-Caveat Lector-
Begin forwarded message:
From: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Date: July 6, 2007 7:57:22 PM PDT
To: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Cc: [EMAIL PROTECTED], [EMAIL PROTECTED], [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Subject: A Civics Lesson in George Bush's America
July 06, 2006
A Window into the Last Stages of Rome
by emptywheel
http://thenexthurrah.typepad.com/the_next_hurrah/2006/07/
a_window_into_t.html
Lots of people are pointing to the juicy bits of Vanity Fair's huge
profile of the burgeoning SoCal bribery scandal. I'd like to return
to a point I've made before--the connection between Republican
corruption and our (in)ability to defend the United States. The
Vanity Fair article portrays the Armed Forces and Appropriations
Committees as a fraternity, a team that cooperates closely, down to
its own private pimps.
On trips to Washington, [CIA director Bill] Casey recalls, Wilkes
was able to usher him into the presence of important members of the
armed-services and appropriations committees, including, most
notably, Lowery and Lowery's closest friend on the latter, fellow
California Republican Jerry Lewis, now 71. The genteel Lewis and
the earthy Lowery reportedly loved to dine and even vacation
together. "Everyone on the defense committee always works
cooperatively," says Casey, who realized pretty quickly that no
money came his way without their support. "It was team play, and
they emphasized that to me constantly."
And that fraternity works to enrich itself, effectively holding
defense and intelligence appropriations decisions hostage to the
pet projects of members of the fraternity.
"The enabler in this story is the Pentagon," explains someone
familiar with the investigation. "To get what it wants —the F-22,
say, or better intelligence— it goes along and funds the shoddy
stuff Cunningham and [Wilkes] want. It's thinking, 'Cunningham will
fund the Taj Mahal of intelligence for us as long as we take care
of his friends.'"
Consider that - -to get what it needs, the Pentagon has to take
care of the fraternity. As one anonymous source says:
"People are missing the completeness of the corruption: It wasn't
'Get me a hooker and I'll get you a defense contract from the
appropriations committee,'" he says. "It's 'I will take care of you
and meet your every wish, need, and fantasy, and in exchange you
are going to take care of me!'
And this scamming fraternity has gravitated to the areas of the
government where they can do the most damage, both in terms of
their own enrichment, because they're the areas with the least
oversight. Defense:
"Many felonies went undetected because in the Defense Department a
lot goes on in secret, and these crimes grew in the shadow of both
9/11 and one-party rule — with little scrutiny. So what you're
looking at is a world where money, secrecy, sex, and indulgence
were all in play. Where everyone is guilty of something."
And intelligence:
Like Congress, the C.I.A. is used to doling out huge sums, often
with little or no oversight. "Look, the agency guys live in a
culture where there's tons of money and a lot of it is cash,"
explains one intelligence source, "where you say, How much cash are
we giving that guy, that asset, and what suitcase was it in? The
American Tourister?"
And in terms of the damage they do to our country's security. We've
got a bunch of boys who haven't matured beyond their college
fraternity days holding our nations' security hostage to their own
self-interest. Remind me again why Republicans are supposed to
better on security?
The whores and the poker parties and the fancy French antiques are
all really seamy. But they have direct consequences for the
security of this country.
-------------------
http://www.tpmcafe.com/node/26996
Let's start with Malaysian Prime Minister Matathir's $1.2M meeting
with President Bush.
The Prime Minister had some more to add when speaking to the
Mayalsian papers. This from Malaysia's New Straits Times:
"It is true that someone paid the money but it was not the
Government," he said.
"I did not touch the money at all. In the US, it is a practice
that if you want to meet their leader, you have to go through a
lobbyist and the lobbyist has to be paid... That is their system.
It is not corruption at all and it is very open -- but they don’t
reveal names."
A valuable tutorial in U.S. governance, no?
And according to the Prime Minister, though Jack Abramoff was paid
$1.2M, the Heritage Foundation deserves more credit than they've
been given for the meeting:
Dr Mahathir said the meeting was arranged by the Heritage
Foundation, a conservative think tank.
"They said I would be able to influence (Bush) in some way
regarding his policies.
"Secondly, it would be good for Malaysia if the relationship
between the two countries improved, and I agreed with that. I
thought I could do something good for the country."
Matt Yglesias at Tapped refers us to this Washington Post piece on
the Heritage.
-----------------
wonkette.com/politics/porter-goss/index.xml
Harper’s Ken Silverstein, who loves this story even more than we
do, is still at it*.
Some of the more sensational stories in Hettena’s book —and he has
on-the-record sources— got me thinking. First, didn’t Foggo’s
frequent indiscretions (for example, flashing his agency ID to jump
the line at a strip club) raise red flags about his character?
Second, wasn’t Foggo’s outlandish sexual behavior —like, say,
publicly performing oral sex on a hooker (hired by Wilkes) at his
own bachelor party— just the sort of thing that makes intelligence
officials potentially vulnerable to blackmail by a hostile spy
service?
*http://harpers.org/archive/2007/04/sb-sex-and-the-cia
In addition to stories in Hettena's new book, I've previously
reported that Foggo had behaved very badly while based in Honduras
in the early-1980s, when the CIA was using the country as a base
for covert programs in Central America. He was said to be a regular
at a Tegucigalpa bar named Gloria's and at a casino at the Maya
Hotel, both places known at the time as hooker hotbeds.
Whether Foggo had official dealings with prostitutes in Honduras or
not, this was clearly a big problem. “Dusty would have been the
perfect target of a counter-intelligence operation,” said one
official who worked in Honduras at the time. “He had access and
knowledge, and was reckless and visible. You're only vulnerable if
you make yourself vulnerable, and that's what Dusty did.”
This person, and several others, have told me that Foggo continued
to display poor judgment throughout his career and had been
reprimanded over his personal conduct -- and that all of this was
well known to Goss before he installed Foggo as executive director.
“When we heard Dusty had been picked, we figured we were doomed,”
he said. “And we were right.”
All of which leads to one of the great, unanswered questions
surrounding Foggo: why would Goss possibly have picked him for such
a senior position at the agency?
I asked the CIA press office if Foggo's personal conduct had ever
raised red flags at the agency. Spokesman Mark Mansfield replied by
email, saying, “Given that legal proceedings are underway, it would
not be appropriate to comment, other than to point out that Mr.
Foggo left the CIA last year and the position he held, Executive
Director, doesn't exist any more.”
See what's free at AOL.com.
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