Jesus, Look who they're sending to run the war:

[The Backlash Cometh]

Ties to GOP Trumped Know-How Among Staff Sent to Rebuild Iraq

After the fall of Saddam Hussein's government in April 2003, the opportunity to participate in the U.S.-led effort to reconstruct Iraq attracted all manner of Americans -- restless professionals, Arabic-speaking academics, development specialists and war-zone adventurers. But before they could go to Baghdad, they had to get past Jim O'Beirne's office in the Pentagon.

To pass muster with O'Beirne, a political appointee who screens prospective political appointees for Defense Department posts, applicants didn't need to be experts in the Middle East or in post-conflict reconstruction. What seemed most important was loyalty to the Bush administration.

O'Beirne's staff posed blunt questions to some candidates about domestic politics: Did you vote for George W. Bush in 2000? Do you support the way the president is fighting the war on terror? Two people who sought jobs with the U.S. occupation authority said they were even asked their views on Roe v. Wade .

Many of those chosen by O'Beirne's office to work for the Coalition Provisional Authority, which ran Iraq's government from April 2003 to June 2004, lacked vital skills and experience. A 24-year-old who had never worked in finance -- but had applied for a White House job -- was sent to reopen Baghdad's stock exchange. The daughter of a prominent neoconservative commentator and a recent graduate from an evangelical university for home-schooled children were tapped to manage Iraq's $13 billion budget, even though they didn't have a background in accounting.

The decision to send the loyal and the willing instead of the best and the brightest is now regarded by many people involved in the 3 1/2 -year effort to stabilize and rebuild Iraq as one of the Bush administration's gravest errors...

MORE:
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/09/16/AR2006091600193.html

[Sabriel]

1. I guess that makes me qualified to oversee the medical system

I've been to a doctor and a hospital a couple of times in my life, so I'm good to go.

The gall of this bunch never ceases to amaze me. Just when you think you're inured to the corruption....

[The Backlash Cometh]

2. Actually, no. Unless you're loyal to George Bush.

You see, you don't have to be qualified, just loyal to the clown. I mean, crown.

[The Backlash Cometh]

3. Wow. Another explosive quote:

To recruit the people he wanted, O'Beirne sought résumés from the offices of Republican congressmen, conservative think tanks and GOP activists. He discarded applications from those his staff deemed ideologically suspect, even if the applicants possessed Arabic language skills or postwar rebuilding experience.

[lonestarnot]

4. Why just descriptions, why no names? I want to know who stole

the 8.5 billion dollars of our hard earned tax money.

[me b zola]

25. There's a lot more than 8.5 billion missing

I'm too lazy to search tonight, but IIRC that 8.5 was only one year. Then of course there's all of the fraud & overcharging.

[lonestarnot]

29. Hell yeah there is more than 8.5 billion missing! Way more than

8.5 billion. This was only one shipment of cash, one! They used forklifts to unload it, how could it just vanish?

[malaise]

30. Some names were included in these

2004 articles.
http://www.sourcewatch.org/index.php?title=Simone_Ledeen

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A48543-2004May22.html

[COSPRINGS]

5. If he actually was competent..

We would just have a President that made evil decisions, but at least executed them well.

[The Backlash Cometh]

10. You've said a lot.

He's not just evil, but incompetent.

Welcome, COSPRINGS.

[Octafish]

6. Your BFEE at work.

From the WaPo article:

"We didn't tap -- and it should have started from the White House on down -- just didn't tap the right people to do this job," said Frederick Smith, who served as the deputy director of the CPA's Washington office. "It was a tough, tough job. Instead we got people who went out there because of their political leanings."

[Jcrowley]

8. And that could easily describe

the entirety of the Bush foreign and domestic policy.

Calling Joe Allbaugh.

[The Backlash Cometh]

11. This goes beyond the pale.

No excuse for this level of incompetence, when so much was at stake.

[Octafish]

21. Incompetence and greed.

Billions disappeared.

Audit: U.S. lost track of $9 billion in Iraq funds

Pentagon, Bremer dispute inspector general's report

Monday, January 31, 2005 Posted: 0412 GMT (1212 HKT)

WASHINGTON (CNN) -- Nearly $9 billion of money spent on Iraqi reconstruction is unaccounted for because of inefficiencies and bad management, according to a watchdog report published Sunday.

An inspector general's report said the U.S.-led administration that ran Iraq until June 2004 is unable to account for the funds.

"Severe inefficiencies and poor management" by the Coalition Provisional Authority has left auditors with no guarantee the money was properly used," the report said.

"The CPA did not establish or implement sufficient managerial, financial and contractual controls to ensure that funds were used in a transparent manner," said Stuart W. Bowen Jr., director of the Office of the Special Inspector General for Iraq Reconstruction.

The $8.8 billion was reported to have been spent on salaries, operating and capital expenditures, and reconstruction projects between October 2003 and June 2004, Bowen's report concluded.

http://edition.cnn.com/2005/WORLD/meast/01/30/iraq.audit/

It's a good bet a big chunk a dat ended up in Smirko's pocket.

It's called kickback. BFEE expertise comes from the late GOP superconservaturd Spiro T. Agnew.

[Octafish]

14. Sam with a showing scalp flattop was particular about the point it made.

The guy's a basket case and a right cheap bastard, too.

Joe Albaugh

Big Man on the Campaign Trail

EXCERPT...

Allbaugh has prospered in part because he has a constituency of one – Bush. "There isn't anything more important than protecting him and the first lady," he said. "I'm the heavy, in the literal sense of the word."

SNIP...

The outcome was a decision to make Allbaugh the campaign manager and leave Rove in the role of chief strategist.

Allbaugh is a nuts-and-bolts manager who enjoys saying no. "Joe is a really good bad cop," says Mark McKinnon, Bush's chief media adviser.

McKinnon recalls asking Allbaugh to inspect the new, Spartan offices the media team has established in Austin, which have no running water and the ambiance of a fallout shelter. "His response was, 'How much were those fancy chairs?' " McKinnon says.

CONTINUED...

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-srv/politics/campaigns/wh2000/stories/allbaugh072399.htm

"That way there's more money for me and Karl to steal."

[The Backlash Cometh]

32. Anyone else notice how Bush is beginning to look like part gargoyle

and part demon?

[The Backlash Cometh]

9. Think of all those soldiers who died...for this?

The Republicans never believed in nation building before, but with Iraq, that all changed. Suddenly they're big proponents of nation building and they've proven they suck at it, because they don't hire based on merit. They hire based on cronyism.

Our soldiers deserved better.

Here's another incredible quote:

One former CPA employee who had an office near O'Beirne's wrote an e-mail to a friend describing the recruitment process: "I watched résumés of immensely talented individuals who had sought out CPA to help the country thrown in the trash because their adherence to 'the President's vision for Iraq' (a frequently heard phrase at CPA) was 'uncertain.' I saw senior civil servants from agencies like Treasury, Energy . . . and Commerce denied advisory positions in Baghdad that were instead handed to prominent RNC contributors."

What game was that fool in the White House playing?

[Octafish]

18. This article is a BFEE smoking gun...

...Check that. This article is a BFEE smoking cannon.

Thank you so very much, TheBacklashCometh.

Next is getting EVERYBODY to know this.

Smith said O'Beirne once pointed to a young man's résumé and pronounced him "an ideal candidate." His chief qualification was that he had worked for the Republican Party in Florida during the presidential election recount in 2000.

Do you wonder if it was one of these "ideal candidates"?



http://www.democracycellproject.net/forum/lofiversion/index.php/t283.html

11.22.2005

5th Anniversary of "Brooks Brothers" Riot in Miami

READ MORE: Halliburton, Jack Abramoff, Tom DeLay, George W. Bush

Today is the 5th anniversary of the "Brooks Brothers" riot in Miami, which stopped the vote count in Dade County.

Remember this famous picture in Al Kamen's column of these Republican "outside agitators"?

Now, think Abramoff. Lay. Enron. Halliburton.

They all chipped in to help pay for the recount. Which in this case means helping to pay for these punks to cross state lines to intimidate public officials to stop a vote count, eat Thanksgiving turkey, and groove on the cosmic stylings of Wayne Newton.

The Bushies set a max of $5K per donor. And Jack Abramoff chipped in to the recount. So did Ken Lay. On the same day.
Enron & Halliburton loaned their corporate jets.
And check out this very interesting Raw Story piece, with lots of interesting Abramoff tidbits, Scalia son hirings, unpaid legal bills, DeLay/Bush connections, a Blunt family marriage, and a great quote from Michael Scanlon about lacking a "bat phone" to Bush.
Get out your shovels, boys and girls. There's a lot of dirt here to dig up...

SOURCE... w lots o' links still working...

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/steve-cobble/5th-anniversary-of-brook_b_11096.html

[The Backlash Cometh]

33. I'm going to say it until I'm Democratically blue in the face:

This level of corruption begins at the local level. You have networks of these good ole boys who are allowed to have carte blanche in their own municipalties and counties, they know what drives their primarily white Republican constituents, and once they ascended to power at the federal level, they literally went ape shit.

[hootinholler]

45. "groove on the cosmic stylings of Wayne Newton" HEY!

You got a link for that? Sounds anatomically impossible to me.

:rofl:

-Hoot

[ninkasi]

20. That's the trouble...

It's all been a game to them. The prize has been wealth and power. They have been giving out taxpayer dollars to the conservative faithful, in return for their loyalty, their campaign contributions, and their votes. In the meantime, our troops have suffered, and died, and innocent Iraqis have suffered, died, an had their country destroyed.

All of this, all of the pain, and the grief, all of the nightmares that will never end for some people, all to cater to the whim of the least qualified person to ever claim the title of President. Whether he is a tool for others, or makes some of these decisions himself, the result is the same.

Our country, the U.S., who used to at least try to do the right thing, now is known as a brutal, savage nation, ready to go to war in a second, and refusing to negotiate or compromise. We have earned the scorn and hatred of millions of people world wide. Even the people who could understand in the beginning that Bush was thrust on us by a conservative SCOTUS, after the 2004 election, their sympathy for us turned to contempt. They reasoned that even if the election had been rigged, we still could have held massive demonstrations, and protests, and tried to get him removed.

Instead, we did nothing, and he has been more barbaric in his second term than his first. So, sending loyal but incompetent sycophants is par for the course with this gang. They don't care about our troops, or the people of Iraq, or world opinion. They only care for power and wealth, and that's all they care for.

[The Backlash Cometh]

36. "In the meantime, our troops have suffered, and died, "

I just can't believe how incredibly inhuman Republican constituents can be. Whenever you point out the pain that our soldiers are going through, they always pipe in that the soldiers volunteered and knew what they were getting into. And then they have the brass balls to tell us to shut up and support the troops. Major, major cognitive dissonance going on here. I can't believe for one minute, that a soldier would volunteer to go to Iraq to die, if he knew that this president was sending inexperienced cronies who couldn't possibly get the job done given their resumes.

[lonestarnot]

12. political "learnings"

bwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwaaaaa :rofl: bushitler talk for brainwash'n.... what's a learning? "'Is' our children learning?"

[Octafish]

19. Freud's First Slip & The Family That Preys Together

From the late, great B. Kliban:



And from the great Calhoun, some of his family history:

The Family That Preys Together -

the Bush Family

by Jack Colhoun
CovertAction Quarterly, 1992
George Jr.'s BCCI Connection

"This is an incredible deal, unbelievable for this small company," analyst Charles Strain told Forbes magazine, describing the oil production sharing agreement the Harken Energy Corporation signed in January 1990 with Bahrain.

Under the terms of the deal, Harken was given the exclusive right to explore for gas and oil off the shores of the Gulf island nation. If gas or oil were found in waters near two of the world's largest gas and oil fields Harken would have exclusive marketing and transportation rights for the energy resources. Truly an "incredible deal" for a company that had never drilled an offshore well.

Strain failed to point out, however, the one fact that puts the Harken deal in focus: George W. Bush, the eldest son of George and Barbara Bush of 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue, Washington, D.C., is a member of Harken's board of directors, a consultant and a stockholder in the Texas-based company. In light of this connection, the deal makes more sense.

The involvement of Junior - George Walker Bush's childhood nickname-with Harken is a walking conflict of interest. His relationship to President Bush, rather than any business acumen, made him a valuable asset for Harken, the Republican Party benefactors, Middle East oil sheikhs and covert operators who played a part in Harken's Bahrain deal. In fact Junior's track record as an oilman is pretty dismal. He began his career in Midland, Texas, in the mid-1970s when he founded Arbusto Energy, Inc. When oil prices dropped in the early 1980s, Arbusto fell upon hard times. Junior was only rescued from business failure when his company was purchased by Spectrum 7 Energy Corporation, a small oil firm owned by William DeWitt and Mercer Reynolds. As part of the September 1984 deal, Bush became Spectrum 7's president and was given a 13.6 percent share in the company's stock. Oil prices stayed low and within two years, Spectrum 7 was in trouble.

In the six months before Spectrum 7 was acquired by Harken in 1986, it had lost $400,000. In the buy out deal, George "Jr." and his partners were given more than $2 million worth of Harken stock for the 180-well operation. Made a director and hired as a "consultant" to Harken, Junior received another $600,000 of Harken stock and has been paid between $42,000 and $120,000 a year since 1986.

Junior's value to Harken soon became apparent when the company needed an infusion of cash in the spring of 1987. Junior and other Harken officials met with Jackson Stephens, head of Stephens, Inc., a large investment bank in Little Rock, Arkansas (Stephens made a $100,000 contribution to the Reagan-Bush campaign in 1980 and gave another $100,000 to the Bush dinner committee in 1990.)

CONTINUED...

http://www.thirdworldtraveler.com/CIA/Bush_Family_Preys_Together.html

Dunno if it's Prescott or Papa Doc Bush or Baby Doc Bush...

[lonestarnot]

27. Octafish, I've learned more about this crime syndicate from you

than any other DUer. You are fantastic. Thanks for everything you do here. The Family That Preys Together more of the tangled web of corruption. I wish there were pictures of these thugs. I am so bad with names, but if I could get a mug shot maybe I could remember who is who. Without a picture of their evil all I know is what corruption looks like. I'm wondering how much one of these fuckers gave the Catholic Church this week to have the Pope make the statements he made and have him knowingly fan the flames in the Islamic world.

[bonito]

7. They only care how smart you far

Not how smart you are.

[lisainmilo]

13. As they dig trenches around Bagdad...

because the war is out of control. The curfews and the lack of traffic on the streets has not been effective in car bombings and people dying every single day. At least a billion dollars is missing, so much for the accounting! http://www.notinourname.net/war/missing-billion-19sep05.htm and this article from as late as March 2006 says "billions" are missing. http://abutamam.blogspot.com/2006/03/iraqs-missing-billions.html

The Freedom Agenda is a failure. Terrorism and hate continue to grow.

As far as Bush....I think people are starting to realize we have Hitler in the WH. He has commited impeachable offenses. I will and I hope all will pursue impeachment, reguardless of what our lawmakers may or may not do, I feel it is our obligation, to us as citizens, to our country and to the world!

Bring Our Soldiers Home
End the War in Iraq
Impeachment info at website.

[lonestarnot]

28. Not just impeachment, the bastards need to be put on trial for

everything from stealing two elections, ripping us off with gasoline prices, murdering thousands upon thousands of innocent people, maiming thousands more, throwing the poor under the bus, raking in billions they've stolen from war profiteering and just outright stolen, creating several generations of slave laborers, not lifting so much as a finger toward stabalization of global warming or the genocide in Darfur and on and fucking on.

[thinks4herself]

15. GOP not worried about a backlash?

It sure seems the GOP lives for the moment and never looks down the road to the time in the future when the other party, hopefully, is in control of things--they are very short sighted. The Dems have been kicked to the curb, forced to meet in the basement, ignored, shut out, disregarded, discounted, and slimed. This could come back around, which actually, I hope it doesn't because we need more than 1-party rule as has been so clearly demonstrated by the horrible job the GOP is doing at governing our nation and as living proof that absolute power breeds absolute corruption.

Black Hearts

[annabanana]

31. Welcome to DU. .

Believe it or not, most of us have no argument with that. Many of us would prefer that we had a system that would apportion power to more than two parties. For right now though, our traditional two party system is completely out of whack.

[mwb970]

35. What makes you think the Dems will ever be in control again?

"the time in the future when the other party, hopefully, is in control of things..."

I don't see any such time in the future. I think these guys are in power for keeps, unless and until We the People literally throw them out. But since that would involve getting up from the TV and turning off the football game, it won't happen.

You might just as well lie back and enjoy it.

[The Backlash Cometh]

38. When the power changes back to the Dems, we must look carefully

at who is leading the party, and who is giving those leaders advice. Democrats MUST go back with a strong purpose to investigate the crimes that have been perpetrated in the last ten years and they MUST have the will to demand accountability. If they don't, if they resort back to the backroom deals and sell their votes to get their states more money...we are doomed.

[newyawker99]

43. Hi thinksforherself!!

Welcome to DU!! :toast:

[newspeak]

16. so, basically they're saying

you can be incompetent, corrupt and of unsavory character as long as your LOYAL to *. Well, that says everything--I want to wake up now from this fekkin nightmare!!!

[Cleita]

17. It reminds me of an interview I was sent to for a new

magazine that was about to be published. I was sent for a bookkeeping job in their accounting section. You would say this job is pretty non-partisan wouldn't you? I passed the tests to see if I was qualified with no problems and I was set up for an interview.

The interview was pretty innocuous until the interviewer asked me what I thought of Cardinal McIntyre, head of the Archdiocese of Los Angeles. I honestly answered that I thought he was an asshole, in politer terms of course.

I was quickly dismissed with the "we will make a decision and call you."

My headhunter was besides herself asking why I would say such a thing. I then asked her why that was important to the job and, was one of the reasons I was sent on the job was all the Catholic School references on my resume?

She replied that they had specified that they only wanted Catholic applicants. (Back then prospective employers legally could ask for what they wanted in an employee, no matter how racist, sexist or biased their request was.) I told her, it really shoudn't have made a difference because a lot of Catholics think he's an A-hole.

So she confided that the magazine was financially backed by Schick Corporation (razors). I found out subsequently by researching that this Corporation is super reich wing and so stuck up in the Vatican's rear end that one cannot criticize or have an open thought about anything, even if all you are doing is crunching numbers.

[The Backlash Cometh]

39. Do you think there was some kind of Opus Dei thing going on?

Sounds like they wanted a bookkeeper who was capable and willing to keep two sets of books for them.

[Cleita]

48. Interesting idea, but at that time I didn't even know what

"Opus Dei" was. I had severed my ties with the Church as soon as I left school. I was not a believer.

[Roland99]

22. Well, that was the old game plan.Now they're "adapting to win"

See the difference?

[JohnnyRingo]

23. It's always "loyalty to Buxh"

Loyalty to the country is never considered when appointing a Representative.
I don't believe it's even secondary to the decision.

This government crossed a line in 2000.

[The Backlash Cometh]

40. Yes, but have you noticed how within that tight requirement: "people

who love George Bush," they couldn't find qualified people to do the job?

I wonder if there is a correlation?:eyes:

[bvar22]

24. *

[Shakespeare]

26. Ah, yes. Bush's fixer.

Fucking criminal.

[leftchick]

34. The US is Now Spending 11 MILLION Dollars An HOUR in Iraq!

ELEVEN MILLION an HOUR! I imagine a LOT of that is waste. It is still happening today. Congress has NO OVERSIGHT of how that money is spent.

[susu369]

37. Is Jim O'Beirne kin to Kate O'Beirne?

[The Backlash Cometh]

41. Yes. I think the article said they were married.

[susu369]

49. Duh - thank you

I only read the first page - now I'll go back and read the entire article.

:dumbsmilie:

[The Backlash Cometh]

50. Been there, done that.

:-) It happens to the best of us. I like to think that most DUers are like me, drive-by participants. We actually have things to do, like dogs to walk, gardens to tend to, suburban lifestyles to lament...

[Ronnie]

42. Al Franken

has been talking about this since Air America went on the air. Or more accurately, it's one of the first things I remember him talking about. So, it's been out there. Somewhere.
MSM should be ashamed.
This is one of the reasons I really like Al Franken. He talks about important things.

[tyedyeto]

44. This doesn't surprise me in the least.

Cronyism has always been rampant in this mis-administration.

[The Backlash Cometh]

46. It's an old local game, and one that needs to be stopped.

[leftofthedial]

47. this is how repukes operate

an ignorant aristocrat (even one that is brain-damaged and/or as stupid as a bag of rocks) is superior to any non-aristocrat.

[Joanne98]

51. A 24 year old who never worked in finance was sent ot open the

Baghdad stock exchange? You got to be shitting me.