Croneyism

[IcemanCometh]

Bush always takes care of his pals (http://www.cnn.com/2005/POLITICS/09/27/brown.fema/index.html)

[SpursWoman]

Yes, Iceman, we understand. That concept never existed until W. took the oath of office.

:fro

[IcemanCometh]

Its certainly never existed better. The problem is Bush's croney are all incompetents or simply severly unqualified for the job they are handed.

[boutons]

Katrina ripped open the rot in the dubya administration. It is NOT like the garden-variety cronyism and corruption common to all govt.

===================

September 26, 2005
Find the Brownie

By PAUL KRUGMAN

For the politically curious seeking entertainment, I'd like to propose two new trivia games: "Find the Brownie" and "Two Degrees of Jack Abramoff."

The objective in Find the Brownie is to find an obscure but important government job held by someone whose only apparent qualifications for that job are political loyalty and personal connections. It's inspired by President Bush's praise, four days after Katrina hit, for the hapless Michael Brown, the director of the Federal Emergency Management Agency: "Brownie, you're doing a heck of a job." I guess it depends on the meaning of the word heck.

There are a lot of Brownies. As Time magazine puts it in its latest issue, "Bush has gone further than most presidents to put political stalwarts in some of the most important government jobs you've never heard of." Time offers a couple of fresh examples, such as the former editor of a Wall Street medical-industry newsletter who now holds a crucial position at the Food and Drug Administration.

A tipster urged me to look for Brownies among regional administrators for the General Services Administration, which oversees federal property and leases. There are several potential ways a position at G.S.A. could be abused. For example, an official might give a particular businessman an inside track in the purchase of government property - the charge against David Safavian, who was recently arrested - or give a particular landlord an inside track in renting space to federal agencies.

Some of the regional administrators at G.S.A. are longtime professionals. But the regional administrator for the Northeast and Caribbean region, which includes New York, has no obvious qualifications other than being the daughter of the chairman of the Conservative Party of New York State. The regional administrator for the Southwest, appointed in 2002 after a failed bid for his father's Congressional seat, is Scott Armey, the son of Dick Armey, the former House majority leader.

You get the idea. Go ahead, see what - or rather who - you can come up with.

Jack Abramoff is a lobbyist who was paid huge sums by clients such as casino-owning Indian tribes and sweatshop operators on Saipan. Two Degrees of Jack Abramoff is inspired by the remarkable centrality of Mr. Abramoff, who was indicted last month on charges of fraud, in Washington's power structure.

The goal isn't to find important political players who were chummy with Mr. Abramoff - that's too easy. Instead, you have to find people linked by employment. One degree of Jack Abramoff is someone who actually worked for the lobbyist. Two degrees is a powerful Washington figure who hired someone who formerly worked for Mr. Abramoff, or who had one of his own former employees go to work for Mr. Abramoff.

Grover Norquist, the powerful antitax lobbyist, is a one-degree man. Mr. Norquist was Mr. Abramoff's campaign manager when he ran for chairman of the College Republican National Committee, then became his executive director. And don't dismiss this as kid stuff: as Franklin Foer explains in The New Republic, the college Republican organization pays serious salaries and has been a steppingstone for the likes of Lee Atwater and Karl Rove.

Mr. Rove, by the way, is a two-degree man. He hired Susan Ralston, Mr. Abramoff's personal assistant, as his own personal assistant. For those unfamiliar with what that means, Ms. Ralston became Mr. Rove's gatekeeper - the person who determined who got to see the great man.

Tom DeLay, the House majority leader, is also a two-degree man. Tony Rudy, who worked for Mr. DeLay in several capacities, left to work for Mr. Abramoff.

Finally, somebody should be considered a two-degree man on account of the recently arrested Mr. Safavian, who worked for both Mr. Abramoff and Mr. Norquist, then went first to the G.S.A. and on to the White House Office of Management and Budget, where he oversaw procurement policy. But I'm not sure who gets credit for hiring Mr. Safavian.

O.K., enough joking. The point of my games - which are actually research programs for enterprising journalists - is that all the scandals now surfacing are linked. Something is rotten in the state of the U.S. government. And the lesson of Hurricane Katrina is that a culture of cronyism and corruption can have lethal consequences.

==========================

NY Times editorial

September 26, 2005

Faking the Katrina Inquiry

As the nation reels from Rita's devastation along the Gulf Coast, any hope for a thorough investigation of government's gross mismanagement of Katrina is quietly ebbing away behind the political levees of Washington. The White House and Republican-controlled Congress, resisting popular support for an independent, nonpartisan commission, remain determined to run self-serving, bogus investigations.

President Bush has designated his domestic security adviser to deliver the supposedly no-holds-barred investigation he promised after his early embarrassment over Katrina. In a similar retreat, Congressional Republican leaders' ballyhooed promise for a special two-house select committee to fathom government's failures has already been scrapped. Democrats are understandably demanding equal membership and subpoena power - if not a 9/11-type independent commission - for such a task. But the House majority refuses to yield its edge in dominating this politically explosive issue. And the Senate goes its own way, advancing some helpful but totally inadequate ideas for post-hurricane oversight by an inspector general and a reconstruction financial officer.

The public should not be misled by the spectacle tomorrow when Michael Brown, the disgraced and departed director of the Federal Emergency Management Agency, will most likely be pilloried in an appearance before a Republican-heavy House committee. Scapegoating Mr. Brown is not enough. Lawmakers should be looking at wider mismanagement. The case of David Safavian, the White House's top federal procurement official, comes to mind. He was already enmeshed in the lucrative Gulf Coast rebuilding plans when he had to resign abruptly to face arrest on charges of obstructing justice in a deepening investigation into lobbyist corruption in Washington.

It's obvious that any honest inquiry into how the nation was caught unprepared must list administration cronyism as a topic of investigation as much as Katrina's timeline. Mr. Safavian was a G.O.P. loyalist and veteran lobbyist appointed to run the entire government's purchasing policy, apparently on the basis of patronage influence, not professional credentials.

There is no way to whitewash a hurricane; a government dominated by one party should be disqualified from investigating itself. Just as President Bush repeatedly fought the creation of the 9/11 commission until public pressure forced him to yield, so should the public now demand that the administration and Congress get real about Katrina.

========================

and:

http://www.spurstalk.com/forums/showthread.php?t=25828


and don't forget how dubya's FERC refused to intervene when Enron, El Paso Gas, and other Repub friends were fixing the energy market to fuck over California in 2001.

The list is endless.

[mookie2001]

Yes, Iceman, we understand. That concept never existed until W. took the oath of office.

:fro

[SpursWoman]

Exactly. :rolleyes

[mookie2001]

thats like saying no one else has ever stolen or lied before

[SpursWoman]

Sure, and it doesn't make it right. But if he's going to get all righteously indignated, why just start and end with Republicans when there's enough fun for everyone?

I mean, where was boutons when Clinton was getting $500 haircuts or whatever?






















And that was a JOKE, btw...since sometimes it appears those actually have to be pointed out sometimes. http://www.ezboard.com/images/emoticons/ohwell.gif

[Nbadan]

Sure, and it doesn't make it right. But if he's going to get all righteously indignated, why just start and end with Republicans when there's enough fun for everyone?

I mean, where was boutons when Clinton was getting $500 haircuts or whatever?

The current administration takes cronyism to a whole new level. Forget $500 haircuts, try mulitmillion dollars jobs and no-bid contracts to Republican shills, some, like Mike Brown, who don't have the foggest clue of how to do their jobs effectively. This is more than just wasted government money, this is about putting friends and those with political connections above the lives of American families.






















And that was a JOKE, btw...since sometimes it appears those actually have to be pointed out sometimes. http://www.ezboard.com/images/emoticons/ohwell.gif[/QUOTE]

[mookie2001]

The current administration takes cronyism to a whole new level. Forget $500 haircuts, try mulitmillion dollars jobs and no-bid contracts to Republican shills, some, like Mike Brown, who don't have the foggest clue of how to do their jobs effectively. This is more than just wasted government money, this is about putting friends and those with political connections above the lives of American families.

no joke

[SpursWoman]

The current administration takes cronyism to a whole new level. Forget $500 haircuts, try mulitmillion dollars jobs and no-bid contracts to Republican shills, some, like Mike Brown, who don't have the foggest clue of how to do their jobs effectively. This is more than just wasted government money, this is about putting friends and those with political connections above the lives of American families.


It's funny, you had a good point going until you referenced Halliburton. The fact that you obviously don't understand the very purpose of their existance and that they've been getting government contracts long before Dick Cheney and George Bush, pretty much made me quit reading.

[mookie2001]

yeah as whottt would say theyre professional "troop supporters"!

[SpursWoman]

Nevermind, I get it. It's the whole affirmative action thing. I never did quite understand that....hire someone that's not nearly as qualified for the job just to be "fair". Gottcha.

[mookie2001]

or just give one person every job and theyll always be the most qualified

[SpursWoman]

Build your business specifically toward handling every aspect of the job, and keep it running and successful for over 80 years and it's pretty much a given that you'll always be the most qualified. You've never strived to be the best at something? Businesses that don't don't survive that long. That is in no way, shape or form the same as Mike Brown & FEMA...they are extemely qualified. He had a strong enough argument without that.

[mookie2001]

you know my favorite times on st is when i can get people to argue against the constitution and for Haliburton
over and over again
hilarious

[SpursWoman]

How, specifically, am I arguing against the Constitution?

[mookie2001]

i didnt mean that
the conservative posters here do that everyday

but people love to take up for Haliburton
whottt would fight a war for the Haliburton Militia if they let him

[SpursWoman]

I think that whole "they gave it to Halliburton 'cuz Cheney used to work there and everyone is just lining their pockets" would hold a lot more water if they weren't tremendously qualified for the job. Especially since they were contracted with the Clinton Administration, the Carter Administration....that's as far back as I've gotten so far. I personally don't care, as long as the job they were hired to do gets done.

Because as big, mean, and crooked as they just have to be..they do employ over 100,000 American workers.

[Vashner]

Most Haliburton do hard blue collar type jobs. Nasty jobs in places that suck.
You know Haliburton helped make Texas economy the way it is. We do have special ties with the middle east oil people. We where / are a lot like them in terms of .. we had the oil.. and the way to get it out. And in a strange way hospitality...
You know I never hear anyone thank Saudi for supplying oil. just that they are dicks for not pumping it faster...

I mean you see those pumps shooting water out of NO? Now imagine 1000 of them.. that's how much we sucking out...

[exstatic]

SW: Yes, Halliburton has some expertise in foreign infrastructure rebuilding. Why, then, are they getting ANY contracts for Katrina rebuilding? There are plenty of other companies that were shoved aside for international rebuilding efforts. Shouldn't they get first crack at stateside work?

Here's a pretty good article on the Bush patronage machine:Time magazine article (http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,1109345,00.html)

[boutons]

http://images.ucomics.com/comics/bs/2005/bs050927.gif

[SpursWoman]

SW: Yes, Halliburton has some expertise in foreign infrastructure rebuilding. Why, then, are they getting ANY contracts for Katrina rebuilding? There are plenty of other companies that were shoved aside for international rebuilding efforts. Shouldn't they get first crack at stateside work?


I believe the first job a subsidiary of Halliburton got was for the removal of bodies. How long were those bodies supposed to sit there while the job was bid out? There was a substantial amount of backlash as it was. That company worked in the aftermath of the tsunami...where over 175,000 people died. That's what they do, that's not good enough for you? And I'm still not clear on who hired them...I believe I heard that was actually Governor Blanco.

The administration is not going to win no matter what they do...bidding out government jobs takes forever....and then the same people that are indignated over Halliburton are the same ones that would be bitching about why nothing has been done yet.

[xrayzebra]

This was taken off Rush Limbaugh Website: Yeah, that same Rush all the libs love to hate. Well, just sometimes, oh judge for yourself.

........MSNBC reports, it's the same thing the New York Times said, "At least two major corporate clients of lobbyist Joe Allbaugh, President Bush's former campaign manager and a former head of the Federal Emergency Management Agency, have already been tapped to start recovery work along the battered Gulf Coast. One is Shaw Group Inc. and the other is Halliburton Co. subsidiary Kellogg Brown and Root. Vice President Dick Cheney is a former head of Halliburton."

Well, I read the rest of the story. I can't find anything in here about the Shaw Group. Who the hell are they? Oh, wait. "Allbaugh's other major client, Baton Rouge-based Shaw Group, has updated its Web site to say: 'Hurricane Recovery Projects -- Apply Here!' Shaw said Thursday it has received a $100 million emergency FEMA contract for housing management and construction. Shaw also clinched a $100 million order on Friday from the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers. Shaw Group spokesman Chris Sammons said Allbaugh was providing the company with 'general consulting on business matters,' and would not say whether he played a direct role in any of the Katrina deals." Well, okay, fine, but who is the Shaw Group? Well, you know, you can easily find this out. You just go to their website. You can really easily find this out, if you want to. Yeah, we all know that Cheney headed up Halliburton, but we don't know anything about the Shaw Group. Well, now we do. "J. M. Bernhard, Jr., is the founder, chairman, and chief executive officer of the Shaw Group, a Fortune 500 company offering a broad range of services to the power, process, environmental, infrastructure, and emergency response markets. The company stock is publicly traded on the New York Stock Exchange. Under Mr. Bernhard's leadership, the Shaw Group has grown dramatically, and through a series of strategic acquisitions to over $3 billion in revenue since it's inception in 1987. Shaw is one of the youngest companies to be named to the Fortune 500, and recently debuted on the magazine's list of America's most admired companies. Headquartered in Baton Rouge, the company employs over 18,000 people at its offices and operations in North America, South America, Europe, the Middle East, and the Asia-Pacific region." Now, you know where I'm reading this from? I said all you have to do is go to the website. I didn't say the Shaw Group website, because I'm not reading from the Shaw Group website.


You know what I'm reading from? The Louisiana Democratic Party website.

.........................

Now you know the rest of the story......have a nice day.

[j-6]

I'm confused. Didn't you say this was all from Rush Limbaugh's website?

[SpursWoman]

The first paragraph, I believe... :)