 donation to McCain. And eleven days later, Ralph Crosby, the head of EADS North America, donated $2,300 himself.

Update II

I agree for the most part with this editorial in my local paper, The Oregonian today.
Boeing's stinging defeat on air tankers

From a purely provincial viewpoint, it's disappointing that the Air Force picked a European supplier over Boeing to build its next generation of refueling tanker aircraft.

The $35 billion contract would have created 44,000 jobs in the United States, most of them in the Northwest, according to Boeing. The company's failure to secure the deal becomes even more painful when you consider that it could grow to more than $100 billion, making it one of the biggest military purchases in history.

But the Air Force appears to have acted properly. It based last week's decision not on what's best for Boeing and the Seattle area, but on what's best for the nation and its defense.

Predictably, a furious outcry has arisen from politicians in Washington state and Kansas, where most of Boeing's manufacturing occurs. Air Force officials, however, counter the backlash with a convincing argument that they chose the better offer, one that will produce a better, bigger airplane at lower cost to U.S. taxpayers with delivery sooner than Boeing can offer.

Concerns about lost jobs in the United States also are being overstated in this controversy. The winning bidder is a partnership between America's Northrop Grumman and the parent company of Europe's Airbus, known as EADS. It says the new tanker will be assembled in Alabama and outfitted with General Electric engines, also built mostly in this country, supporting a total U.S. work force of about 25,000.

Boeing backers also warn there's risk in outsourcing sensitive defense contracts to foreign entities. This argument ignores the global nature of military procurement in an age when Boeing and other U.S. companies sell military aircraft and other defense hardware worldwide.

For its part, Boeing complains that the bidding process was flawed and skewed toward the EADS-Northrop combine. Congress should look into those complaints and make sure the competition was fair and open.

But Boeing needs to do some self-examination, too. The company could have locked up the tanker deal several years ago if it hadn't been for a procurement scandal that led to prison terms for a former Air Force official and a top Boeing executive, along with the departure of the company's chief executive.

Does the latest Boeing setback reflect a company that still has lessons to learn? Does it suggest arrogance, overconfidence or flagging competitiveness?

Amid all the protectionist rhetoric, those are worthwhile concerns for America's legendary aircraft manufacturer.

More on the air tanker deal

Below Jazz discussed the bru ha ha over the contract awarded to Northrup Grumman and EADS for the next generation of air tankers. As I said in the comments section there is a little more to the story than free trade. If they were going to use an existing airframe, the most economical thing to do, there were two choices, Boeing and EADS (Airbus). By all rights Boeing should not have even been able to bid on the deal and here is why:

Unethical conduct
In May 2003, the US Air Force announced it would lease 100 KC-767 tankers to replace the oldest 136 of its KC-135s. The 10 year lease would give the USAF the option to purchase the aircraft at the end of the contract. In September 2003, responding to critics who argued that the lease was vastly more expensive than an outright purchase, the DOD announced a revised lease of 74 aircraft and purchase of 26.

In December 2003, the Pentagon announced the project was to be frozen while an investigation of allegations of corruption by one of its former procurement staffers, Darleen Druyun (who had moved to Boeing in January) was begun. The fallout of this resulted in the resignation of Boeing CEO Philip M. Condit and the termination of CFO Michael M. Sears. Harry Stonecipher, former McDonnell Douglas CEO and Boeing COO, replaced Condit on an interim basis.

Druyun pleaded guilty to inflating the price of the contract to favor her future employer and to passing information on the competing Airbus A330 MRTT bid (from EADS). In October 2004, she was sentenced to nine months in jail for corruption, fined $5,000, given three years of supervised release and 150 hours of community service.

And this was not the only example of unethical conduct on the part of Boeing.

Industrial espionage
In June 2003, Lockheed Martin sued Boeing alleging that the company had resorted to industrial espionage in 1998 to win the Evolved Expendable Launch Vehicle (EELV) competition. Lockheed alleged that the former employee Kenneth Branch, who went to work for McDonnell Douglas and Boeing, passed 25,000 proprietary documents to his new employers. Lockheed argued that these documents allowed Boeing to win 21 of the 28 tendered military satellite launches.

In July 2003, Boeing was penalized, with the Pentagon stripping $1 billion worth of contracts away from the company and awarding them to Lockheed Martin. Furthermore, the company was forbidden to bid for rocket contracts for a twenty-month period which expired in March 2005.

In early September 2005, it was reported that Boeing was negotiating a settlement with the U.S. Department of Justice in which it would pay up to $500 million to cover this and the Darleen Druyun scandal.

If Boeing had been a bit more honest it might have had a better chance of winning the contract.

Radhi al-Radhi, Hero - Versus - Darn Near Everybody

***Previously posted on Chuck for and I'm reposting here in reaction to Ron's "Corruption, Incompetence, and Iraq," post and the fact that I have seen virtually nothing in MSM.***


Maybe a hick from Baker City, Oregon is easily impressed...I don't think so. How was it going in Iraq for Judge al-Radhi head of the Commission on Public Integrity? Kinda rough, 31 employees killed and 12 family members killed, serving the interest of the Maliki government, which wasn't very enthusiastic. Unenthusiastic enough to fire Radhi while he and some of his staff were in the US for US sponsored training last month, and cut him off monetarily. It seems this guy made some pretty serious enemies. Just for good measure add in the State Department, yup, US State Department under Condi's direction. Yeah, that historically challenged factually deficient, Condi Rice, promoter of global democratization and BushCo ethics. (cough, cough - I put those two words next to each other??)

This is quite honestly such a mess that I'm torn on which part leads to the next and what's more disturbing. OK, my post in September gave some detail to corruption in Iraq and Radhi's difficulties engaging it, his efforts show the Maliki government to be nearly paralyzed by corruption, something inconvenient for BushCo at this point. Thursday he testified before Henry Waxman's committee, detailing what's been going on. Within minutes Republicans were on the attack:

"Corruption is not a new phenomenon," remarked Representative Tom Davis, the senior GOPer on the panel.

Republican, Representative Darrell Issa, "We're not surprised a country that was run by a corrupt dictator…would have a pattern of corruption."

Republican Representative John Mica noted that corruption plagues many democratic countries, including the United States. Mica cited Watergate and the prosecution of Reagan administration officials, and he claimed that the Clinton administration had "the most number of witnesses to die suddenly."

I'm not going to re-write this AlterNet story, there are a lot more details, not nice details, but we start to get to some of the salient points when Waxman wants to see the State Department report on Iraqi government corruption - it's classified. The 70 page draft was "Sensitive, Not Classified;" the 80 page version is now off limits.

Writing to Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice, Waxman contended that this was absurd and outrageous. He argued it was ridiculous for the State Department to claim it could not answer even general questions about Iraqi corruption within a public setting. At the hearing, Waxman hurled a series of queries at Butler. What effect does corruption have on the Iraqi government's ability to achieve political reconciliation? Has Maliki obstructed any corruption investigations? Does the Maliki government have the political will and capability to root out corruption? Is corruption funding the insurgency? Again and again, Butler replied that he would be delighted to answer these questions in the proper setting: a classified hearing behind closed doors. This information, he explained, was secret because its disclosure would "endanger" U.S.-Iraqi relations.

Is your head spinning? Yet? Waxman evidently was, he noted that Condi had recently praised the Maliki efforts against corruption - very publicly - but now the not so positive was classified. The pattern of embarrassing documents finding their way into classification continues. Henry got wound up enough to say, "Secretary Rice is going to have a confrontation with this committee….The executive branch must answer the questions of the legislative branch." Knock yourself out, Henry, Condi luuuuuvs George II much more than she fears you.

According to a Radhi associate, Radhi left the committee room believing he had done the right thing. Even as he was depending on the U.S. government to process his asylum request, he had delivered Congress a straight message that happened to be rather inconvenient for the Bush administration. Then hours later, he received disturbing news: his son, who had been trying to obtain political asylum in England, was ordered by the British government to return to Baghdad. That's where people connected to Radhi have been kidnapped, tortured and killed. "For Judge Radhi," the Radhi associate said, "this put his day on Capitol Hill in a very different light."

That's right Rep Mica, there's corruption in DC, rather inconvenient of your Republican self to bring it up. Radhi battles it in Bhagdad, loses friends and family, and finally his position and economic well-being and you thugs belittle him in your smug little BushCo world of cronyism and corruption. The man is a hero and you and your's are scum sucking bottom feeders and you will exact your revenge for him making George II's surge look pointless.

Just exactly how ignored has this story been? Bet you knew nothing of it from the MSM. Yep, that leftist elite media the wing nuts are always railing against... Follow those links and see what it really is that's got me going, I'll be damned if I'll sit still for this crap out of those weasels.

Here's a little PostScript for you:

"No U.S. government agency has provided him any help to date," says a Radhi associate. On Monday morning, I asked Nicole Thompson, a State Department spokesperson, if this is true. She promised a quick answer. No reply came quickly. When I called again, she told me she had to check with Bureau of Near East Affairs and the Bureau of International Narcotics and Law Enforcement Affairs. On Wednesday afternoon, Thompson called with an official response:

State Department officials have met with Judge Radhi and are aware of his situation. As a standard practice, we do not comment on private conversations.

The Nation

Corruption, Incompetence and Iraq

We can come up with a lot of reasons that the Bush/Cheney cabal invaded and occupied Iraq; oil, middle east hegemony etc. But what if they just wanted to turn the middle east into a temporary cookie jar for their friends - a quick chance to make some big bucks. Frank Rich talks about the Iraq war and the seemingly unending corruption which is even more prevalent the the apparent incompetence.

Set against the epic corruption that has defined the war in Iraq, Mr. Riechers’s tragic tale is but a passing anecdote, his infraction at most a misdemeanor. The $26,788 he received for two months in a non-job doesn’t rise even to a rounding error in the Iraq-Afghanistan money pit. So far some $6 billion worth of contracts are being investigated for waste and fraud, however slowly, by the Pentagon and the Justice Department. That doesn’t include the unaccounted-for piles of cash, some $9 billion in Iraqi funds, that vanished during L. Paul Bremer’s short but disastrous reign in the Green Zone. Yet Mr. Riechers, not the first suicide connected to the war’s corruption scandals, is a window into the culture of the whole debacle.

Through his story you can see how America has routinely betrayed the very values of democratic governance that it hoped to export to Iraq. Look deeper and you can see how the wholesale corruption of government contracting sabotaged the crucial mission that might have enabled us to secure the country: the rebuilding of the Iraqi infrastructure, from electricity to hospitals.

Perhaps the Iraqi government realize that the Bush administration has no intention of actually rebuilding their country and that's why they have contracted with the Iranians and the Chinese to do it. The Bush administration probably knows that the war can't be won but they want to keep the lid off the cookie jar for another 15 months so their friends can pocket some more of our children and grand children's money. As Peggy Noonan suggested a week ago the Bush administration might actually prefer that a Democrat wins in 2008. The Bush administration will attempt to blame the inevitable humiliating withdrawal on the next president, that's what the surge was really about - buying time. They would probably prefer a Democratic President and the hated Hillary would be ideal.

The pure evil of the Bush/Cheney administration is monumental and the damage done may well prove to be fatal. The standing of the United States will never be the same and the US economy will become a follower rather than a leader as a result of the eight years of the Bush administration. The Bush Cheney legacy will not be known for incompetence but for selfish greed on an unprecedented scale that resulted in tens of thousands of deaths.

Politics All the Time, Governance Be Damned

It hasn't been a secret that BushCo has politicized governance, the DOJ has been one of the more public messes along with Dorita Doan over at GSA but McClatchy Papers raises the smell a bit higher. From 7/01 to 8/06 the Treasury got at least 10 political briefings and Commerce got four in (big surprise) '02, '04, '06. The Hatch Act violations that possibly go along with this behavior might be enough to get your goat, but there's EVEN MORE.

McClatchy's investigation of Treasury and Commerce officials' public appearances show a pattern of grant and funding announcements coinciding with GOP political interests. In fact they seem to coincidentally coincide with the goals set out in the "briefings." Congressional investigation has caused one Anonymous congressional aide to state that there are, ' "a number of remarkable coincidences" similar to how Treasury and Commerce events appeared to coincide with the strategy in the political briefings.' Included in the investigation's findings is that White House Drug Czar John Walters took 20 taxpayer paid trips to appear with Republican candidates.

"In the months leading up to the 2002 election, then-Commerce Secretary Don Evans, Bush's former campaign-finance chairman, made eight appearances or announcements with Republican incumbents in districts deemed by White House aides either as competitive districts or battleground presidential states. During the stops, he doled out millions of dollars in grants, including in two public announcements with Rep. Heather Wilson, a New Mexico Republican in a competitive district."

Now if I were talking about a Democratic administration the stuff would hit the proverbial fan, but somehow this is just business as usual for BushCo. Let's not be naive, any administration would like to have its accomplishments seen as an outgrowth of its ideology and would make certain that its Party's candidates had access to information to make that case. Nobody in their right mind would try to censure that, but there is a difference between governing and bragging about it and directing policy to benefit candidates. The latter is the reason for the Hatch Act. Maybe somebody remembers the stink raised about political contributors "earning" a night in the Lincoln Bedroom? That, of course, was back in the innocent days before the "permanent Republican majority."

Look here, I have campaigned for national office and I surely made a point of the benefits to my constituency of electing somebody with my views. I had every intention of winning and then attempting to bring forward the policies I espoused. Fortunately for me, somebody else got to try on Greg Walden, but at no time did it occur to me that it would be acceptable to use the government as my political tool. Such behavior is so corrosive to the good of the country as a whole that there is actually a law forbidding it - the Hatch Act. Here's the bad joke:

"Violations of the Hatch Act are treated as administrative, not criminal, matters, and punishment for violations ranges from suspension to termination. The administration has not taken any action against Doan." I know the care and caution that some people exercise in respect to the Hatch Act, one of my most ardent and committed supporters is a Federal Employee and his conduct was such that not even the most vindictive investigation would be able to find a whiff of violation. It is not that difficult to be politically active and fly straight - except for BushCo.

‘Routine’

Via Think Progress

During the White House press briefing this morning, spokesman Tony Snow characterized President Bush’s commutation of Scooter Libby’s prison term as “routine.”

If it's not just "routine" for rich white men who are members of the Bush/Cheney tribe David Boaz over at Cato At Liberty has some suggestions for additional commutations that Mr Bush might consider "routine".

• Mandy Martinson — 15 years for helping her boyfriend count his drug-dealing money.
• DeJarion Echols — 20 years for selling a small amount of crack and owning a gun, causing Reagan-appointed federal judge Walter S. Smith, Jr. to say, “This is one of those situations where I’d like to see a congressman sitting before me.”
• Weldon Angelos — 55 years for minor marijuana and gun charges, causing the George W. Bush-appointed judge Paul Cassell, previously best known for pressing the courts to overturn the Miranda decision, to call the mandatory sentence in this case “unjust, cruel, and even irrational.”
• Anthea Harris — 15 years when members of her husband’s drug ring received sentence reductions to testify against her, although she had not been directly involved in the business.

And Mr Boaz has a couple of other examples.

A compassionate conservative should also use the pardon power to head off the DEA’s war against doctors who help patients alleviate pain. He could start by pardoning Dr. Ronald McIver, sentenced to 30 years for prescribing Oxycontin and other drugs to patients in severe pain. Or Dr. William Hurwitz of Virginia, sentenced to 25 years but then granted a retrial, convicted again, and awaiting sentencing, which could still be 10 years.

Of course they have a problem - they are not members of the Bush crime family.