| Topic: |
Politics > Politics-USA |
| User: |
"Black Elk" |
| Date: |
25 Jun 2006 06:56:38 PM |
| Object: |
Senate Republicans Kill Second Bill on Corrupt Defense Contractors |
Senate Republicans Kill Second Bill on Corrupt Defense Contractors
Submitted by Bob Geiger on June 20, 2006
From our 'waiting for the other shoe to drop' file, we have news that Senate
Republicans followed up their rejection of a bill last week to penalize
corrupt companies like Halliburton, with a vote today against another
measure that would have formed an oversight committee to investigate
defense-contractor fraud.
With only 44 votes in favor, the second such bill -- also sponsored by Byron
Dorgan (D-ND) -- went down in flames 52-44, with Lincoln Chafee (R-RI) the
only GOP senator voting for the bill's passage.
S.Amdt. 4292 would have established ".a special committee of the Senate to
investigate the awarding and carrying out of contracts to conduct activities
in Afghanistan and Iraq and to fight the war on terrorism."
Senate Republicans last week shot down by a 55-43 vote, an amendment to
strictly penalize contractors caught defrauding the government, with every
single Republican senator voting to let corrupt defense contractors off the
hook for cheating the troops and the American people.
"A lot of people are making a lot of money, spent by this Congress, in
support of our soldiers who are at war, and we have some contractors who are
not playing straight with the soldiers or the American people," said Dorgan
on the Senate floor.
Dorgan and Senate Minority Whip ***** Durbin (D-IL) had sent a letter to
Armed Services Committee Chairman John Warner (R-VA) in May asking him to
start an investigation into allegations of defense-contractor abuses in Iraq
contracts.
"These matters fall clearly within your committee's jurisdiction, and they
have a direct bearing on our troops' mission and safety in Iraq, as well as
on the use of taxpayer dollars," said the Dorgan-Durbin letter to Warner.
"In the alternative, we would hope that you would support the creation of a
special committee of the Senate - modeled after the Truman Committee during
World War II - to conduct oversight hearings on Iraq contracting."
Durbin talked more about it on the Senate floor on Friday.
"I don't understand why there isn't a sense of outrage in this Congress on a
bipartisan basis, on both sides of the aisle, that we are not only being
ripped off as taxpayers by these no-bid contracts but that we are
shortchanging these men and women who are risking their lives while we stand
in the comfort and safety of this Senate," said the Illinois Democrat. "I
know Halliburton is a big political force in this town. I know in some
quarters you are not supposed to question Halliburton. This is some sacred
institution politically. I don't buy it. I count the soldiers that are
putting their lives on the line to be much more sacred and much more
valuable than any big, huge, no-bid corporation."
Unfortunately, the Republican majority in the Senate doesn't agree with him.
http://www.democrats.com/node/9278
--
They knew...
Despite the whitewash, we know that the Bush administration
was warned before the war that its Iraq claims were weak.
http://www.inthesetimes.com/site/main/article/they_knew_0802/
--
"Sometimes" Bill said, "There are forces too powerful fo us to whip
individually, in the time framework that we would like. We have to keep
working at our goal. But we have to be sensible enough, not to risk
everything and get ourselves destroyed or killed in the process. That
victory we seek may take much longer than we wanted, and come in ways we
never anticipated."
William Colby (Ex CIA Director)
The Franklin Cover-up
.
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