GOVERNMENT WASTE

- FEDERAL –

Date	Gov’t Agency	Who, What, Where?
07/11/02 09/24/04	Defense Department	Halliburton – It’s Nice to Have Friends Most of the contracts Halliburton has obtained from the government have been sole source procurement, without a competitive bidding process. Since the invasion of Iraq, Halliburton has seen their share of the pie increase from $468 million to $3.92 billion (the government authorized $30 billion in emergency money to fight terrorism), no doubt because of certain influences in the White House. Oh boy, the fox is in the hen house again. Obviously, Halliburton is not the only scoundrel making off with tidy profits but isn’t someone watching over the hen house? That’s the job of the Defense Contracts Audit Agency (DCAA), which rarely invokes its power to disbar a contractor from doing business with the government. But DCAA did recommend in a confidential memo that Halliburton should be suspended or debarred from future government contracts. DCAA showed that one of Halliburton’s subsidiaries, Kellogg, Brown & Root (KBR) could not account for $1.8 billion in charges out of a total of $4.3 billion spent on the LOGCAP (Logistics Civil Augmentation Program) III contract for the U. S. Army to provide logistical support for our troops in Iraq and Afghanistan. $1.8 billion lost in the paper work? We’re not talking about losing track of $3.14. Can you imagine running any business when you really don’t know why or with whom you spent that kind of money? It’s obvious that none of these clowns have ever worked in the private sector. This is pure, unadulterated nonsense. When they spend that kind of money there must be a paper trail in the form on invoices and checks, unless the money was handed out in the form of cash. But that’s another issue worthy of an in-depth investigation. In 1997, KBR billed the government for sheets of plywood at $85.98 that actually cost $14.06 for work they did in the Balkans, plus they billed to have their offices cleaned 4 times a day. The DCAA has charged Halliburton for overcharging for fuel, food and other services they have provided in Iraq, while the Justice Department is investigating business activities they had in Nigeria and Iran. The Army paid KBR $750,000 for work at a Fort Ord in California that cost about $125,000. What other mastodon skeletons are hidden in the closet? In June 2005, Bunny Greenhouse, the Army Corps of Engineers top-contracting official, recently blew the whistle on Halliburton when she stated, “I can unequivocally state that the abuse related to contracts awarded to Kellogg Brown and Root (KBR) represents the most blatant and improper contract abuse I have witnessed during the course of my career.” So how does the Army respond? Now what would you expect? They awarded Halliburton $4.97 billion in additional work in Iraq on top of the questionable $9.1 billion they have billed to-date. Now in all fairness, an Army spokesman stated that the award was actually made in May but the Army saw no purpose in divulging it to the general public until now. According to the Star-Ledger newspaper, Senator Frank Lautenberg, who often has great lapses of memory at his advanced age, was quoted as saying, “At this point, why don’t we just hand them the keys to the Treasury and tell them to turn off the lights when they are done?” There can only be one of three possible scenarios to justify this latest award. 1) Pentagon contractors are all so equally inept that giving the contract to either Moe, Larry or Curly will likely produce the same inadequate results, or 2) Halliburton’s previous association with Vice President Dick Cheney is still paying huge dividends, or 3) the people who are in charge of awarding the contracts have either been drugged or are somehow making a tidy nest egg off the deal. What ever happened to the quality of work and morals on which America built our worldwide reputation? Is it now so insignificant that you can lie, cheat and demonstrate world-class incompetence and be rewarded beyond your wildest dreams? The entire Pentagon relationship with its contractors is disgusting and turning uglier by the day.
04/20/03	U. S. Army	U. S. Army Builds Fantasyland We have Disney World, Six Flags, Universal Studios and Congress, where you can escape reality and dwell in Never-Never Land for a day to forget your troubles. Take the kids out for an enjoyable day to a New York Giants football game and spend the equivalent of the Gross Domestic Product (GDP) of Romania so you can forget about your problems, your job, your annoying neighbor and your overdue property tax bill. Now the U. S. Army can help, too. The Army is in the throes of building a $200 million museum on the grounds of Fort Belvoir, Virginia to help you pass the time. It’s not as if there might be any more pressing needs like the wars in Iraq or Afghanistan, and what about those wipes for the troops in the field? The pathetic excuse for this latest boondoggle is that the museum will offer Americans an understanding of what the life of the soldier is all about. The propaganda spews out that “everyone can identify with the trials and tribulations of the young men and women who put themselves in harm’s way to do a job that most of us don’t want to do ourselves.” As a U. S. Army veteran of the Vietnam War, I really hate it when military bureaucrats flaunt patriotism to justify the expenditure of another exorbitant amount of money. The proposed design envisions exhibit space for 515,000 art and historical artifacts, and all of the other accoutrements like restaurants and gift shops. The primary objective of this state-of-the-art facility is to show simulated battles and use 4-D (dimensional) simulators available in advanced amusement and theme parks. Yep, you guessed it. Universal Studios is a paid consultant. Want to bet it overruns the projected budget? Here’s the clincher. The Army stated that the museum is NOT designed to encourage recruitment. What? I would have thought that would have been one of its’ primary goals considering the problems the military has in their recruitment drives now that we are fighting multiple wars. I have my routine alternate suggestions on how to use that expenditure. For one, we could give all of our active duty troops each a $100 bonus check. Better yet, to accomplish the education of the public, I’ll make a 30-minute video of the proud history of the Army and mail it to the 100 million households in the country for about the same cost.
08/06/04	Congress	$500 Baby Giveaway Representative Harold Ford (Tennessee Republican) and Senators John Corzine (New Jersey Democrat) and Rick Santorum (Pennsylvania Republican) are among our clueless elected officials who are pushing a new bill in Congress in 2004 under the American Savings for Personal Investment, Retirement and Education (ASPIRE) Act to create a $500 savings account for each child born in the United States after December 31, 2005. In addition, the Federal government would put an additional $500 into accounts for children born to families with incomes below the Federal poverty line. According to Kansas State researchers, who should know better, the idea may work. Why do I have a problem with this plan? Here’s just another example of one of thousands of government giveaway programs that march us onto the road to socialism and eventual bankruptcy, for one. Let’s look a little deeper. How much will this plan cost, how will it be administered, and will it really benefit the people? According to the World Factbook, in 2004 there were approximately 4,200,000 babies born in the United States. For a rough estimate, let’s assume 25% of those babies are born to families below the poverty line. That means the direct cost to the taxpayers is approximately $3 billion per year. But let us not forget about how many thousands of new Federal employees will be needed to manage this effort to add to the bloated bureaucracy? This is not a simple and straightforward task. That’ll probably add an additional $1/2 billion per year in labor costs assuming 2,500 new employees plus new computer systems, office space, etc., must be allocated to manage the effort. I can just picture the problems with people trying to get their paws on an extra $500 with phony birth certificates. How will the bureaucrats verify that a request for the monies is valid? Can you just imagine the headaches this will cause in paper work for the people below the poverty line who must fill out garbled “governmentese” forms to request the extra $500? Who are these people? They are generally indigent, poorly educated souls who often cannot read or write. According to the plan, the money can be withdrawn once the child turns 18 and could be applied to education, home ownership or retirement. This gem of an idea will be a nightmare for government employees to verify how the money will be used. Can you just picture the difficulties people will encounter with the mindless bureaucracy trying to get their money with this complex idea? Assuming beyond belief that all will go well, in actuality, how much will the $500 buy towards a child’s college education? At today’s rates, $500 saved today will yield about $1,200 in 18 years, not discounting inflation which will cut that in half to about $600 in real dollars. According to the U. S. Committee on Education and the Workforce, the average cost of tuition and fees at a private college or university is over $18,000. So with the $600, your child may expect the benefit of ten days of education. This is another classic idea that looks good on paper, but will quickly become a gigantic boondoggle benefiting few of the people it intends to help, and of course waste another $3-4 billion. This “ain’t” chicken feed, folks. All of these expenditures add up to an awful lot of money.
09/08/04	NASA	Genesis Space Capsule In 2004, the Genesis Space Capsule, which had orbited the sun for more than three years in an attempt to gather clues to the origin of the solar system, crashed to Earth after its parachute failed to deploy. This $260 million project was designed to collect space particles on a series of very sensitive disks, which by the way many people doubted would work at all. Here’s the nail in the coffin for this outrageous project. They could not have the capsule accomplish a conventional parachute landing, as the fragile disks would be damaged beyond repair due to the force of the impact upon landing. So what did the geniuses at NASA decide? They opted to have some Hollywood stunt men fly helicopters to snatch the capsule out of the air with hooks assuring a soft recovery. The pilots had participated in dozens of practice runs but the spacecraft was tumbling to earth instead of the smooth descent if the parachute had opened as planned. They were unable to retrieve the capsule resulting in a smorgasbord of metal buried in the ground. NASA has stated that they were able to recover some material from the now obliterated disks, but scientists had planned to study the material for 5 years. Most likely, they now have about a week’s work. Instead of using hooks to snag the capsule, the American public would have been better off if the stunt men had used butterfly nets to snag the NASA managers.
10/14/04	Defense Department	Custer’s Last Stand Two managers, who worked for Custer Battles, another contractor which provides services in Iraq, wrote memos exposing fraudulent billing practices, including charges for nonexistent services or services provided at grossly inflated prices. On top of that, former employees of the company are suing the company for charging the Iraqi Coalition Authority $157,000 for a $95,000 helicopter landing pad. Even better then that, they repainted a few forklifts, which had been abandoned by Iraqi Airlines, and then charged the authority thousands of dollars a month to lease those same forklifts. But the Pentagon has shown it has some backbone and is withholding $10 million in payments. They actually have barred the company from future contracts. I hope we can say with confidence that this is Custer’s Last Stand.
10/19/04	Defense Department	Boeing Strikes Again As a part of Homeland Security, the Transportation Security Agency (TSA) awarded a contract in 2003 to Boeing Corp. to install 7,000 explosive detection devices at 429 commercial airports in a 7-month time frame around the country. The original contract was for $508 million but TSA made 54 changes (probably relatively minor at that) to the contract that raised the final price to $1.2 billion with 18 months to accomplish the work – par for the course in government work. Remember my previous references about how contractors milk those changes. The Homeland Inspector General investigated the Boeing charges on the contract and found that Boeing had billed $82 million as project manager for actual costs of $39 million. Of course, Boeing responded with the standard canned line that Boeing did a job that people said could not be done. Was he referring to the simple installation of a black box at over 400 airports for over a billion bucks? The Homeland Inspector General was also critical of TSA’s expenses, including one lavish affair at a posh Washington, D.C hotel in November 2003 to celebrate its 2-year anniversary that cost the taxpayers $461,745, including $85,000 for a party planner. It obviously was much more elaborate than your typical Tupperware party.
10/24/04	Defense Department	The B-2 Bomber – The Ultimate Boondoggle Once again the government lets defense contractors dictate the price of weapons systems at any cost to the taxpayer. The relatively new B-2 Bomber has a price tag of about $2 billion per copy. Original estimates projected a cost of $270 million per plane. According to the Bulletin of Atomic Scientists, “the plane is currently worth five times its weight in gold.” Are we crazy to let this ridiculous pricing happen without screaming and shouting? Naturally, the head of the U.S. Air Force responded with the typical quote to justify outlandish expenditures, “Its worth every penny if we save one American life.” Saving American lives is not the issue – this is typical military subterfuge - the issue is why do we need to waste incredible sums of money on very questionable, or in some cases, very badly conceived and wasteful projects. Oh yes, we were force fed the propaganda about its infinitesimally small radar signature due to its revolutionary shape, which of course is really just an advancement on the “Flying Wing” invented by Northrup Corporation in the 1950’s. The reason for the B-2 bomber was to avoid the radar systems so we could bomb the hell out of our archenemy, the Soviet Union, which no longer exists. Now I guess we can use these planes to bomb the border with Mexico to stifle illegal immigration. After spending gazillions of dollars to develop this state-of-the-art aircraft, the designers have the gall to tell us that because of the very expensive materials used to deflect the enemy’s radar, the plane must be housed in climate-controlled hangars and have become a maintenance nightmare. This pathetic solution would only be permitted in defense work. In private industry, the manager would soon be sweeping floors if he had the audacity to suggest that design even in jest. On top of that, rumors were flying that the B-2 melted in water. The Air Force actually flew a busload of newsmen to its base in Missouri so these people could watch Air Force personnel wash the planes. Under actual battle conditions, of course, the enemy would never realize that simply bombing the aircraft hangars immobilizes the entire fleet. It becomes painfully obvious that’s why the Air Force stationed the B-2 in Missouri, the geographical heartland of the country. I can just see it now - all of the air conditioning technicians will need secret clearances just to adjust the thermostat in the hangar. To make a reasonable comparison, one B-2 bomber costs the same as a sparkling new aircraft carrier, a small city on water, over 3 football fields in length, 13 stories high, and home to 5,000 men and women.
12/14/04	Defense Department	The C-17 – Another Bomber Fiasco The C-17 AirLifter is the latest addition to the U. S. Air Forces global airlift capability. The C-17 was preceded by the C5A, one of the most scandalous programs in government procurement history. But I won’t delve into that program, as it would take another book to explain that ultimate mismanagement. The C-17 is a four-engine cargo jet that can land on short landing strips in remote parts of the world and drop airborne troops. Since the day the contract was originally awarded to McDonnell-Douglas, it was plagued by technical ineptness and cost overruns. In 1994, the Pentagon put McDonnell-Douglas on probation due to flaws in the design and postponed the program. In fact, McDonnell-Douglas performed so badly (that’s saying something for a defense contractor) that they were taken over by Boeing. The C-17 program has so many perverted twists that it’s virtually impossible to list them all in this limited space. In many ways, it almost makes the B-2 Bomber look like the picture of management perfection. One item stands out like a sore thumb. The former top Air Force acquisition official, Darleen Druyun, who is often referred to as the “Godmother of the C-17,” accepted an executive position with Boeing after she was instrumental in redirecting the Pentagon’s acquisition of the C-17 aircraft. It should be mentioned that Boeing hired two of her relatives during the negotiation period. She was convicted in April 2004 of a Federal conspiracy charge when she told Boeing that their prime competitor, Airbus, underbid them by billions of dollars for the refueling tanker lease-purchaser agreement, offering the company an opportunity to resubmit their bid. The Pentagon subsequently investigated over 400 contracts she was involved in, and found 8 contracts as suspicious with a value of over $3 billion. Four of those 8 contracts are with Boeing. The Inspector General is supposedly investigating those contracts now. On February 19, 2005, former Boeing Chief Financial Officer Michael M. Sears was sentenced to four months in prison for illegally offering a choice job to Druyun while she was negotiating a multi-million contract with the company. If you thought there isn’t some grand collusion between the government and its contractors, according to the Project On Government Oversight, from 1999-2002, there have been 36 instances of misconduct or alleged misconduct by Boeing resulting in approximately $358 million in fines or penalties, restitution, and settlements. How do they afford these huge fines? Excessive profit, my friends, simply excessive profit. Here are some of the more pertinent facts about the C-17 program: · The General Accounting Office (GAO) says that the Air Force has enough C-17s to thwart the Air Forces’ effort to keep adding these “Spruce Gooses” to the defense appropriations bill. · An illegal proposal has been kicking around that puts the government in the business pf subsidizing a commercial version of the plane that Boeing can then sell to private air haul companies. The theory being that this “sharing arrangement” will reduce the purchase price of future acquisitions. And if you believe that costs will be lowered, I have a bridge I want to sell you. As a part of this deal, Boeing wants an exclusion from certain laws that requires them to provide financial data related to the program. Excuse me, can I hear that one again? · Russia’s equivalent to the C-17, the An-124, can carry 85 percent more payload than the C-17X. · The major advantage of this aircraft over military versions of the Boeing 747 or other competitors is that the plane can land and takeoff on a 3,000 runway. Excuse me - that’s 3,000 feet on a dry runway. It’s 6,300 feet when it rains which kind of negates the very purpose. Here we are talking about the rain again. You might think that these are the same people who designed the B-2 Bomber, or maybe it’s just a plaque that affects all defense contractors. · In 2003, the Air Force restricted one-third of the fleet to only fly within the continental United States due to continual technical problems.
12/22/04	Defense Department	The F/A-22 Fighter – the Raptor Another overly hyped program, that has been under development since the cold war with Russia, is the F/A-22 Raptor jet fighter. Par for the course, the Raptor costs five times what the F-15 costs, the plane it is designed to replace at an astronomical cost of $258 million per plane (over a quarter billion dollars per plane – what lunacy!). Even the recent versions of the Russian MIG fighter, which few countries possess, is the only plane that can stand up to the F-15, the supposed antiquated fighter. And of course, the original estimates were that the F/A-22 would cost about $70 million per copy, even at that number an outrageous amount of money. Republicans in Congress tried to kill the program in 1999, to no avail. No country has an air force even vaguely approaching the power of the U. S. Air Force. The Air Force’s command of the skies is unchallenged. Just like the B-2 Bomber, the Raptor is designed to avoid enemy radar and to shoot down Russian fighters. The plane has the ability to not only drop smart bombs but it also can capture enemy intelligence as it flies at well over 1,000 miles per hour. I wonder if it performs well in the rain? The F/A-22 project was conceived as a “cost plus” contract, which roughly translated means “milk the taxpayers,” because Joe and Mary Taxpayer pay for all cost overruns. Why is this contract still roaring ahead full bore? That’s because the prime contractor, Lockheed Martin, managed to find 1,000 different contractors to provide parts in 43 different states to share in the kill. The Congressmen and Congresswomen who approve a contract of this magnitude are all too eager to claim they were responsible for bringing the work to their district. The plan is to procure 277 planes at a total cost of $71.8 billion. Twenty years ago, the Air Force planned to build 760 Raptors at a cost of $35 million per plane. Ten years ago, the proposal changed to 438, then 339 and eventually to the 277 planes at $258 million each today. One of the reasons cited for the huge increase in cost is because the plane’s avionics, designed to sight an enemy aircraft far beyond the pilot’s field of vision, “did not work as planned and it took us a while to figure out,” according to Lockheed-Martin. For the costs of the program to escalate so phenomenally, Lockheed-Martin must have 10,000 people working 24 hours a day to figure out that little problem. In March 2004, the Government Accountability Office stated that flight tests indicated that the Raptor was not meeting its requirements for a reliable aircraft.
12/27/04	Defense Department	The Bradley Death Trap Many of us have probably watched the made-for-TV movie, “The Pentagon Wars,” in which the costs (over $14 billion) of developing the Bradley Fighting Vehicle for the U. S. Army skyrocketed totally out of control. Air Force Lt. Col. John Burton was assigned to evaluate the usefulness of the Bradley Infantry Fighting Vehicle, an Army troop carrier/scout vehicle that was in reality a deathtrap for its crew. Burton kept trying to prove whether it was an effective weapon and safe for its crew, but he was constantly harassed by his temporary commanding officer, an Army General, so this individual could get the Bradley into production and then into the field after years of foot dragging by all involved. Through chicanery and backdoor politics, the Colonel was finally able to demonstrate the problems with the design, to no avail. When the Israeli Army purchased the vehicle, they made all of the changes recommended by the Colonel. Unfortunately, this is not an isolated incidence. In blunt terms, there is no accountability for taxpayer’s money – there is only accountability through the political chain of command. To spend $14 billion to continuously STUDY one weapons system is outrageous. On top of that, the vehicle has the complexity of a can opener. With that huge expenditure of money, they should have had thousands of the vehicles in the field plus they should have found the cure for cancer. Do you think this stupidity would have been permitted in the private (commercial) sector? More heads would have rolled then in the French Revolution.
01/23/05	NASA	Mars Spirit Rover In 2004, the Mars Spirit Rover landed on the planet, moved off its landing pad, began transmitting data to the earth, and then went silent. Another software problem was found to be the culprit. During the flight to Mars, NASA decided to upload a spanking new operating system (just like in a Personal Computer) to fix vulnerable shortcomings in the original operating system. But they made a primitive error that left some of the old programming code still active. Once NASA engineers realized the problem, they worked frantically to revive the dormant spacecraft until finally they were able to make the probe operational. Why was the spacecraft launched if it was known that there were major problems with the software?” Is it possible that the political chain of command would not tolerate another delay?
01/24/05	FBI	FBI Accountability After spending $170 million on computer software that would agents in the field access to information on suspected terrorists, the FBI admitted that the system is a failure. They may even have to start over with a spanking new design. Giving the FBI the benefit of the doubt, this is not a rare occurrence in the field of software development. Ford Motor Company and McDonald’s have incurred greater losses on massive projects as well. According to various studies in the year 1996, only 16% of projects were completed on time, and nearly a third were cancelled outright.. However, by 2003, 34% of projects were completed on time, so private industry has significantly improved their productivity. The irony of this failure is that a casino in Las Vegas developed NORA (Non-Obvious Relationship Awareness) that likely does all of the tasks desired by the FBI plus much more at a fraction of the cost. The obvious lesson is that the FBI should turn to the private sector to develop their systems. Now the truth can be told that as early as two years ago, the FBI had identified over 400 deficiencies in the system (but never told the contractor likely in fear of the outrageous cost extras the contractor would bill the FBI), plus they proceeded with a $17 million testing program with full knowledge that the system was going to be abandoned. The VCF is a just one cog in the grandiose $581 million master plan called Trilogy that includes thousands of high-speed computers for agents. Hopefully, the same fate will not befall Trilogy.
01/25/05	Defense Department	8 of 25 Programs on GAO’s High-Risk List The government agency with the largest budget is also the agency with the most problems managing taxpayer monies. The General Accounting Office (GAO) publishes a “high risk” list of government programs that identify areas of concern such as financial and contract management, personnel security clearances, and other infrastructure. Out of 25 programs identified, DOD managed 8. Two primary areas of concern that were identified are inventory management and weapons acquisition. The report also noted that there were significant problems with the Department of Homeland Security’s sharing of information.
01/25/05	Pentagon	New Presidential Helicopters Congress has authorized $6.1 billion to be spent to build 23 helicopters for the President. That’s about $265 million FOR EACH HELICOPTER. An international team headed by Lockheed Martin will spearhead the international effort comprised of Lockheed Martin, Bell Helicopter, and Agusta Westland, a British-Italian consortium. They beat out Sikorsky Aircraft of Connecticut, which had built the helicopters since the Eisenhower administration. Of interest, Bell Helicopter, the winner, is based in Texas. The Pentagon stated that the new helicopters are a result of new security requirements post – 9/11. Supposedly, the existing helicopters could not carry the load of new security and communications equipment deemed necessary. Many critics of the deal have stated that the primary reason the deal went to the international team was to reward the British and Italians for their support in the Iraq war at the expense of an American company, Sikorsky. With the cost of each helicopter an outrageous $265 million, this is more likely a form of foreign aid.
01/31/05	Defense Department	Iraqi Reconstruction Loses Track of $9 Billion The Office of the Special Inspector General for Iraqi Reconstruction stated that “due to severe inefficiencies and poor management,” the Coalition Provisional Authority (CPA) in Iraq has lost track of $8.8 billion in monies that were destined to for salaries, operating and capital expenses, and reconstruction projects. In one instance, CAP staff identified one ministry where 8,206 guards were on the payroll, only 602 guards could be validated.
02/15/05	NASA	NASA Administrator Accused of Waste Outgoing NASA administrator Sean O’Keefe is being investigated for potential misuse of government airplanes and expensive getaways while heading the space agency.
02/15/05	Pentagon	Rarely Do Systems Work Do you remember that during the first Gulf War, the outlandish claims about the kill ratio of the Patriot Missile System, when the generals were claiming that it had nearly a 100% kill ratio? After the war, it was proven that the system was a dismal failure. How can this be? As another example, take the Antimissile System, which has been under development while a number of administrations have changed hands. According to the systems developer, the Missile Defense Agency (MDA), the system may be capable of hitting targets up to 80% of the time. The system is designed to send interceptors into space to KO enemy warheads. It’s just another drop in the proverbial bucket, but the government has spent over $130 billion on this latest venture into the Twilight Zone. Flight tests, to determine if the thing actually works, have been delayed several times. It doesn’t take a brain trust to know with each passing day more and more is being spent with each delay because the government pays for these delays – not the contractor. These tests started in 1999 (5 years ago) with the accustomed failures that led to months of delay until the failure point could be determined. Five hits were recorded in these tests, but under very “controlled conditions.” As a final blow, the Operational Test and Evaluation Office has had prolonged arguments with the developer, MDA, over the likely effectiveness of the missile system. I’ll bet the kill rate will be great as long as it doesn’t rain. The most ironic part of this total incompetence is the fact that I have often heard company management officials use the empty line, “If you want it to work the first time, it’s going to cost a lot of money.” Since systems rarely work the first time out of the barn, then obviously we, the taxpayers, are wasting our money. I wonder, “Can we ask for a refund?” The latest news is that during the period from December 2004 to February 2005, the Antimissile System failed miserably in its most current tests at a whopping $85 million for each test. The reasons for the failures are always given as some infinitely small glitch, as if we are supposed to believe that it’s a 10-minute operation to fix the problem.
02/24/05	Homeland Security	Hundreds of Projects Without Merit An audit released last week revealed hundreds of small grants awarded to projects without merit by the organization’s staff. One port that receives less than 20 ships per year received funding for security lighting. Another received grants to buy encrypted radios that were incompatible with federal and state radio systems already in use. The larger ports of Los Angles, Long Beach, New York received grants but so did St. Croix in the Virgin Islands, and Martha’s Vineyard. It’s obvious that Homeland Security either has too much money or is wasting it in useless gestures.
03/14/05	Congress	Pork In Every Budget According to the Citizens Against Government Waste (www.cagw.com), our elected representatives, who are supposed to be fiscally responsible, added 9,362 projects in the 13 appropriations bills of 2003 at a cost of $22.5 billion. Out of the 9,362 projects that can hardly be classified as “essential” to the American people, we’ll briefly review a few examples in each category of Congress’ spending that ignores the burden of the American people. Agriculture: $44,239,000 for projects in the state of Iowa including: · $33,000,000 for the National Animal Disease Center · $700,000 for the Midwest Poultry Consortium · $280,000 for the Iowa Vitality Center. Commerce, Justice and Judiciary: $76,570,000 for projects in South Carolina for Senate Commerce Appropriations Chairman Ernest Hollings, including: · $1,500,000 for shrimper assistance · $1,000,000 for oyster recovery · $500,000 for seafood marketing. District of Columbia: $19,000,000 for projects including: · $250,000 for the Washington Opera Education and Community Program · $250,000 for Values First to implement a values infusion program · $100,000 for Project Reality for the Game Plan abstinence program. Energy and Water: $218,053,000 for projects in South Carolina for Senate Commerce Appropriations Chairman Ernest Hollings (yes, that’s the same guy we mentioned in the Commerce category), including: · $216,000,000 for cleanup of the Savannah River site · $396,000 for Town Creek · $257,000 for the Folly River (aptly named no doubt). Foreign Operations: $25,000,000 for the International Fund for Ireland in support of the Anglo-Irish accord. The key verbiage within this bill states “those projects that hold the greatest potential for job creation and equal opportunity for the Irish people.” Do we not have enough problems holding onto our jobs in this country with outsourcing without spending $25 million on a foreign country to take our jobs? The other bills in this category ranged from $500,000 to $4,000,000. Interior: $38,250,000 for projects in Alaska for Senator Ted Stevens including: · $750,000 for sea otter research · $350,000 for backcountry hut repairs · $250,000 for the Iditarod National Historic Trail · $150,000 for the Alaska Whaling Commission. Labor, Health, Human Services and Education: $83,329,000 added for 239 projects alone in the state of Pennsylvania to satisfy the political cronies of Senator Arlen Specter and his fellow Republican and Democratic state office holders. · $36,101,000 for projects in Iowa for Senator Tom Harkins and House appropriator Tom Latham including: · $2,000,000 for the Iowa Communications Network statewide fiber optics demonstration · $250,000 for Family Communications Inc. · $300,000 for Iowa State University for the Universal Kitchen Design Project. Legislature Branch: Members of Congress have taken steps to improve security after 9/11, but many of the items approved in these bills have nothing to do with security: · $5,065,000 for the Capital building · $1,750,000 for Senate office buildings (nothing to do with security) · $120,000 for the Botanic Garden (nothing to do with security)..
03/15/05	Defense Department	Army Proposes Spending $100 Billion on Future Combat System The Army has unveiled its Future Combat System, of which Boeing has already received a $21 billion contract, to modernize land and air vehicles with a state-of-the-art system of wireless computers. The Boeing portion of the contract was awarded under “Other Provisioning Authority” rather than the normal procurement authority, which was designed for much smaller contracts to circumvent some of the auditing rules and other restrictions to attract commercial equipment makers without much of the “red tape.” Senator John McCain is leading the congressional investigation of Pentagon procurement practices. The concept behind the Future Combat System is to set up a vast network of computers to help soldiers make quicker, better battlefield decisions. Skeptics claim that the project is “unbelievably complex” involving 30 millions lines of computer code, and to further complicate matters, the Army last year added numerous additional classes of weapons system including armed unmanned robotic vehicles to the communication link. Army officials said Saturday that the first phase of the program, called Future Combat Systems, could run to $145 billion. Paul Boyce, an Army spokesman, said the "technological bridge to the future" would equip 15 brigades of roughly 3,000 soldiers, or about one-third of the force the Army plans to field, over a 20-year span. David M. Walker, the comptroller general of the United States, said in an interview that the Pentagon's future arsenal was unaffordable and Congress needed "to make some choices now." DOES ANYONE WANT TO BET IT WON’T WORK?
03/31/05	U. S. Army	“Stryker” Troop Transport Following in Footsteps of Bradley Death Trap The U. S. Army spent $11 billion developing the new Stryker troop transport vehicle. 311 of the vehicles are in use in Iraq. The Army Chief of Staff cannot commend the performance of the vehicle enough, but a December 2004 report lists a catalogue of complaints including design flaws, inoperable gear and maintenance problems in addition to unexpected risks from rocket-propelled grenades. Commander’s displays work so poorly that their use has been discontinued. Typically, the military responds with the classic line that they need time to get the bugs out, but the reality is after spending $11 billion none of these problems should exist.
04/01/05	Congress	Mid-Year Budget Pork State Budget Alabama $4 million for the International Fertilizer Development Center; $35,000 for the Sports Hall of Fame. Alaska $443,000 to develop salmon-fortified baby food; $1.5 million for the Anchorage Museum-Transit Intermodal Depot. California $150,000 for the Girl Scouts Golden Valley Council bridge project. Florida $1 million for the Palm Coast Trail System. Kansas $100,000 for a municipal swimming pool. Kentucky $2.3 million for an animal waste management research laboratory. Hawaii $4 million for mitigation of congestion in Kapolei City. Illinois $1.4 million for a sound barrier on Interstate 55. Maine $300,000 for the Great Falls parking garage. Massachusetts $1.2 million for Cape Cod bike repair. Mississippi $750,000 for the Mississippi Museum of Natural History. Missouri $1.5 million for the Rep. Richard Gephardt archive at the Missouri Historical Society. Montana $1.5 million for a “fuels-in-school” biomass project. North Carolina $1 million for the Garden Parkway. Ohio $750,000 for a sewer construction project; $350,000 for a music education project at the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame; $200,000 for the Dennison Railroad Depot Museum. Oregon $6.28 million to Oregon State University for wood utilization research; $628,000 for a barley gene mapping project. Pennsylvania