Saturday Morning Scandalrama, Sponsored by the Bush Administration

source article from Daily Kos

by SusanG
Sat Apr 29, 2006 at 10:37:58 AM PDT
While we're wallowing in the Republican Whorefest at the Watergate it's easy to lose sight of plain old-fashioned, money-based GOP corruption stories clicking across the news wires at a NASCAR pace. As a public service, I bring you three separate stories about shenanigans - and keep in mind, these are all articles from just this morning. There is not time enough in a day to keep track of the daily skullduggery without borrowing the ATT/NSA database.


First, there's trouble brewing at the VA:


WASHINGTON -- A subcommittee of the House Veterans Affairs Committee has opened a preliminary inquiry into a veterans administration contract with QTC Management Inc., a firm headed by former Veterans Secretary Anthony J. Principi.

It appears that Mr. Principi may have steered $1.2 billion worth of contracts to his own company, some of them recommended by a congressional committee headed by - you guessed it - Mr. Principi, before he joined QTC.

Second, we encounter Lester Crawford, former commissioner of the Food and Drug Administration, under investigation for "financial improprieties and making false statements to Congress."

It seems that Mr. Crawford sold $50,000 worth of shares in a company regulated by the agency just a month before he resigned as FDA head to go off into the wild blue yonder of Washington lobbying. Under Mr. Crawford's leadership, the FDA also played games with the approval of contraceptive Plan B, which was being delayed in heading to market - allegedly under political pressure from the conservative right - despite research studies citing its safety.

Third, the Los Angeles Times got hold of internal reports that show that Parsons Corp., awarded billions of dollars worth of contracts to build Iraqi health and safety facilities and infrastructure, has fallen (as the Times quaintly phrases it) "dramatically short of a number of goals."


The firm was to have rebuilt Iraq's health and security infrastructure. However, an audit and interviews show it will finish only 20 of 150 planned health clinics, and nearly $70 million of medical equipment meant for the clinics sits unused.

... The U.S. Army Corps of Engineers failed to properly monitor Parsons' performance, stonewalled investigative efforts and exercised "poor cost controls" as Parsons spent $186 million on a contract to build the health clinics, according to a draft copy of an audit obtained by The Times. About $60 million of that was spent by Parsons on management and administration.

The reports and interviews taken together suggest a wholesale failure in two of the most crucial areas of the Iraq reconstruction -- health and safety -- which were supposed to win Iraqi goodwill and reduce the threat to American soldiers.


Yes, your taxpayer dollars at work. Or rather, your children's and your grandchildren's debit card run up, all in the interests of feeding the Republican Party and its cronies.