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mdovell
Joined: 22 Dec 2007
Posts: 461
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Posted: Fri Jun 12, 2009 3:05 pm Post subject: No, no no this can NOT be happening!
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www.marketwatch.com/story/stimulus-fraud-could-hit-50-billion
"After 9-11, counterterrorism became the FBI's top priority, even as the agency grappled with corporate crime such as the Enron and WorldCom scandals, said Muller, who took the helm of the FBI on Sept. 4, 2001, just one week ahead of the terrorist attacks.
The 9-11 attacks prompted the FBI and other government agencies to divert resources from financial fraud and other corporate crimes to fighting terrorism, including the transfer of 2,000 agents tracking white-collar crime to counterterrorism, Mueller said. "
Ok ok...so that generally is a creation of bush but yet obama didn't fix it BEFORE these massive plans? 50 billion is quite a bit to just let go.
The other thing that gets to me is in the boston area they are considering giving big dig contractors an ability to get funds from this for projects. To sort of elaborate this was a project building tunnels underwater and rerouting much of the traffic
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Big_Dig_(Boston,_Massachusetts)
First they said it wouldn't leak. Then thousands of leaks were found. ok it can drain. small bits came down..ok
The a WHOLE panel came down. Crushing a women in her car and she died. They found out eproxy that was used wasn't nearly as strong as it should have been. This is not a contractor I want to get funds by simply saying they are sorry.
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Calapso
Joined: 26 Aug 2008
Posts: 306
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Posted: Fri Jun 12, 2009 4:52 pm Post subject:
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I read that article. It doesn't say 50 bilion has been defrauded. It says it's what a guy that runs a financial services comapny (Jesus H. Christ there is a oxymoron, somone in the financial service sector worried about fraud) is predicting thats the amount. The article also states that the government is going to be as transparent as possible with the money.
Will money get wasted? You bet. It happens everywhere, even in private industry. It doesn't make it feel any better. But, nothing I have seen suggests anything like the KBR continuing fiasco is on the horizon.
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Nofsdad
Joined: 06 Jul 2003
Posts: 8380
Location: Central CA
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Posted: Fri Jun 12, 2009 5:00 pm Post subject:
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| Quote: |
| Ok ok...so that generally is a creation of bush but yet obama didn't fix it BEFORE these massive plans? |
Gosh Dovell... that's the closest I've ever heard you come to admitting that the Bush administration may not be TOTALLY blameless in this situation... the fact is that the last FOUR administrations all did more than their share to set the stage for what this country is going through. Geez, the collapse took place and the bailout plan was well in place before Obama ever took office for Chrissake.
But true to form, after using the term "generally a product" to describe any Bush involvement... even though everything you refer to as well as the total collapse and the formulation of the bailout plans took place on HIS watch and therefore the events leading up to it had to have occurred prior to that... your emphasis goes back to being on Obama's five months in office and blaming him... for either creating or not fixing... not sure which with the Limbaugh listeners, maybe both... what 12 years of hard right "leadership" under Reagan and Bush Sr, 8 years of soft right "leadership" under Clinton and another 8 years of hard right leadership under Bush Jr. had wrought.
And don't forget, during that period, Republicans controlled Congress totally between 1994 and 2006. If Republicans had WANTED to fix the crap that was wrong, they had ample time and opportunity to do so.
The simple fact is that Republicans didn't want to fix anything... any more than Democrats want to really fix anything now.
But to point the finger at Obama as the Great Satan who is selling out America, after only five months in office is such Limbaugh marching order rhetoric as to be almost as laughable as Limbaugh himself. If Obama is indeed selling us out it's to the exact same people that the last four presidents before him sold us out to and I didn't hear any of this bullshit economics rhetoric from the Republicans during ANY of the Republican administrations so therefore one can make the case that it's nothing but pure partisan crap. Those that try to blame him alone for the entire crisis, even offhandedly... get my nomination for the Dittohead Hall of Fame... NOT an award to be coveted.
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mdovell
Joined: 22 Dec 2007
Posts: 461
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Posted: Fri Jun 12, 2009 9:44 pm Post subject:
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Ok
Well it also quotes the head of the FBI who isn't tied to the financial industry in saying that the potential for fraud is there.
In terms of blame I remember around 9/11 there were republicans that said to blame clinton for the prior eight years of not getting obl while democrats said to blame bush since he was in office at the time. It's obvious that obama inherited a mess but eventually there will be a time when he can't totally blame bush on things. I know the collapse and the bailout didn't occur under obama.
To note just to say something. When exactly should people judge obama? I've heard arguments that the people of the country should let him do nearly anything he wants for about two years with no opposition. And then we'd judge him. Ultimatly after four years the people decide if he's to be reelected.
btw I wouldn't call bush sr hard right...heck I wouldn't call carter that much on the left either.
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Magnolia
Joined: 26 Aug 2005
Posts: 1707
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Posted: Fri Jun 12, 2009 9:51 pm Post subject:
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| mdovell wrote: |
btw I wouldn't call bush sr hard right.. |
I wouldn't either. Frankly, I don't know what to call him.
BUT - I sincerely believe that if a finger were pointed at ONE person, it WOULD BE BUSH SR. Follow his political path and history. All the way back to the CIA.
Bush SR. enabled and/or created most of shit we see today. He and buddy, Cheney. Son Dubya was only a contiuance tool.
mho.
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mdovell
Joined: 22 Dec 2007
Posts: 461
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Posted: Sat Jun 13, 2009 2:39 am Post subject:
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well Bush sr was the head of DCI which is actually beyond that of the cia...although he only held that job for a year it was when the Church commission happened.
Even going beyond that there's usually always been a scandle or something bad that occured in a given presidental administration. A few years ago it was mensioned about the outing of plame in the cia. But at the same point we let 1,500 cubans die in bay of pigs and they all worked for the cia.
there's been plenty of shady things in history
We overthrew the leader in iran in the early 50's and put the shaw back in which laid the seeds for the iranian revolution later.
In ww 2 we were fighting japan before Pearl Harbor with the Fighting Tiger group. Concept being if China had enough of airforce they could repell japan.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Flying_Tigers Well technically instead of freeing china we freed and occupied japan! 4 years after the war mao had his revolution.
in europe the concept of defending democracy was a fallacy. most of eastern europe fell under the control of the USSR (except yugoslavia) Spain was a dictatorship, portugal was one as well. The world even allowed Italy to somewhat take control of somalia again. From 1950-1960 UN Italian peacekeeping troops occupied it
France asked for US help in vietnam and we sent them planes with no wheels on them!
Israel actually buys oil from Iran!
www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2008/apr/04/israelstehranconnection
www.jpost.com/servlet/Satellite?pagename=JPost%2FJPArticle%2FShowFull&cid=1212659723371
in ww one the leaders of UK, Germany and Russia were all cousins (kaiser wilhelm, czar nicholas the 2nd and george the 5th)
South Korea, USA and Japan helped make the nuclear reactors that north korea is using to make bombs!
http://www.voanews.com/english/archive/2003-06/a-2003-06-30-23-International.cfm?moddate=2003-06-30
"The mammoth construction project - backed by the United States, the European Union, Japan and South Korea - is part of a 1994 agreement to keep the Korean Peninsula free of nuclear weapons and provide the impoverished nation with energy. "
How does making a nuclear reactor make it harder to make nuclear weapons? Since when do we make nuclear reactors to solve poverty and hunger?
Robert McNamara stated in the movie Fog of War that he didn't push for troops to go further into vietnam because he thought the same thing would happen that happened in korea - chinese involvement. Only to find out decades later that chinese and vietnamese hate each other! (which was proven in a small conflict in '79)
I've heard russia actually wanted to enter nato during the late 90's..clinton laughed it off and kosovo didn't exactly help.
If you really want to see something going beyond the middle east and bush or cheney look up US policies and history towards Latin America it's very rough to say the least.
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Nofsdad
Joined: 06 Jul 2003
Posts: 8380
Location: Central CA
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Posted: Sat Jun 13, 2009 3:29 am Post subject:
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| Magnolia wrote: |
| mdovell wrote: |
btw I wouldn't call bush sr hard right.. |
I wouldn't either. Frankly, I don't know what to call him.
BUT - I sincerely believe that if a finger were pointed at ONE person, it WOULD BE BUSH SR. Follow his political path and history. All the way back to the CIA.
Bush SR. enabled and/or created most of shit we see today. He and buddy, Cheney. Son Dubya was only a contiuance tool.
mho. |
I agree that's all he was and that Cheney was actually running the country the whole time. But if W wants the glory... not to mention those huge speaking fees he's mentioned in regard to how he's going to spend his later years... for having been the president, then he's always going to bear the ultimate responsibility.
Cheney, after 8 years of virtually refusing to appear in public, is all over the TV now trying to grease the skids for that kid of his... who's also on virtually every talking head show out there... to carry on HIS legacy.
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Nofsdad
Joined: 06 Jul 2003
Posts: 8380
Location: Central CA
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Posted: Sat Jun 13, 2009 3:40 am Post subject:
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| Quote: |
| btw I wouldn't call bush sr hard right.. |
He was only a one term president while the rest of them got eight years to cast their legacies in stone. Had he been able to secure a second term I'm quite sure he would have done his duty for God, country, the Carlisle Group and Halliburton/KBR... just as the rest of them have done and as he himself did during his one term.
Note that he surrounded himself with that same little group of Neocons... INCLUDING Dick Cheney... that had been establishing Republican policies and politics since the days of Nixon and that went on to precisely orchestrate W's administration in order to put as much money in their pockets and those of their corporate benefactors so as to ultimately produce the situation we have today, leave it for someone else to try to fix and then bitch and moan because the other guy hasn't fixed it yet.
When you peek behind the curtain and see who really runs this country, you begin to realize that it's the same people year after year, decade after decade with the only changes coming when one of them dies off and they replace him with one just like him. It doesn't matter who the president is... it really doesn't matter which party he belongs to... he's just out there to take the flak , to be the mouthpiece.
The only actual change is that another faction from the same bunch takes over so they can get THEIR share of the booty but the wealth keeps flowing upward and the rich do get richer and the poor do get poorer.
Obama has a ways to go to convince me he's any different but I sure as hell don't expect him to accomplish in 5 months or even a year what the rest of them couldn't or wouldn't do in eight years, or even four in the case of Bush Sr.
When he's had as long to "fix" the problems as W had... or at least the 6 years that W had both houses of Congress... and he and other Republicans went right on telling us that our economy was "robust" and nothing was wrong until four fricking days before Bear Stearns went into the crapper and the whole damned house of cards came down... then we'll talk about his "failures".
That's if some of the hate spewers on radio and TV don't get him killed first.
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mdovell
Joined: 22 Dec 2007
Posts: 461
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Posted: Sat Jun 13, 2009 3:15 pm Post subject:
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Well those groups you mensioned can also be tied to the left as well. KBR was well known for doing work in south vietnam for LBJ
www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=1569483
In terms of claiming of someone just running the country that's a bit of a strech. Obama doesn't dictate anything to me or you for that matter.
Making arguments of time and duration that someone had eight years so therefore someone else should have eight years is a tit for tat argument.
On the same note the NASDAQ crashed and lost 5 trillion of wealth. the index lost at least 60% and yet there was no investigations and no blaming of public officals. Why? Because it was largely thought to be people investing companies that went under on their own..bad business plans and poor judgement
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dot-com_bubble the more things change the more they stay the same.
Just consider this for a analogy
1980's it was known that the USA was given aid to iraq
1990's went to war against iraq (100 hour ground war, two months of bombing but we left well except the no fly zones)
2003 onward...occupying iraq
Aiding a place, at war with it and then occupying...the only thing beyond occpying is annexation. However in all honesty although I dislike his domestic policy his foreign one seems ok so far.
Of course there's not going to be a change as well you can't put the average joe into government. I'm sorry but it doesn't work that way. Most people don't vote for starters. the major media is ment to be a passive form made for say people 8 years old and up..it is not made for people to think about a subject, only to accept it. If you have faith in the general public running things well I got news for you.
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Nofsdad
Joined: 06 Jul 2003
Posts: 8380
Location: Central CA
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Posted: Sat Jun 13, 2009 8:02 pm Post subject:
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If I wanted to do it your way, I would simply mention that the Viet Nam War era also encompassed the NIXON administration'
Once again... read your history Dovell. And the following facts are derived from KBR's OWN history at their OWN website.
The CONSTRUCTION company that was "doing work for LBJ" was Brown& Root, a company that had been formed in 1919 and at the time of LBJ's administration was already relatively new subsidairy of Halliburton[b/], an OIL SERVICES company which had acquired B & R in [b]1962.
Notice that there is no "K" yet? That's because K stands for the M.W. Kellogg Company which was a separate company at that time, an ENGINEERING firm, started in 1901 that also did government contract work and that wouldn't become the "K" in KBR for decades yet.
Kellogg and later Brown & Root, did a lot of engineering and construction work for the government beginning as far back as the turn of the 20th century. But they were not conjoined until after they had both become subsidiaries of Halliburton, B&R in 1962 AND Kellogg in 1998.
I'm getting damned tired of having to explain this every time you try to connect Cheney's company (or companies" to a Democratic administration from the ancient past... well, the last century anyway... just to play the "they did it too" game in these so called "discussions" or whatever the hell they're supposed to be.
It wasn't until In 1988 that a company called Dresser Industries acquired M.W. Kellogg. Then in 1998, well into the era of corporate crime and "Voodoo Economics" along with really bad corporate governance, Dresser Industries was itself acquired by Halliburton who then merged Kellogg with what was left of Brown & Root. Let me see now, who was the head honcho of Halliburton by that time? Oh well, it escapes me.
Anway, through most of the Bush administration, Halliburton... largely through the power now being wielded by it's former CEO as the primary string puller of the administration was already the primary no bid contractor for the US government, and in 2003 they managed to become the largest franchisee in the corporate, for profit "War On Terror" or whatever you choose to call it.
Then... in 2007... 44 years after LBJ, and amid growing criticisms and allegations of malfeasance and poor performance, Halliburton spun KBR off into a standalone company and moved itself offshore so there could be no IRS scrutiny or SEC scrutiny.
KBR has soldiered on ever since, proudly doing the work that Halliburton had started and there's simply no way you can claim that it's the same company that did work for LBJ when it didn't even flipping EXIST then. It's like saying that the Sears Holding Company that exists today is the same Sears And Roebuck we all remember fondly from our childhood.
And even if you can't get yourself around that info... there is also the fact that The scandals involving KBR did not occur... or at least come to light... until the W administration and the onset of the "War On Terror". I'm not saying that Kellogg and/or Brown & Root never tried to screw the taxpayer mind you, but only that I can find no record of it.
This is the second time you've done this and it was all explained... in detail, the first time, yet here you are making the same claims you were making then as if nothing had ever gone before.
This is why I seriously question whether or not you actually READ the responses to your posts or bother to read the information to which links are provided for you.
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mdovell
Joined: 22 Dec 2007
Posts: 461
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Posted: Sun Jun 14, 2009 1:30 am Post subject:
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I question your logic only because you harp on about problems rather than solutions. And when called for any you simply state to search your posts? I'm afraid you don't have any sort of list of talking points here. Thats great you are negative an angry...but at least try to suggest something.
This is the title of the article I referenced
"Cheney's Ties to Company Reminiscent of LBJ's Relationships"
What part of this don't you get?
"Nearly 40 years ago, Halliburton faced almost identical charges over its work for the U.S. government in Vietnam -- allegations of overcharging, sweetheart contracts from the White House and war profiteering. Back then, the company's close ties to President Johnson became a liability."
You already are willing to marginalize all people that work in the financial industries but yet you get specific with this? Ok so there was no "k" in it...big deal.
If you want to write some letters into NPR and have it a go with them then go right ahead.
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