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Jim Hightower
Wednesday, August 11, 2004 "THE PENTAGON'S REVOLVING DOOR" Time for another Gooberhead Award – presented periodically to those in the news who have their tongues going 100 miles per hour... but who forgot to put their brains in gear.
Today, I've got a whole nest of Goobers for you – all of whom are nesting in the fraud-ridden Pentagon... except when they fly that coop to feather their nests with top jobs at Lockheed, Boeing, Halliburton, and other corporations that pocket billions in bloated Pentagon contracts. The scam of such Goobers is to work awhile at the Pentagon, gain insider knowledge and contacts, then peddle their insider connections to corporations wanting more fat contracts from us taxpayers.
Take Pete Aldridge, who has made a career of spinning in and out of the revolving door between the Pentagon and military contractors. He was secretary of the air force, then he left to become president of air force contractor McDonnell Douglas. Then George W. brought him back inside to be in charge of all Pentagon purchases. Last year, he left again, this time to become a highly-paid board member at Lockheed – but just before leaving, he personally approved a $3 billion contract for 20 jet-fighters to be made by – you guessed it – Lockheed.
Even while Pete's on Lockheed's payroll, Bush named him chairman of a space exploration commission. Pete's commission recently called for privatizing NASA. Guess what corporation stands to gain the most from such a move? Bingo, if you said Lockheed!
About his glaring conflicts of interest, Pete simply declares that he's in compliance with current ethics laws. But, of course, these laws are shams, written by lobbyists for Goobers like Pete. "Legal" isn't the same as moral.
To learn more about all the Petes now nesting in top jobs with military contractors, call the Project on Government Oversight: 202-347-1122.
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<>Dennis Wingo response:
1. Lockheed is the ONLY contractor building the fighters that you posted about. This purchase has been planned for years after Lockheed won the JSF contract a few years ago. It was a fair competition between them and Boeing.
2. The Aldridge commission did NOT call for privatizing NASA. You wanna debate me on this as I live a few miles from a NASA center and work with them all the time? What was talked about was making some of the NASA centers an FFRDC (Federally funded Research and Development Center). This is what NASA Jet Propulsion Laboratory already is today, run by Caltech. From what I am seeing locally the only viable contender is the University of Alabama in Huntsville, my old school and employer. NO ONE is talking about contractors taking over any portion of a NASA center.
3. I am seeing individuals moving from NASA or DoD into private enterprise. To be honest I don't particularly like this but the system generally corrects its errors as most of Boeing's top management, including the CEO, CFO, and several others being fired for trying to rig an aircraft procurement for Boeing. This was done by a Republican administration.
Also, the rule mandating a cooling off period of two years between leaving the government and going to private industry was killed by BILL CLINTON in his final couple of days in office.
Learn to differentiate between propaganda and reality.
<>(the rest of the debate is here: http://leovilletownsquare.com/ubbthreads/showflat.php?Cat=0&Board=Debate&Number=641586&Searchpage=1&Main=640668&Words=+Thomas&topic=&Search=true#Post641586 <http://leovilletownsquare.com/ubbthreads/showflat.php?Cat=0&Board=Debate&Number=641586&Searchpage=1&Main=640668&Words=+Thomas&topic=&Search=true#Post641586> sorry Doug for linking to another debate site, but I really hate this smug bastard!) <>Any help would be welcomed.
(1) http://leovilletownsquare.com/ubbthreads/showprofile.php?Cat=0&User=5916&Number=641593&Board=Debate&what=showflat&page=&fpart=1&vc=1 <http://leovilletownsquare.com/ubbthreads/showprofile.php?Cat=0&User=5916&Number=641593&Board=Debate&what=showflat&page=&fpart=1&vc=1>
(2) http://skycorpinc.com/credit.htm