But Wait: There's More!

by hilzoy

In the crush of scandal-related news, there's one story I didn't want to overlook. Via TPM, the LATimes reports:

"Wilkes and his associates made their largest federal campaign donations to House Appropriations Committee member Rep. John T. Doolittle, a Republican from Sacramento, who received $82,000. Cunningham received $76,500, and $60,000 went to Appropriations Committee Chairman Rep. Jerry Lewis (R-Redlands). (...)

The Pentagon was slow to pay Wilkes because Army officials in the field preferred Audre's rival system, according to an inspector general's report. So in July 1999, co-conspirator No. 1 faxed Cunningham "talking points" on how to bully a Pentagon manager into releasing more government funds. These documents were included in Cunningham's sentencing hearing.

The memo instructed the lawmaker to demand that the Defense Department official shift money from another program to cover funds designated for ADCS. "We need $10 m[illion] more immediately," Cunningham was to tell the official.

If the official didn't cooperate, Cunningham was to say his next calls would be to two high-ranking Pentagon officials. The script called for Cunningham to add: "This is very important and if you cannot resolve this others will be calling also" — two names in this passage are blacked out in the memo. Despite Cunningham's threats, the Pentagon manager was unmoved, according to grand jury testimony.

A week later, Cunningham and Lewis called a Washington news conference to announce that they had slashed $2 billion in funding for the F-22 Raptor fighter jet, one of the Pentagon's prized programs, citing cost overruns. Both congressmen had been key supporters of the project, and their comments shocked Pentagon officials."

So: Brent Wilkes, otherwise known as "co-conspirator No. 1" in the Duke Cunningham indictment, needs more money. In order to get it, he begins by giving Cunningham explicit instructions, in writing, on how to deal with the Pentagon. When that doesn't work, Cunningham and Lewis, the head of the House Appropriations Committee, threaten to slash funding for fighter jets.

I am delighted to note that federal prosecutors have opened an investigation into Lewis' dealings with lobbyists.

I want to note a few points about this.

First: the House Appropriations Committee chairman is one of the most powerful members of the House, since he controls the Appropriations Committee, and it in turn controls everyone's money. His involvement is a very, very big deal.

Second: note that Lewis and Cunningham seem to have been willing to threaten a major defense program as part of a shakedown. The next time you hear someone complain that we can't trust the Democrats with our nation's security, think of this, and remind yourself that at least they don't sell out the national defense for cash. To be clear: i don't know anything about the F-22. For all I know, it might deserve to be cut. If it does, this is surely not the way to do it. And if it doesn't -- if it's a genuinely worthwhile plane -- imagine the pilots who might die in combat for the lack of it, and ask yourself how exactly you'd explain to their parents that their sons and daughters didn't have the equipment that would have kept them safe because our Congressional representatives were more concerned with their bribes than with the safety of our troops or our ability to defend our country.

Third: the House majority leader has been taking bribes. Duke Cunningham has pled guilty, Bob Ney seems to be about to be indicted, and now Lewis is under investigation. There are also rumors about others, like John Doolittle. I am not a lawyer, but it looks to me as though these people are basically running a criminal enterprise out of the Congress, financed with our money. Ask yourself: is it conceivable that the rest of the House Republicans didn't know anything about any of this? Not to me.

When there's corruption in an organization you're a part of, the obvious thing to do is to eliminate it. What makes this the obvious thing to do is not just that it's right, but that it's much, much better to police your own than to be policed by others, and much better to antagonize the odd corrupt official than to have your entire party or organization go through a major public scandal. And this is not rocket science: it's obvious.

Not obvious enough, however, for those modern Solons who are the House Republicans. From which I conclude two things. First, they do not care enough about our country. If they had, they would have done something to prevent their colleagues from looting it. And second, they did not think that they would ever be caught.

It is very, very important that this latter assumption be proved false: that we be able, in the future, to count not just on the patriotism and responsibility of our representatives, but on their fear of doing jail time, in order to keep our government from being transformed from an instrument of the public good into an instrument for the enrichment of Brent Wilkes and people like him. There's a huge financial incentive to siphon off government funds: the money Brent Wilkes seems to have paid Duke Cunningham is a pittance compared to the money the government paid him. That would, of course, be our money. As long as the people who do this can act with impunity, they probably will. That's why they need to do serious time.

They should also pay a price at the polls. If anything like this had happened when Democrats were in office, I would have voted Republican, even though I disagree with most Republican positions on policy. There are some things that are more important than policy, and making sure that our Representatives not think that they can get away with looting the country is one of them. They can do this only because they are in power. I personally long for the day when two uncorrupt political parties can face off, leaving voters with a choice between two sets of decent, responsible candidates with very different views.

But we are not there now. Now, the Republican party has been taken over by criminals. (And criminals with no particular respect for our freedom or our Constitution, which only makes it worse.)

Throw the bums out.

Comments

[Nell]

My disgust with these corrupt clowns is so deep that at this point it's beyond anger. I just want a big, fat, healing laugh at their expense. I got one today at the via our local Republican paper, whose online poll asks:

Why are Democrats gaining in national polls?
- People are getting sick and tired of Bush
- Democrats just have more momentum, better ideas
- Republicans appear to be involved in scandals
- Democrats have done a good job of criticizing the GOP
- Republicans seem surrounded by bad news
- Other (Please specify in the comment box)

First chuckle: you have to choose just one answer. Outright wheeze: "Republicans appear to be involved in scandals ... seem to be surrounded by bad news."

Spider holes of denial, baby.

[Nell]

the money Brent Wilkes seems to have paid Duke Cunningham is a pittance compared to the money the government paid him. That would, of course, be our money.

And what do you think Brent Wilkes and his cronies with their fake firms did with that money? Do you think any serious proportion of it went to provide any services at all?

No way... it's all a giant shell game. That money was siphoned right off again (minus luxurious perks for the principals) to Republican campaigns or one of their right-wing slush fund organizations.

[Slartibartfast]

The last thing defense appropriations needs is crap of this sort. The process is screwed enough as it is, and the question of whether this system or that is the right way to go is clear only rarely. Yet we still wind up having a major scandal at least once every decade. So, here's the thing: we already have quite a bit of oversight, yet the oversight is failing to catch things of this nature. Is more oversight needed, or oversight of a different nature?

Me, I have no idea, but I'm leaning toward the latter. Still, no idea what it would look like. I've lived in the world of defense contracting (granted, I'm just an ingunir) for 25 years or so, and cheating by contractors on contractors is now much harder, but cheating by contractors in collusion with congressmen and lobbyists to obtain contracts seems to be pretty wide open. Ideas?

[IntricateHelix]

Just make it all stop.

[javelina]

Okay, Hil, you are now officially the Energizer Bunny (TM) of bloggers. Specifically, of political bloggers who keep digging up things that scare the heck out of me. Or, as in this case, peeve the heck out of me.

I'm exhausted now. Maybe they're showing The Manchurian Candidate or something equally cheerful on the hotel television ...

[Steve]

Senator Obama had a great proposal for an independent ethics commission. You can read more about it here.

The gist is that this commission would be comprised of former judges and Congressmen, and would handle the initial investigation of complaints. The process is confidential, so there would be no gain from filing frivolous complaints, and in fact there would be substantial fines for doing so.

If the commission finds merit in the complaint, it can make a public report to the House/Senate Ethics Committees as well as the Department of Justice. There's no requirement for anyone to take action, but if they don't, the report is right out there in public so pressure can be applied.

I think it's a good, common-sense solution to the problem of no one in these bodies wanting to rock the boat. I hope it ultimately goes somewhere.

[Pooh]

At a certain point, what does one say?

[hilzoy]

Pooh: One of my biggest challenges as a blogger. It reminds me of the time I used to write travel guides for a living. Just try to imagine how to find fresh, new, interesting ways to say: yet another basically decent but unremarkable hotel. After about the 200th such hotel, it's a real challenge.

Then, of course, it was possible to say: yet another basically decent but unremarkable hotel. I don't ever want to the point where I write: ho hum, another torture story/violation of the Constitution/amazing scandal.

[Pooh]

And tommorow, the same people will be making the same lame "nothing to see here" claims...I can only guess the number of "easy for Hilzoy to say when it's her ox being gored" complaints...

[hilzoy]

Pooh: just one of the many moments when I regret not having been blogging for long enough that people could see me respond to Democratic malfeasance. It wasn't all that different, modulo the difference in the seriousness of the charges.

[hilzoy]

Not, I hasten to add, that I think that many people would have cared. It would just be nice to be able to point to stuff.

[KCinDC]

Yes, of course, nothing to see. This sort of thing has been going on forever, and we've always known it was happening. Anyone with half a brain knew the NSA was doing this. In fact, it's practically the definition of what they're supposed to be doing. No one would expect them not to be doing it.

Oh, and USA Today and the other media outlets reporting the story are traitors. Those so-called journalists should be hanged for endangering the country by revealing important secrets to our enemies -- things our enemies had no way of knowing and could never have guessed.

[Frank]

Hilzoy- Perfect. You nailed it like Digby!

[Nell]

Hilzoy, this is different. Slarti, read my second comment. Mark my words: when it all comes out, it will be shown that this is no ordinary defense-contractor corruption. These clowns are providing exactly nothing in the way of actual services. The money is being recirculated back into the right's slush fund network. It's a parasitical political operation that uses tax money for partisan consolidation.

[Slartibartfast]

Slarti, read my second comment. Mark my words: when it all comes out, it will be shown that this is no ordinary defense-contractor corruption. These clowns are providing exactly nothing in the way of actual services.

I agree; I think this is both much worse and much harder to stomp out. It's possible that this sort of thing has always been going on, and that the recent collars are evidence that oversight is working, but someone would have to show me.

[Nell]

In further support of my suspicions, this reader email to Laura Rozen:

I had a business connection with him in San Diego about two years ago and came away thinking that sooner or later I'd be reading about him on the front page, and not in a good way. I've toured the ADCS facility in Poway. It's like a corporate Taj Mahal, everything is super high-end. Lavish flower arrangements in the lobby, toilet paper in the bathrooms folded like a hotel room, marble everywhere. Weird thing is NO ONE seems to actually work there! Brent showed us his production floor and it was completely empty. Tons of huge, elaborate, obviously incredibly expensive equipment and no one using it. (Can you say "your tax dollars at work"?) ... Check out all his "businesses". The special events one is especially interesting. He'd throw a party in an elaborate, high-tech room at ADCS and give the catering business to his special events firm rather than paying for it directly. I'm not sure how this worked but it seemed very fishy at the time and seemed like he could make the company look successful this way.

[John Thullen]

Were the expensive machines on the production floor designed to NOT make armored clothing for our people in Iraq?

If not, what were they designed to NOT make.

Here's what we do. Rather than sending National Guard troops recently home from Iraq to the Mexican border to keep an eye out for people who enter the country to actually make cheap stuff, let's send a platoon or two, unsupervised, to the ADCS facility. They can consider the layout and the lovely toilet paper and the flowers and, well, we'll see what happens.

Is Lieutenant Calley still in the reserves? Unless anger-management has sucked the life out of him, maybe he would be make a good platoon leader for this mission.

[rilkefan]

What's really expensive is to make machines that can be used for multiple purposes. So these were probably designed to NOT make _anything_.