Oct 24, 2007 at 3:09 PM by Political Chase
After 36 years of service, Condoleezza Rice suddenly discovers incompetence that no one preceding her deemed intolerable?
State Department Official Resigns in Wake of Blackwater Criticism
The assistant secretary of state, who oversaw diplomatic security, submitted his resignation in the wake of a report critical of his handling of Blackwater security contractors, according to State Department spokesman Sean McCormack.
Ambassador Richard Griffin told his staff earlier today he would be submitting his resignation to Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice.
Griffin’s resignation follows the release yesterday of a State Department review that found serious problems with the operations of the Diplomatic Security Service, which Griffin oversaw, including lax oversight of private security contractors, including Blackwater USA.
The review panel found the Diplomatic Security Service did not have enough agents and needed better Arabic language skills and cultural awareness.
The panel was appointed by Secretary Rice to review “the State Department’s handling of security practices in Iraq,” following a Sept. 16, 2007 incident involving Blackwater security guards in which 17 Iraqi civilians died.
Oct 24, 2007 at 1:44 PM by Political Chase
I am not convinced the proper message is getting through as the press continues to report on the poor results achieved as a result of the State Department hiring contractors to provide security services. Today the New York Times focuses on Dyncorp, and in a somewhat broader sense, the Bush administration’s use of contractors for various functions and services throughout the government. While none of the allegations made about Dyncorp and the State Department today should be trivialized, they are unquestionably a subset of a systemic issue throughout the Bush administration with respect to privatizing government services. The real issues are privatization policies in general and how efficiently they are managed throughout the administration.
At this late date in the Bush administration, there is relatively little that can be done to address the systemic issues because the root cause is quite simply George Bush’s catastrophic management of bad decisions and policies.
As the Times reported, George Bush has outsourced an incredibly large segment of the government, but has not managed the outsourcing, which always results in failure. That’s a very broad and strong indictment that I cannot possibly support in the confines of a single post; however, many years of successful outsourcing experience qualifies me to render that opinion.
The administration has obviously outsourced government operations and services to contractors such as Dyncorp and Blackwater, and basically walked away from those functions with an expectation they will be properly managed by the contractor simply because a contract exists between the two parties. Successful outsourcing simply does not work that way. These few passages from today’s article support my argument.
State Department contracting officials complain that they do not have nearly enough people to properly oversee the more than 2,500 contractors now under their informal command around the world.
The Bush administration has doubled the amount of government money going to all types of contractors to $400 billion, creating a new and thriving class of post-9/11 corporations carrying out delicate work for the government. But the number of government employees issuing, managing and auditing contracts has barely grown.
The only real solution is to fire the incompetent president, but since the government is not Acme Corp. firing the incompetent manager is not an option — plain and simple. This is what we get for electing an idiot with a long-standing history of failure after failure. Congress can only approach these issues tactically as they arise, deal with them to the extent possible, and wait for the Decider to go back to Crawford, unless he is impeached otherwise .
Oct 24, 2007 at 2:11 AM by Political Chase
As I mentioned earlier, we have been heads-down all day researching political donations to Sen. Jay Rockefeller. Based on the Federal Election Commission’s records, Rockefeller received substantially more money in 2007 from the telecom industry than in 2006 as was reported here last week and in the Times today. However, I have a problem with the data provided by the FEC, and do not want to roll out all the details until I know the information provided by the FEC is applicable and credible. However, this is the big picture of what I am seeing.
According to the FEC’s reporting system for the 2007 - 2008 cycle, Rockefeller has received $2,915,542 in total contributions this year. Most of that is broken down into “Individual Contributions” and “Non-Party (e.g. PACs) or Other Committees”. More specifcially Individual Contributions total $1,558,067 and PAC totals $840,798. When those contributions are broken down by each contribution, the record reflects Rockefeller received $223,500 from the telecommunications industry this year, but the FEC has many of those contributions with a record date from prior years — some as far back as 2001. Either those records are wrong or there is some screwball accounting practice they are employing, for whatever reason, to officially apply the contributions to 2007 - 2008 cycle.
Maybe they are applying the same principle as Rockefeller intends to do with the telecom companies. He gives them retroactive immunity and the FEC is applying retroactive accounting for his contributions.
If I extract all contributions that have a record date prior to 2007, Rockefeller has received $106,000 in telecom related donations, but at the moment I can’t say which amount is correct.
For now let’s assume the $106,000 is reasonably accurate. That’s certainly enough to get his attention and make him think twice about handing out get out of jail free cards.
More later.
