[dialo]

Halliburton has finally admitted that the Altanmia contract was rewarded because of kickbacks: http://money.cnn.com/2004/01/23/news...ex.htm?cnn=yes

We all know this is just how the company does business. Note that there is also an investigation in france about kickbacks with nigeria. Last year, Halliburton admitted to bribing nigeria officials in a seperate incident.

Of course, this is just the tip of the iceberg on this case and the company in general.

[maxelson]

Bush hater. You must be. This can be the only reason you persist in this persecution of this misunderstood and well connected corporate entity.

[spacefreak]

Originally posted by dialo:
Of course, this is just the tip of the iceberg on this case and the company in general.

Let's look a little deeper, shall we?

The multi-year contract was in effect during much of the Clinton administration. During those years, Brown & Root did extensive work for the Army under the LOGCAP contract in Haiti, Somalia, and Bosnia; contract workers built base camps and provided troops with electrical power, food, and other necessities.

In 1997, when LOGCAP was again put up for bid, Halliburton/Brown & Root lost the competition to another contractor, Dyncorp. But the Clinton Defense Department, rather than switch from Halliburton to Dyncorp, elected to award a separate, sole-source contract to Halliburton/Brown & Root to continue its work in the Balkans. <snip>

The Army's sole-source Bosnia contract with Brown & Root lasted until 1999. At that time, the Clinton Defense Department conducted full-scale competitive bidding for a new contract. The winner was . . . Halliburton/Brown & Root. The company continued its work in Bosnia uninterrupted.

As the record shows, Halliburton won big government contracts under the Clinton administration, and it won big government contracts under the Bush administration.

And then we have this:

The big jump in KBR's contracts takes place under the Clinton administration. By Clinton's second term, "one of every seven Pentagon dollars passed through KBR."

Why the dramatic increase under Clinton? Blame Al Gore. Well, not really, but sort of. According to this section of the CPI report:

At one time, federal agencies constructed buildings, built machines and cleaned offices themselves, or found another agency to do it. Today, the U.S. government spends some $200 billion a year buying everything from information technology services to pencils to advanced weapons systems from the private sector.

The Defense Department alone accounts for 75 percent of that spending. Following a series of scandals in the 1980s, where the Pentagon was revealed to have paid outrageous sums for commercially available products, Congress decided to overhaul government procurement. The result was the Federal Acquisition Streamlining Act of 1994, which simplified the maze of procurement regulations to make it easier for federal agencies to buy products from the private sector.

The new law dovetailed with former Vice President Al Gore's "Reinventing Government" initiative, which aimed to trim the federal workforce, and matched the realities of the Pentagon's shrinking budget. As a result, where the federal workforce has shrunk, the contractor workforce has grown.

By and large, the Bush administration is following the law and using all the procedures the law lays out. The trouble is that the laws are bad. We've privatized significant portions of government operations in areas where there is no need for doing so. In principle, privatization might lead to competition and cost savings for the taxpayer. In practice, in many of these areas there is no competition -- Halliburton and Bechtel are essentially monopoly suppliers in the fields where they've won contracts. When you outsource services to private monopolies, all you're setting yourself up for is the busting of some public sector unions and some price-gouging at the hands of monopolist corporations.

The story of the company's government activities is related in Robert Caro's Path to Power, the first volume of his biography of Lyndon Johnson. Brown and Root financial support was critical to Johnson's early election victories in the 1930s, and Johnson was instrumental in landing government contracts for the firm. He was able to get the contract for the Mansfield Dam near Austin, TX, which produced the Lake Travis reservoir, electrified much of Johnson's congressional district, and bailed Brown and Root out of financial difficulty due to the depression. Much of this firm's business has been based upon connections to government throughout a long portion of its history.

Why not look into some of the other companies who reap significant government contracts while contributing millions to campaigns of both parties?

Oh, that's right. Dick Cheney didn't work at those companies.

And where's all the bitching about the LBJ, Carter, or Clinton admin's relationship with KBR/Halliburton? My guess is that it's because that doesn't fit into your liberal agenda.

[spacefreak]

Originally posted by maxelson:
Bush hater. You must be. This can be the only reason you persist in this persecution of this misunderstood and well connected corporate entity.

Sorta. I'm not saying that cronyism isn't present here. I just want people to be consistent in their complaints and positions, and realize that KBR (and many other corporations) have been consistently receiving lucrative US contracts for the better part of a century while significantly contributing to the campains of both parties.

I'd rather people take a stand on the issue as a whole, not just the part that involves the Bush admin.

[dialo]

Sorry, shorty, but all you've done is show that it has gotten large contracts. Let's look at some of the details:


Iraq:

Halliburton approved of the sanctions imposed on Iraq because as Dick Cheney explained, “One major uncertainty is the potential negative impact on oil prices should Iraq reenter the market.”_ But at the same time, the morally amorphous company managed to work on both sides of the curtain._ Detailed investigative reports by the Financial Times and theInternational Herald Tribune revealed that Halliburton, through two if its subsidiaries, skirted the sanctions on Iraq and did some $23.8 million in business with the ‘evil’ regime._ The oil services company was paid to rebuild the very same Iraqi infrastructure that its CEO was complicit in destroying as defense secretary under Bush I._ Interestingly, one month prior to the publication of these reports, Mr. Cheney had claimed: “I had a firm policy that I wouldn't do anything in Iraq, even arrangements that were supposedly legal.”_ Cheney's company did its business in Iraq through European subsidiaries “to avoid straining relations with Washington and jeopardizing their ties with President Saddam Hussein's government,” (Risen 7-28-2002; Lee 11-13-2000; Bruno and Vallette 9-2000; Flanders 10-06-2001; Cavelli 11-19-2001)

And some of the crimes and fines (bold deals with overcharging and crazy accounting):

Subverting Democratic Values and the Rule of Law - Criminal Activity

Between 1993 and 1994, Halliburton allegedly shipped Israeli goods illegally to Iran several times between 1993 and 1994._ As a result, the_ the Department of Commerce filed charges against the company._ While under the leadership of Dick Cheney, Halliburton agreed to pay a $15,000 fine for the alleged offense, but refused to admit it had violated any laws._ (Bruno and Vallette 2000; Flanders 10-06-2001)

In spite of the passing of the Iran-Libya Sanctions Act in 1995, Halliburton continued to do business with Iran through its multiple subsidiaries - while Cheney was the CEO. (Bruno and Vallette 2000; Flanders 10-06-2001)

Halliburton had extensive investments and contracts in Indonesia. One of its contracts was canceled by the post-Suharto government during a purging of corruptly awarded contracts._ Indonesia Corruption Watch revealed that Kellogg Brown & Root (Halliburton's engineering division) was among 59 companies using collusive, corruptive and nepotistic practices involving former President Suharto's family._ (Bruno and Vallette 2000; Flanders 10-06-2001)

Before Cheney, Halliburton was very active in Libya, making $44.7 million there in 1993._ In 1994, as a result of sanctions on Libya their income dropped to $12.4 million. Ignoring the sanctions, Halliburton did business in Libya throughout Cheney's tenure. A member of Congress accused Halliburton “of undermining American foreign policy to the full extent allowed by law.” (Athans and Lolordo 8-16-2000; Bruno and Vallette 2000; Flanders 10-06-2001)

A 1997 investigation by the General Accounting Office (GAO) revealed Halliburton has repeatedly overcharged the government for its services._ For example, in one case, Halliburton charged the U.S. government $85.98 per sheet of plywood delivered to a location outside the U.S._ In another instance, the company attempted to bill the Army for the income taxes that its employees were liable for while working in Hungary._ (Chatterjee 5-2-2002a; Gerth and Van Natta 7-14-2002)

In 2000, the GAO discovered that Brown and Root had grossly mismanaged its expenditures at the army's facilities in Kosovo._ For example, contract labor working in the Balkans on the U.S. taxpayers' clock_ were encouraged to work extra hours doing redundant tasks.__ The report explained that at Camp Bondsteel laborers often cleaned offices_ and bathrooms over and over again - up to four times a day._ (Chatterjee 5-2-2002a; Hennessey 5-23-2002)_ Additionally, it revealed that Brown and Root had ordered so much furniture ($5.2 million worth) that the army had great difficulty finding room for it all._ Processing the order alone cost U.S. taxpayers $377,000. (Hennessey 5-23-2002)

The former Brown and Root contract manager, Dammen Grant Campbell, blew the whistle on his ex-employer, revealing that the Halliburton subsidiary had purposefully inflated its invoices by exaggerating the quantity and quality of the supplies its used on government contracts._ In the span of about 4 years, between 1994 and 1998, the company sent the government these fraudulent bills for 224 projects._ (Chatterjee 5-2-2002a)

KBR charged the U.S. Army $750,000 for electrical repairs that had cost them only about $125,000 at a base in California._ Commenting on the incident, A KBR lawyer explained, "The company happened to negotiate a couple of projects we made more money on than others._ On some projects the contractor may make a large or small profit, while on others it may lose money, as KBR sometimes did on this contract."_ (Gerth and Van Natta 7-14-2002)

The Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) is currently investigating Halliburton for possible fraudulent accounting in 1998 and 1999._ The company is accused of booking $100 million in reimbursement income for cost overruns on construction contracts before its customers actually agreed to pay these extra costs._ The New York Times_ reported that according to a former Dresser Industries executive Halliburton claimed the income "to obscure large losses on several important construction contracts."_ Halliburton's auditor, Anderson Accounting, is assumed to have approved of the misleading financial statements._ (Berenson and Bergman 5-22-2002; Harrington and Toedtman 5-30-2002)_ According Halliburton's current CEO, David Lesar, Cheney had been aware the projected cost-overrun payments were being recorded as revenues._ (PRNewswire 7-14-2002) While much of the complacent public seems content that Cheney's former company is not being overlooked by the SEC, more critical observers_are calling attention to the apparent conflict of interest between Harvey Pitt, the current SEC chairman, and the allegations he is charged with investigating._ (Coile 7-1-2002; Fields 7-9-2002)_ Pitt at one time was a top lobbyist and attorney for several major Wall Street brokerage and accounting firms._ Even Al Gore has raised his voice._ In a speech on June 29, he complained: "They picked the principal lawyer and lobbyist for the big five accounting firms who, before coming to the government, went and pleaded with the SEC to open up loopholes for the accounting companies."___(Coile 7-1-2002)_ Another conflict of interest is that the SEC reports to the Vice President._ (Harnden 5-7-2002)

In May of 2003, Halliburton admitted to having paid $2.4 million to an official posing as a tax consultant in exchange for tax concessions from that country. According to Halliburton, the bribes, which took place between 2001 and 2002, did not involve senior company officers. The SEC is investigating the issue and Halliburton may ultimately be liable for some $5 million in back taxes in Nigeria. [Guardian, 5/9/03; Houston Chronicle,5/8/03]

Disregard for Human Rights.

Halliburton was accused by local villagers of being involved in the shooting of a protester by Nigeria's Mobile Police Unit._ Dick Cheney has lobbied heavily to prevent or eliminate federal laws that restrict Halliburton's ability to do business in this country. (Bruno and Vallette 2000; Flanders 10-06-2001)

Halliburton did a significant amount of business with the notorious regime in Burma. An investigation by EarthRights International in 2000 documented Halliburton's complicity in major human rights violations - including the murder, torture, rape, forced labor and forced relocation of some of Burma’s indigenous populations._ (Bruno and Vallette 9-2000)

[spacefreak]

Another good article on this

The most persuasive rebuttals have come from people who actually know something about the government procurement process. For example, Steven Kelman was an administrator in the Office of Federal Procurement Policy under Bill Clinton and now is a professor of public management at Harvard.

Last week, Kelman wrote an op-ed article in The Washington Post on the alleged links between contributions and reconstruction contracts. "One would be hard-pressed to discover anyone with a working knowledge of how federal contracts are awarded — whether a career civil servant working on procurement or an independent academic expert — who doesn't regard these allegations as being somewhere between highly improbable and utterly absurd," he observed.

The fact is that unlike the congressional pork barrel machine, the federal procurement system is a highly structured process, which is largely insulated from crass political pressures. The idea that a Bush political appointee can parachute down and persuade a large group of civil servants to risk their careers by steering business to a big donor is the stuff of fantasy novels, not reality.

The real story is that the Halliburton subsidiary, Kellogg, Brown & Root, won an open competition to provide the service support for overseas troops. This contract is called the Logcap, and is awarded every few years. KBR won the competition in 1992. It lost to DynCorp in 1997, and won it again in 2001.

Under the deal, KBR builds bases, supplies water, operates laundries and performs thousands of other tasks. Though the GAO has found that KBR sometimes overcharges, in general the company has an outstanding reputation among the panoply of auditing agencies that monitor these contracts.

[dialo]

And the lobbying:

Halliburton lobbied Congress to lift sanctions on countries with which it sought to do business.

Even though the nation’s leaders and their friends in the executive suites of the world’s largest multinational corporations blissfully hail the wonders of ‘free trade,’ all available evidence indicates that one of the real forces behind corporate success is the ability to manipulate the conditions within which the so-called ‘free market’ operates._ In the case of Halliburton, this reoccurring theme is particularly acute._ While Halliburton opposed the the use of sanctions on some countries, it simultaneously supported imposing sanctions on other countries - depending of course on how the sanctions would effect Halliburton._ This policy of inconsistency demonstrates that the so-called principles of 'free trade' are applied only when it is profitable to do so.

Between 1995 and 2000, Halliburton, under the leadership of former secretary of defense and current Vice President Dick Cheney, successfully lobbied against the imposition of international sanctions against countries with which it wanted to do business._ In most cases these countries were being sanctioned because of serious human rights abuses._ Halliburton, along with a few other companies, attempted to argue that the best way to discourage the violations of human rights was to do business with them, or as they explained it – ‘engage.’_ Here are a few examples of cases where they successfully undermined sanctions.

Dick Cheney lobbied to lift sanctions against aid to Azerbaijan that were mandated under section 907 of the 1992 Freedom Support Act._ The sanctions were imposed because of concerns about the ethnic cleansing of the Abkhazis._ Cheney claimed the sanctions were the result only of groundless campaigning by the Armenian-American lobby. Then in 1997, Halliburton subsidiary Brown & Root bid on a major Caspian project from the Azerbaijan International Operating Company._ (Halliburton 8-11-1997; Bruno and Vallette 2000; Flanders 10-06-2001; Cohn 8-10-2001)

_It successfully lobbied, through the front organization U.S. Engage, against a 1997 bill intended to impose sanctions against foreign governments that persecute religious groups._(Bruno and Vallette 9-2000)

_It supported the overturning of the Massachusetts Burma law that discouraged the state government from awarding contracts to companies doing business in Burma, a country notorious for its repressive government._ Halliburton’s business interests in Burma and their complicity in major human rights violations - including the murder, torture, rape, forced labor and forced relocation of some of Burma’s indigenous populations - was documented in a 2000 report by EarthRights International._ (Bruno and Vallette 9-2000)

Dick Cheney has lobbied heavily to prevent or eliminate federal laws that restrict Halliburton's ability to do business in Nigeria. (Bruno and Vallette 2000; Flanders 10-06-2001)

As the CEO of Halliburton, Dick Cheney lobbied relentlessly against the Iran-Libya Sanction Act of 1995 and tried to secure Halliburton an exemption._ The oil company was very upset that it was being prevented from participating in the development of Iran's offshore oil fields and it wanted to take an active part in the construction of proposed pipelines that would carry Caspian Sea oil to the Persian Gulf._ He argued that the “the unintended result of our policy toward Iran is to give Russia more leverage over the independent states of central Asia and the Caucusus by blocking export routes toward the south."_ (Bruno and Vallette 2000; Flanders 10-06-2001)

All this just from the CCR page where you can get more info on the company, including descriptions of the huge contracts: http://www.cooperativeresearch.org/c...lliburton.html

[dialo]

Originally posted by spacefreak:
Under the deal, KBR builds bases, supplies water, operates laundries and performs thousands of other tasks. Though the GAO has found that KBR sometimes overcharges, in general the company has an outstanding reputation among the panoply of auditing agencies that monitor these contracts.

Utter and complete bullshit, as demonstrated by nothing less than a MOUNTAIN of fact. Thanks.

[spacefreak]

Originally posted by dialo:
Utter and complete bullshit, as demonstrated by nothing less than a MOUNTAIN of fact.

And 70+ years of consistent government contracting.

[spacefreak]

There are a number of legitimate questions Democratic candidates could be asking about our procurement system. Are we so overreliant on private contractors that the line between combat personnel and support personnel is getting blurred? Should we beef up the Pentagon procurement staff, to give us the ability to manage contracts from a wider cast of companies? What do we do if the private contractors decide to pack up and leave Iraq?

But answering these questions would mean coming up with a positive vision of how to better proceed with our reconstruction efforts. Instead the Democratic presidential candidates are content simply to repeat demagogic and misleading applause lines.

Just like your string of posts here, dialo.

[dialo]

Originally posted by spacefreak:
And 70+ years of consistent government contracting.

Sorry, kid, but there's a mountain of fact here, not even including the two admission of doing business with bribes and third ongoing investigation in the same just this year.

[thunderous_funker]

spacefreak,

First you suggest that the cronyism dates back to previous administrations (which I agree with, Dems aren't immune at all), then you quote a member of the Clinton administration to dismiss any allegations of favoritism.



"who you know" drives business at every level. Every level. It also drives business at the government level. Yes, they have rules to try and stamp it out, but we all know that it still happens.

And it happens when Democrats are in power and when Republicans are in power.

For me, the issue isn't whether or not one side has higher moral ground to stand on--because they don't--but rather, how does a company that is consistantly accused of gross misconduct, overcharging and illegality consistantly regarded as the "best possible candidate" through the procurement process?

Seems to me that "fool me once, shame on you. Fool me twice, shame on me" has turned into "fool me twice, you must be the best man for the job".

Or as Bush likes to say, "fool me once, shame on...um...me....fool me twice....um......macan't get fooled again!"

[dialo]

Spacefreak, you really are ridiculous. LOOK UP.

And right now we aren't talking about whether KBR actually gets contracts (which are in fact quite different that the ones given to other government contrators), we are talking about its illegal and unethical business practices.

[spacefreak]

Originally posted by thunderous_funker:
First you suggest that the cronyism dates back to previous administrations (which I agree with, Dems aren't immune at all), then you quote a member of the Clinton administration to dismiss any allegations of favoritism.

Exactly - either the problem lies with US Gov't (all admins) - KBR cronyism, or it's simply not that big of a problem at all, or it's the way this stuff gets done.

Focusing completely on the Bush Admin - KBR is both ridiculous and transparent.

[thunderous_funker]

Originally posted by spacefreak:
Exactly - either the problem lies with US Gov't (all admins) - KBR cronyism, or it's simply not that big of a problem at all, or it's the way this stuff gets done.

Focusing completely on the Bush Admin - KBR is both ridiculous and transparent.

I completely agree with you.

Democrats don't like to admit that Clinton was as cozy (or even more cozy) with big business than any republican in memory. Its one of the reasons I'm not a democrat.

[dialo]

Originally posted by spacefreak:
Exactly - either the problem lies with US Gov't (all admins) - KBR cronyism, or it's simply not that big of a problem at all, or it's the way this stuff gets done.

Focusing completely on the Bush Admin - KBR is both ridiculous and transparent.

Nice job at skirting the real issue of this thread, which is halliburton's illegal and unethical business practices, including Cheney's lies regarding it's operations with Iraq.

[spacefreak]

Originally posted by dialo:
Nice job at skirting the real issue of this thread, which is halliburton's illegal and unethical business practices, including Cheney's lies regarding it's operations with Iraq.

The real issue is that you choose to focus solely on Halliburton, which would be fine if you encompassed their most-of-a-century history of contracts with the US government. But no. This is about the Bush administration for you. They are your target.

Otherwise, you'd also bitch about all the other companies that overcharge the Pentagon, like Hamilton Sundstrand overcharging the military by millions of dollars for helicopter parts.

[dialo]

Originally posted by spacefreak:
Then why do they still get contracts, and why did they get preferred Clinton contracts, and Reagan contracts, and Carter, Ford, Nixon, LBJ contracts if they are known for and specialize in illegal and unethical business?

And why are you restricing your focus to KBR?

Because Halliburton is in a league of it's own in terms of corruption and size.

[dialo]

Originally posted by thunderous_funker:
Democrats don't like to admit that Clinton was as cozy (or even more cozy) with big business than any republican in memory. Its one of the reasons I'm not a democrat.

You are right that democrats don't like to ackowledge it. However, Halliburton is in a league of it's own.

In just Iraq, it was first given a no-bid contract. When there was an uproar, it was announced that it would be out of the running for the biggest contracts. Only a few months later, it was awarded (again, without bidding) the largest (by ~6 times) contract in Iraq.

Then we have the Altanmia contract. The Army Corps of Engineers has been covering KBR's tracks ont his one, including continuing to allow shady deals using by issuing the waiver allowing it to keep contract information secret.

This sets Halliburton apart from betchel and the other government contractors (which, yes, have stong government connections and some of which, like dyncorp, are extraodinarily corrupt, though on a smaller scale).

That doesn't even account for the other major new contracts:

Kellog Brown and Root's DOD forward operating base 10-year contract.

*

Summary of KBR's 10-year, no-limit-on-costs, contract
o

The 'war on terrorism' has considerably improved the business climate for Halliburton's subsidiary, Kellog Brown and Root (KBR), which has recently been provided with numerous lucrative jobs by the Department of Defense. After the Bush administration launched its 'war on terrorism' the U.S. ‘Defense’ Department awarded a lucrative 10-year contract on December 14 to KBR for the construction of forward operating bases for the U.S. military. The services that it provides under this deal, known as the Logistics Civil Augmentation Program (LOGCAP), include: Planning, base camp maintenance, facilities maintenance, laundry services, food services, airfield services, property accountability and supply operations. The contract is to last ten years and it guarantees Halliburton business wherever Bush, Cheney, and their successors decide to send U.S. troops in their fight against ‘terror.’ So far, evidence has surfaced that Brown and Root will be providing the services at the Bagram base in Afghanistan, the Khanabad Air Base in Uzbekistan, as well as the Guatanamo base in Cuba. (Greene 2-1-2002; Chatterjee 5-2-2002a; Corpwatch 5-2-2002; Hennessey 5-23-2002; Gerth and Van Natta 7-13-2002; Pace 8-5-2002)

Halliburton stands to make a handsome profit from the deal as the contract stipulates that the company's compensation will be based on a percentage of its total spending, i.e., the more taxpayer money Halliburton spends, the larger its profits will be. (Hennessey 5-23-2002; Pace 8-5-2002) The New York Times noted that this 10-year contract with "no lid on costs" is "the only logistical arrangement by the Army without an estimated cost" and that it "could produce hundreds of millions of dollars for the company." (Gerth and Van Natta 7-13-2002) Interestingly, the Department of Defense has agreed to pay Halliburton in this manner despite a September 2000 GAO report that clearly demonstrated that Halliburton has a reputation for overspending - with impunity. (Hennessey 5-23-2002; Gerth and Van Natta 7-13-2002) In fact, the Department of Defense outright ignored the GAO's recommendation to solicit new bids for the contract. (Pace 8-5-2002)

Another notable attribute of the KBR contract is that several of the jobs that Halliburton has so far taken part in, could have been performed at less expense had they been done by the military's own engineers. A New York Times report convincingly concluded, 'By hiring an outside company to handle much of its logistics, the Pentagon may wind up spending more taxpayer money than if it did the work itself.' (Gerth and Van Natta 7-13-2002)

Also of considerable benefit to Halliburton's intermediate and long term prospects is the fact that the army is currently in the midst of changing over to prefabricated forwarding operating bases known as 'Force Providers.' Observers suggest that these new mobile bases represent the government's intent to further privatize logistic military support services. (Chatterjee 5-2-2002a,b)

Some observers have suggested that this deal was designed in part to bail out Halliburton who The Washington Post suggested back in February 2002 was suffering financially as evidenced by its falling stock price and ominous insider selling (Greene 2-1-2002; Chatterjee 5-2-2002a). The drop in market value was likely a result of insider knowledge that Halliburton's earnings would have to be restated on account of the SEC investigation into Halliburton's inappropriate accounting procedures.


*
[Other new contracts]
o

Guatanamo Bay Air Base in Cuba. Preliminary construction on the base was performed by the Navy's brigade of engineers, known as the 'Seabees'. However, work on the Guatanamo base was quickly handed over to KBR who stepped in after winning a $300 million five-year logistic support contract. Brown and Root will, among other things, construct two more permanent prison facilities to house the current population of 'al Qaeda' and 'Taliban' detainees, in addition to whatever future 'unlawful combatants' that the U.S. military intends to sequester. One of the facilities is a $23 million 612-unit facility while the other, contracted by Halliburton in July 2002, is a smaller $9.4 million 204-unit facility. The bulk of the labor is being performed by workers from the Philippines and India; even though, as Seabees spokesman Daryl Smithexplained to the New York Times, "Seabees typically can perform the work at about half the cost of contractors, because labor costs are already sunk and paid for." (Chatterjee 5-2-2002a; Gerth and Van Natta 7-13-2002; Aldinger 7-26-2002)
o

Khanabad Air Base in Uzbekistan. For the first six months, logistic support at the Khanabad Air Base was provided by the Army's First Corps Support Command. Now, at an increased cost of 10 - 20%, local Uzbeks on the payroll of Kellogg Brown and Root are providing the services, as part of a $22 million deal. According to Halliburton, the Uzbeks are being paid in accordance with 'local laws and customs.' The reason for this switch to a more expensive service provider who relies on a less experienced and a lower paid work force is that "they do a better job of maintaining the infrastructure' - at least according to what Lt. Col. Clay Cole and his staff told the New York Times. Notably, they failed to provide the Times with any details to substantiate this interesting claim. Whatever the truth is behind that assertion, it does little to take away from another curious fact with regards to KBR's Khanabad contract. According to the New York Times, "[T]he Army failed to ascertain, as regulations require, whether its own units, which handled logistics there for the first six months, were available to work when it brought in the contractor, according to Army spokesmen." [Gerth and Van Natta 7-13-2002; CorpWatch, 3/20/03]
o

Bases in Afghanistan. In November 2002, KBR started a one-year $42.5 million contract to provide services for troops at bases in Bagram and Khandahar. [CorpWatch, 3/20/03]
o

Bases in Kuwait. Roughly 1,800 KBR employees- mostly people hired locally at cheap wages - are involved in the construction of numerous tent cities designed to house roughly 80,000 foreign troops, a figure that represents about 1/10 of the country's total population. [CorpWatch, 3/20/03]
o

Reconstruction Agencies in Iraq. Halliburton's KBR subsidiary provided logistical support to the U.S. interim government in Iraq. [Los Angeles Times, 5/9/03]
o

U.S. Troops in Djibouti. Halliburton's KBR subsidiary provided logistical support to U.S. troops in Djibouti. [Los Angeles Times, 5/9/03]

[spacefreak]

Originally posted by dialo:
Because Halliburton is in a league of it's own in terms of corruption and size.

Really?

Defense Department auditors determined in November that Hamilton Sundstrand gave "inaccurate and misleading" information about the true costs of military helicopter parts. Hamilton Sundstrand overcharged the military by millions of dollars, the report said. The auditors calculated that, if Hamilton Sundstrand continued the overcharging, the Pentagon would pay more than $22 million extra from this year through 2009. That would represent an improper markup of about 88 percent, the report said.

[dialo]

Originally posted by spacefreak:
Really?

So you post one case (or, hell, let pretend you posted a few) of overcharging by Hamilton Sundstrand as a response to me pointing out that a long, detailed and ongoing history of corruption, illegal and unethical activity of the world's second largest oil services company and the company that builds and runs all of the bases constructed in the war on terror puts Halliburton in a league of its own in terms of corruption and size.

Interesting.

[thunderous_funker]

Why do you insist on defending a company that you admit conducts itself unethically and illegally?

It doesn't reflect well on you. I respect your instance that we acknowledge that cronyism crosses the party lines, but the more you defend them, the more you just sound like an apologist.

[Wiskedjak]

Originally posted by spacefreak:
The real issue is that you choose to focus solely on Halliburton, which would be fine if you encompassed their most-of-a-century history of contracts with the US government. But no. This is about the Bush administration for you. They are your target.

You're the only one talking about Bush here. You are inferring that Dialo is talking about Bush based upon no evidence. The reality is that you have no idea what Dialo is "really talking about", but are instead trying to put his arguements into canned Liberal arguements so that you can throw back your canned Conservative arguements.

Respond to the arguement at issue rather than try to derail it because you think you can read minds through the Internet.

[TheMosco]

Originally posted by Wiskedjak:
You're the only one talking about Bush here. You are inferring that Dialo is talking about Bush based upon no evidence. The reality is that you have no idea what Dialo is "really talking about", but are instead trying to put his arguements into canned Liberal arguements so that you can throw back your canned Conservative arguements.

Respond to the arguement at issue rather than try to derail it because you think you can read minds through the Internet.

Thats the first thing i noticed in this thread, spacefreak was the one that brought bush into the picture while dialo just brought up how bad a company hal is.

[thunderous_funker]

Originally posted by TheMosco:
Thats the first thing i noticed in this thread, spacefreak was the one that brought bush into the picture while dialo just brought up how bad a company hal is.

Karl Rove has instructed the troops to begin every rebuttal with "Yeah, but Clinton....."

Not spacefreak's fault. He is just sticking to the plan.

[spacefreak]

Originally posted by Wiskedjak:
You're the only one talking about Bush here. You are inferring that Dialo is talking about Bush based upon no evidence.

I repeatedly used the term "Bush administration", and if you peruse dialo's posts, you would see that the mentions of Cheney (who is in the Bush administration) number into the double digits.

Considering Halliburton/KBR's 70+ years of goverment contracting, and the plethora of info that dialo posted, how many mentions of other Halliburton employees or executives do you see?

I see a mention of one whistleblower and one mention of the current CEO (who's trying to pass the buck to...Dick Cheney). And then Cheney, Cheney, Cheney, current vice president Cheney, Cheney, Cheney, Cheney, Cheney, Cheney, Cheney, Cheney, Cheney, Cheney.

So here we have a huge multi-national corporation with billions of dollars in revenues, and thousands upon thousands of employees, but yet the only name mentioned in all these accusations and "evidence" of criminal behavior is Dick Cheney.

Yeah - I'm sure this is only about Halliburton. I'm curious as to why Halliburton wasn't hounded when Cheney was actually working there.

[TheMosco]

Originally posted by spacefreak:
I repeatedly used the term "Bush administration", and if you peruse dialo's posts, you would see that the mentions of Cheney (who is in the Bush administration) number into the double digits.

He didn't bring up dick cheney until after you did. You claim that you wish people wouldn't look at just look at the connections to the bush administration and look at the issue on the whole and thats exactly what he was doing. He wasn't giving tons of evidence against Hal in some long bush conspiracy post until you started with your garbage, he was posting a recent news article about the company giving kickbacks and didn't even mention the connection to bush in his original post. You are complete skirting the issue and have completely committed the two-wrongs fallacy and maybe even the red hearing fallacy (knew ethics class would pay off!). You get around the issue of Hal being a corrupt company by saying clinton did it to which has nothing to do at all with the original post.

[spacefreak]

Originally posted by TheMosco:
He didn't bring up dick cheney until after you did.

Right, and his linked article didn't contain:

Vice President Dick Cheney headed Halliburton from 1995 until he became George Bush's running mate in 2000.

I'm sure he also didn't mention the France-Nigeria investigation, in which the targeted figure mentioned for indictment is....Dick Cheney.

[thunderous_funker]

Originally posted by spacefreak:
Right, and his linked article didn't contain:I'm sure he also didn't mention the France-Nigeria investigation, in which the targeted figure mentioned for indictment is....Dick Cheney.

Because the allegations are that misconduct occured while he was CEO. Or do former CEOs suddenly become immune when they enter politics?

If they have evidence that Hal was bribing Nigerian officials while Cheney was CEO, then he should be investigated.

[spacefreak]

Originally posted by thunderous_funker:
Because the allegations are that misconduct occured while he was CEO. Or do former CEOs suddenly become immune when they enter politics?

If they have evidence that Hal was bribing Nigerian officials while Cheney was CEO, then he should be investigated.

No - not immune, and I agree completely. However, there are some sketchy issues surrounding the French investigation. I think you'll find this interesting, and I'd like to hear your take on it.

A judicial investigation has been opened with regard to “the bribery of a foreign public official”, for the first time in France. It focuses notably on the French company Technip and the American Halliburton, which were associated in a Nigerian operation. Such an international inquiry is possible since the 1997 adoption of an OECD convention on the “fight against the corruption of foreign public officials in commercial negotiations” which came into effect in French law in 2000. It’s within this new judicial framework that the Judge Renaud Van Ruymbeke is conducting his investigations and the Paris court contemplates an eventual indictment of the present United States’ Vice President, Richard Cheney, in his capacity as former CEO of Halliburton.

Now here's the kicker:

This offence, created during the 1997 adoption of the OECD (Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development) convention on “the fight against bribery of foreign public officials in commercial negotiations”, is being enforced for the first time since it came into effect in France in 2000. In this affair of presumed “international bribery” the only contract targeted is the one posterior to this date- that of June 2002-, a time when Dick Cheney had left Halliburton for the Vice-Presidency of the United States.

It seems, however, to be confirmed that the initiative and the establishment of the occult system of commissions essentially come from KBR- during a period when Dick Cheney presided over the Halliburton Group-, even if its associates could not have remained ignorant of what was going on.

What's so interesting to me? The charges themselves didn't become law 2000. They then target a 2002 event, and then solely target an indictment against Cheney because he was CEO in 1995 when the commission schedule was determined.

Imagine that you're managing a sandwich shop, and in the course of your employment, you implement a better meat slicing system. After you resign from your position 5 years later, a new law is passed stating that food service managers can be responsible for any bodily injury endured by employees of the establishment. 3 years after that, some high school kid making sandwiches at your former shop slices the tip of his finger off. Do you feel you should be the sole target of the lawsuit?

"Evil Cheney" or not, this legal pursuit is unjust.

[thunderous_funker]

Your analogy is flawed. The activity in question was illegal even if the means of enforcing it weren't yet organized. The activity violates US laws that have been in place since 1977 called the Foreign Corrupt Practices Act.

When the original charges were levied against Haliburton employees last may, the company pre-emptively alledged that it all took place after Cheney's tenure (an odd move for a company, if you ask me).

Now the French Investigation (under the new French law) has revealed evidence that the activity in question happened throughout the 90's and has threatened to subpoena Cheney in order to get to the bottom of it.

Of course, none of that would be necessary if US enforcement agencies were doing their jobs. They have successfully prosecuted only 50 cases since the law was passed in 1977 despite rampant scandals thorought the years.

The US gov felt it was more important to be "business friendly" than to clamp down and tarnish the image of companies abroad.

So I don't buy the allegation that this is politically motivated against Cheney. Halliburton employees broke the law, the company admits that much, but it argues it happened after Cheney. Seems to me they are the one's guilty of making it political by trying so hard not to implicate the Veep.

Of course, the SEC has yet to settle the issues of the accounting fraud allegations against Halliburton from almost 2 years ago. Again, it seems that Cheney's political status is an obstacle to justice rather than some sort of magnet for unjust persecution.

[dialo]

Originally posted by spacefreak:
Right, and his linked article didn't contain:

Relevant fact

I'm sure he also didn't mention the France-Nigeria investigation, in which the targeted figure mentioned for indictment is....Dick Cheney.

The investigation is of KBR, and the judge simply warned that cheney may be brought into it.

I brought it up because it was yet another bribery case involving halliburton, not because of cheney.

[dialo]

Originally posted by thunderous_funker:
So I don't buy the allegation that this is politically motivated against Cheney.

This has actually been substantiated by a french moderator at another forum who noted that the french judicial system has been very independent and is currently in the midst of prosecuting many corruption cases against business executives, similar to our own rash of enron scandals, and corrupt politicians.

[dialo]

Originally posted by thunderous_funker:
Again, it seems that Cheney's political status is an obstacle to justice rather than some sort of magnet for unjust persecution.

How true. And it even affects public perception of the cases. Would anyone really be so defensive about him and if he wasn't the vice president?

[Wiskedjak]

Originally posted by spacefreak:
Right, and his linked article didn't contain:

Are you suggesting that Dick Cheney didn't head Halliburton from 1995 until he became George Bush's running mate in 2000? Any discussion about the practices of any company is going to include recent CEOs.

[dialo]

Originally posted by Wiskedjak:
Are you suggesting that Dick Cheney didn't head Halliburton from 1995 until he became George Bush's running mate in 2000? Any discussion about the practices of any company is going to include recent CEOs.

And Cheney in particular is extraordinarily well-known because he is vice president and has a long history at the top of national politics. It would be seen as an unethical omission if his presence as the very active head of the company was not mentioned when discussing its activities at that time.

[kindbud]

Offers *SMACKDOWN* award to spacefreak




well done.

[theolein]

Originally posted by kindbud:
Offers *SMACKDOWN* award to spacefreak




well done.

Offers lessons in debating tactics to Kindbud.*




*Some things wear down with use. Posting the words "SMACKDOWN" every time one of your buddies post something is, contrary to your perception, NOT an indication that a point has been made. It's like a little child screaming "Nyah, Nyah, Nyah" while putting its hands over its ears to avoid listening to better arguments than it has.

Bakc OT: Why are there people who still believe that corporations operate in any ethical or moral way? Corporations are there to make money. Corporations don't give a rat's arse whether they make money with slave labour or with supposed enemies of the countries where they reside. They will only operate in a seemingly ethical and moral matter if it affects their bottom line and their ability to function.

Why should Halliburton be any different? Because Dick "Ann thinks I'm sexy" Cheney was a CEO there? What a joke.

[Developer]

Originally posted by theolein:
Why are there people who still believe that corporations operate in any ethical or moral way? Corporations are there to make money. Corporations don't give a rat's arse whether they make money with slave labour or with supposed enemies of the countries where they reside. They will only operate in a seemingly ethical and moral matter if it affects their bottom line and their ability to function.

That's true for stock corporations. Their purpose is to make money since that's what their owners - the shareholders - want. They buy a share just for that.

But it's not true for privately held companies.