A whistleblower’s claims that reconstruction in Iraq has been rife with waste, fraud and abuse — particularly in regard to a division of Halliburton — will be turned over to the Justice Department, a U.S. senator said Friday.

[B.H.] Greenhouse has testified that the contracts awarded to Kellogg, Brown and Root represent “the most blatant and improper contract abuse I have witnessed during the course of my professional career.”

[Senator] Dorgan attempted unsuccessfully to persuade Congress to hold hearings on the allegations, and when they declined he conducted unofficial hearings before the Senate Democratic Policy Committee.

At those hearings, witnesses, including Greenhouse, testified that waste, fraud and abuse were rampant, Dorgan said. One example given was the torching of new $85,000 trucks because of easily reparable deficiencies, such flat tires and clogged fuel pumps.

Now, who would be corrupt enough to give a contract to these thugs?



  1. RabidWolf says:

    This is a big surprize to someone?
    Or the disclaimers?

    RW

  2. Mike says:

    Everybody, grab your tired, old conspiracy theory hats.

  3. GregAllen says:

    I am skeptical of all-things-Bush but this level of war profiteering even pushed my boundaries.

    Could any human being be so cold and so greedy?

  4. Shane B says:

    Let me know when we start auditing the 4 trillion dollars we spend within our governement, so I can get my waste and fraud refund back from the IRS.

  5. RTaylor says:

    When blood is smelled within the beltway, the attacks will pile on. The sad thing is the opposition party had to wait for favorable polling before attacking the administration. As they say, “You can’t be helpful if you don’t get reelected”.

  6. Mike says:

    What makes Kellogg Brown and Root ‘thugs’?

  7. Matt Garrett says:

    I am aghast that John Dvorak would deliberately mislead his readers regarding this. Before he took the oath of office, Dick Cheney sold his Haliburton stock in 2000.

    http://archives.cnn.com/2000/ALLPOLITICS/stories/09/12/campaign.cheney.halliburton.reut/

    In addition, according to WikiPedia:
    http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Halliburton

    “Cheney’s deferred compensation from Halliburton, which appeared on his 2001 financial disclosure statement, generated an income between $50,000 to $100,000. Cheney also retains 433,000 share-equivalent unexercised stock options at Halliburton.

    On the question of Cheney’s deferred compensation from Halliburton, officials of the Bush-Cheney campaign said that before entering office in 2001, Cheney bought an insurance policy that guaranteed a fixed amount of deferred payments from Halliburton each year for five years so that the payments would not depend on the company’s fortunes. The officials also said he had promised to donate to charity any after-tax profits he made from exercising his stock options. These steps are not unusual for corporate executives who enter government.”

    You’re a much better journalist than that, John.

  8. Eideard says:

    I Googled “Halliburton crook” and got the image above. Gee, maybe I should’ve taken the time to Photoshop it and change $40 million to $8 million. Would that make the issue any less?

    Oh, my name’s not John. And the whistleblower is named Bunnatine. Does that mean the Justice Dept. shouldn’t act?

  9. Matt Garrett says:

    Nice Dodge. Does that come with a hemi?

  10. site admin says:

    Matt, learn how to read the blog before you accuse me of anything. This might help:

    http://www.dvorak.org/blog/primer/blogprimer1.htm

  11. Parallax Abstraction says:

    But knowing how to read it would mean that he can’t flind wild accusations and then what fun would that be? 🙂


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