"The Bush Administration's Teapot Dome"

Stan Collender says it's "hard to come to any conclusion other than that the spending of taxpayer funds in Iraq bordered on, or actually was, simple and straightforward corruption," and wonders if anyone will be prosecuted for their actions:

The Bush Administration's Teapot Dome, by Stan Collender: Discussions about the federal budget ... here at CG&G, typically focus on "formulation," that is, on the process and politics of putting the budget together and getting it enacted. That's the part we all generally agree is broken, not working properly, overly politicized, and...well...you get the picture.

But this story from Friday's Washington Post, which talks about $15 billion in spending on Iraq that can't be accounted for properly, or in some cases at all, shows that the other stage of federal budgeting -- implementation -- is similarly broken, not working properly, and...well...you certainly get this picture as well.

In fact, it appears as if virtually every procedure and law designed to prevent just this type of malfeasance was circumvented.

This spending was done in the midst of a national emergency and some of the usual safeguards couldn't be followed in the interest of national security and getting the job done quickly, right?

Nonsense. The Pentagon's own inspector general confirmed that this lack of concern for procedural safeguards was blatant and commonplace. That makes it hard to come to any conclusion other than that they were ignored rather than expedited or poorly executed.

It's also hard to come to any conclusion other than that the spending of taxpayer funds in Iraq bordered on, or actually was, simple and straightforward corruption.

Given the magnitude of the spending involved, Iraq may be the Bush administration's contribution to the biggest public corruption scandals of all time like Boss Tweed in New York, James Michael Curley in Boston, and Teapot Dome.

My question is whether any one, that is, any individual, will be prosecuted for their actions. ... [L]aws and spending rules were broken by individuals and there are three reasons why they should be criminally prosecuted.

First, we need to know whether they were ordered to ignore the laws and regulations. If they were ordered to break the law, we need to know who was pulling the strings. ...

Second, these individuals almost certainly broke a variety of laws. At least one of these, the Antideficiency Act, actually calls for civil penalties and jail time...

Third, not prosecuting the individuals and instead allowing this situation to be nothing more than a political scandal will encourage others to do this again, or keep doing it...

There would have been widespread outrage and anger if this were a domestic department or agency. The fact that this was the Pentagon and the spending was related to activities in Iraq doesn't make this more acceptable.

Update: Pete Davis follows-up.

Comments

[howard]

the bush administration does not believe in the rule of law, period. this is merely another manifestation.

[robertdfeinman]

White collar crime is so rarely prosecuted that when it happens it makes headlines (like a person getting hit by lightening).

There are several aspects of this.
1. Firms (and their managers) settle with enforcement agencies. They admit to no wrongdoing and the firm pays a penalty. In other words the hapless stockholders pay the fine.
2. The Justice Department engages in "selective" prosecution and just ignores filing charges against cronies.
3. Obvious influence peddling is ignored as people move from government to private industry and back again: the famous revolving door.
4. Laws on the books are ignored by regulatory agencies. A law demanding that potentially harmful chemicals be tested has been on the books for over a decade and not one chemical has yet to be tested.
5. Adverse information about environmental or health conditions is suppressed and staff within the relevant agencies is muzzled or forced out.
6. Steps to control the influence of money on politicians are bypassed or ignored. The FEC has been inoperative for months, for example.

I could continue, but the present situation isn't reminiscent of Tea Pot Dome, the US is more like the dying days of the USSR where the nomenklatura ran everything for their personal benefit and the overall economy collapsed. A society which can't protect its population against recognized threats and can't supply aid when needed when the unforeseen happens isn't functional.

The protective function has been failing for decades (the AIDS epidemic, for example) but this became glaringly apparent with Katrina.

The rule of law has been violated before in times of war such as with the Palmer Raids in the WWI period and the Japanese-American internment during WWII, but the violations now (wiretapping, torture, secret policing and databases, imprisonment without trial, etc) are a first for a period when there is no serious threat to the US. For anyone to equate disorganized of groups of violent actors throughout the world with the kind of threats posed during WWI and WWII and to use this as a justification for these violations of the rule of law is despicable and usually only found in authoritarian dictatorships.

Democracy is lost when people do nothing.

[ken melvin]

Yes, 'tis true; the bush administration does not believe in democracy. And, someone OK'd the $320 million, perhaps without fingerprints, but someone high up in the administration OK'd paying militia, etc.

[Bruce Wilder]

I've summarized the Bush Republican agenda many times as:
1.) torture;
2.) pointless and perpetual war;
3.) national bankruptcy;
4.) political and business corruption.

Opposed to this malign agenda, I've sometimes suggested, is a Democratic Party, which is, at least, ambivalent about this agenda.

I wish both parts of this stark summary were simply a joke. I'm afraid the truth is this country is awash in the banality of evil. The Teapot Dome scandal was a single conspiracy, breathtaking in its cynical audacity, as the oilman, Edward Doheny, bought the Secretary of the Interior, Albert Fall, a remarkably ruthless and greedy individual. But, it was a single scandal. The Bush Republicans, in their scope, are closer to our Fascist Party than progenitors of a mere scandal.

The Bush Administration is a vast flooded landscape of scandal, engaged in without much hint of embarrassment and more than a little arrogant bravado. A brief survey of the last 7 years, from any well-informed vantage, would allow one to spot a half-dozen scandals, any single one of which is more than an order of magnitude greater in moral import or monetary value than Teapot Dome.

And, in reaction against this flood is . . . a barely aroused, barely arousable, careless, ignorant and complacent elite. It isn't just some Democrats in Congress, including the leadership, who resist mightily a full recognition of what is, it is also a Media Elite of fops and fools, court jesters and professional demagogues, who, when they are not chasing white women missing in Aruba, simply refuse to see a pattern painted in shades of black, white and neon fuscia.

The punditocrisy that wanted George W. Bush as President in place of the "serial liar" and "inventor of the internet" Al Gore, and which cheerleaded for aggressive war against Iraq for no particular reason remains undisturbed in their positions of privileged opinion leadership. No seems to think that Tom Friedman, master of the meaningless mixed metaphor and moral pygmy, should not be on the New York Times Op-Ed page as the country's leading foreign affairs commentator. Instead, he is joined by the fact-challenged William Kristol. William Safire was a liar and a knave, but at least he could write; what the excuse is for these morons, I can scarcely fathom. Maureen Dowd and Gail Collins -- I cannot even formulate a suitable insult for these snarky fools.

It is not that our elites are not capable of acting on manufactured outrage. The University of Colorado showed little hesitation about investigating and disposing of the pissant Ward Churchill, when Churchill offended tender sensibilities with talk of roosting chickens. But, let someone suggest that the University of California might want to disemploy John C. Yoo, consigliere to the torture mob in the Administration, and the response is shrugged shoulders and incoherance.

The nation's banking system is staggering under the aftermath of a deregulatory policy that unleashed a vast wave of fraudulent and predatory lending, and academic economists want to puzzle over whether the Fed has a feasible policy role vis a vis "housing bubbles". The enormous bonuses paid to the architects of the present catastrophe are barely remarked upon.

Sense and sensibility, to avoid the charge of being "shrill", are bullied into an acknowledgement of "facts" and shibboleths, which are often repulsive and unworthy. In another thread, anne, reading Obama's recent speech on Latin America policy, larded with "tough" language about states and their elected leaders as if these democrats were little hitlers, even as it argued for diplomacy over war, and wrote: "What I really get though, is what we have become."

[hari]

Bruce - for a Memorial Day weekend - this is a sad commentary on American democracy indeed.

From our vantage point, although we've witnessed a lot of political shenegians over the decades, this type of repugnant decitful leadership has not been experienced for a long time, I suggest.

A SuperPower with hardly any legitimate competitor to worry about in the world is basically in the process of committing *hara kiri* - a la GWB!

says...

Was Stan asleep for the Katrina response? The corruption and incompetence in this domestic response was truly breathtaking, truly outraged the voters and directly tanked Bush popularity with voters and led to the GOP defeat in the 2006 Congressional elections. The continued incompetence of Bush and his GOP sycophants in Congress is motivating the electorate to vote the bums out.

A couple of choice quotes from Alan Wolfe about current conservative ideology:

"Contemporary conservatism is first and foremost about shrinking the size and reach of the federal government. This mission, let us be clear, is an ideological one. It does not emerge out of an attempt to solve real-world problems, such as managing increasing deficits or finding revenue to pay for entitlements built into the structure of federal legislation. It stems, rather, from the libertarian conviction, repeated endlessly by George W. Bush, that the money government collects in order to carry out its business properly belongs to the people themselves. ...

But like all politicians, conservatives, once in office, find themselves under constant pressure from constituents to use government to improve their lives. This puts conservatives in the awkward position of managing government agencies whose missions--indeed, whose very existence--they believe to be illegitimate. Contemporary conservatism is a walking contradiction. Unable to shrink government but unwilling to improve it, conservatives attempt to split the difference, expanding government for political gain, but always in ways that validate their disregard for the very thing they are expanding. The end result is not just bigger government, but more incompetent government."

[outsider.com]

Presidential directive 51

[Bruce Wilder]

NATIONAL SECURITY PRESIDENTIAL DIRECTIVE 51: "This directive and the information contained herein shall be protected from unauthorized disclosure, . . ."

[Bruce Wilder]

Alan Wolfe: "Contemporary conservatism is first and foremost about shrinking the size and reach of the federal government."

Smaller government is just a bullshit cover story for the rubes. Alan Wolfe is such a useless tool.

[Blissex]

«Bruce - for a Memorial Day weekend - this is a sad commentary on American democracy indeed.
From our vantage point, although we've witnessed a lot of political shenegians over the decades, this type of repugnant decitful leadership has not been experienced for a long time, I suggest.»

I'll bring out my usual evidence: hereditary peanut monopolies to fund segregationist politicians, and apex laws.

What most amazes me however of the current Conservative Movement is their moral zeal!

They believe that the constant stealing and thieving by the lazy, corrupt bottom 80% of the population, and even more so the exploitative parasitism of the bottom 40% is so evil that any chance to make restitution is meritorious.

All those billions of depraved taxation money have been returned to the moral forces of Republicanism by the heroes of the Bush administration.

Think of the Republican party as the the collective realization of Ragnar Danneskjöld and all is clear. They don't want the looters and moochers to win -- it is like letting the terrorists win.

[Bruce Wilder]

Erik Prince = Ragnar Danneskjöld

Ayn Rand would be proud. Really, she would.

[pgl]

I have to wonder how much of these missing funds got channeled into some secret Karl Rove fund designed to perpetuate the Congressional majorities so they could cram even more corruption down upon us.

[2slugbaits]

I'm not convinced about the validity of charges concerning Anti-Deficiency Act violations. I've sat in quite a few G8 end of year meetings and the comptrollers have all been pretty vigilant about making sure no one violates the Act. Perhaps Collender has in mind some of the unauthorized obligations that the troops incurred while actually in theater. This is possible, but I believe the Pentagon contends that those kinds of violations are exempted under the foraging act dating back to the Civil War.

A more serious charge could be leveled against GEN Tommy Franks who has already admitted to laundering several hundred million dollars (FY2002 dollars) in order to prepare for the Iraq War all the while that the Administration was denying they were planning for war. But it gets better, certain high officials also laundered $200 million in Defense Emergency Relief Fund (DERF) dollars that Congress allocated in the closing days of fiscal year 2001 (last few days of September...the last business day of the fiscal year was on a Friday, which led to some chicanery over the weekend). Some folks innocently asked people "close to the White House" if they honestly believed Abrams tanks, Bradley Fighting Vehicles and M109A6 155mm self-propelled howitzers would fit in Afghan caves. Nod, nod, wink, wink. The DERF dollars were specifically earmarked for Afghanistan, so any diversion to build up forces for the war in Iraq would have been illegal.

[Alex Tolley]

BW: "Opposed to this malign agenda, I've sometimes suggested, is a Democratic Party, which is, at least, ambivalent about this agenda."

And what exactly is the Democratic leadership doing about any of this? We've been hearing about unaccounted $US losses for years. One can try to say that Republicans controlled Congress until 18 months ago, preventing any investigation. But what is the excuse now?

[zinc]

Wow... Memorial Day 2008

WWII is long over. The veterans that lived and built the great society are passing and the fallen have long been dead. Was it so that a syncopant GW Bush could loot this great country of it's wealth and dignity ? I think not.

My father, still alive, was shot in the face in a French village during the advance of the 7th army from the beaches of Normandy. Awarded two silver stars, a bronze star, and a purple heart for valor, he rarely talks about his experience and even less about his part. He lived, raised 7 college graduate children on a Teamster truck driver wages. Unlikely that many Iraq veterans will be able to do the same.

John McCain is busy politicking about his "service" to our country. His cynical message is that the chicken hawk Bushes, Rove, Cheney, Rumsfeldt, Wolfowitz, Harvard, Princeton, and New York mobsters own the country and God bless our veterans, they serve their masters well.

I will cast my vote and pray that my fellow countrymen, and chicken shit democrats in congress, wake up in time.

[Bruce Wilder]

Alex Tolley: "One can try to say that Republicans controlled Congress until 18 months ago, preventing any investigation. But what is the excuse now?"

To a considerable extent, the Republicans still control Congress. The Democrats' nominal control of the Senate rests on the vote of independent Joe Lieberman of Connecticut, who campaigns regularly with McCain. Lieberman chairs one of the chief investigative committees -- the Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee -- and, of course, has investigated no more than did his good friend, Susan Collins, Republican Ranking member. The Republicans in the Senate have blocked almost all legislation with habitual and routine threats to "filibuster" everything.

With a bare and merely nominal majority in the Senate, the Administration is quite effective in peeling off crucial support. My own State's senior Senator, Diane Feinstein has often provided critical support for the Administration on controversial legislation and appointments, including the appointment of our current slug of an attorney general. The phenomenal success of her husband, Richard Blum, as an investor in companies winning Defense and Veterans Affairs contracts is purely coincidental.

In the House, the Democratic leadership enjoys a comfortable margin of seats, but the Democratic caucus is less disciplined than their Republican predecessors, and some part of the 45 member Blue Dog faction votes with the Republicans and the Administration on critical issues. The Republicans in the House are also engaged in procedural delay and obstruction. A portion of the Republican minority actually voted against the annual Mother's Day resolution, to eat up time, precious time.

And, of course, the Administration has used its control of the Executive branch to obstruct many investigations, defying supoenas and so on.

Beyond the Administration, the leading Media organizations, journalists and pundits, who brought us George W. Bush as a President one could have a beer with, and the Iraq War as a walkover, remain ensconced and unapolegetic. The nation's fourth estate remains a reliable propaganda echo of the Republican Wurlitzer, and politicians take notice. Major scandals come and go with scarcely any notice. (As a test, I like to ask people if they knew that at one point the three top officials of the CIA resigned in a corruption scandal. I've never actually encountered anyone off-line, who knew anything about it. Very few people are aware of the nature of the U.S. Attorneys scandal, and none would, if it were not for the work of on-line Talking Points Memo.) Petraeus and the Surge went forward, with the Pentagon using their pet "retired" military analysts to coordinate the dissemination of propaganda through the Media, unimpeded.

I don't think the Democrats have done particularly well, though I acknowledge that they have had a weak hand, politically, with only a nominal majority in the Senate, and a hostile, incompetent Media.

I suspect that too many Democratic politicians have remained complacent. But, I also suspect that some have been afraid to provoke a constitutional crisis, preferring the lower risk course of running out the clock on this Administration. I cannot say that they have been wrong to fear the consequences of a failed impeachment effort or the precedent of open Presidential defiance of Congress reaching a conclusion favorable to the President. The Democrats cannot count on either the Courts or the Media, in such a confrontation, and may well reason that discretion is the better part of valor, with the prospect of securing larger Congressional majorities and a President, ahead.

Even so, the Democrats have accomplished some things, and given important cover for executive branch investigations to go forward.

[outsider.com]

An observation. When asked if she would curtail the executive powers W. assumed, Hillary Clinton said she would "consider it". As Ayn Rand also said, "poison as food, poison as antidote."

[Organic George]

You ain't seen nothin yet.

Bush will pardon everyone that worked in his administration before he leaves office. There will be no justice for these crimes.

Bush will enact a scorched earth policy of directives and administrative rulings that will keep the dems in knots for years after he leaves office. Environmental policies like the recent ruling to allow coal powdered plants near national parks or the SC rulings that minorities must have identity cards to vote will roll out of this administration like a failed levee

The Bushies are just mob thugs and why the media and Dems keep expecting anything honorable from this mob is beyond me.

[baileyman]

Sometimes it's corruption as described. But more often it's all legal and above board, entire programs created to transfer public money to business. The second is much worse than the first.

[me]

What EVERYONE said.

I would only add that I am reading Torture Team by Sands. Thee people that approved torture are proud, arrogant and stunned that they are not perceived as heroes. That they are ostracized troubles them and they are miserable. Amazing.

But with the dems doing nothing and the people doing nothing, robertdfeinman is correct about democracy lost.

To read colburn and the rest now about getting back to basics, the typical republican slogans, they fail to realize they had their chance at governing and it was a colossal failure. Their planned permanent republican majority is in tatters. Their preachers are shocked that their sermons are on youtube and the country shuns them for the wackos they are.

I live in one of the most republican districts in Georgia and in the grocery store I commenter about the prices and a stranger behind said remember in November. Very unusual for here.

[reason]

Robert D. Feinman
White collar crime is so rarely prosecuted that when it happens it makes headlines (like a person getting hit by (sic) lightening).

Robert,
in my experience neither makes the news, but I suspect whilte collar prosecutions are MUCH less frequent than lightning strikes.

[Craig Hubley]

"What most amazes me however of the current Conservative Movement is their moral zeal!

They believe that the constant stealing and thieving by the lazy, corrupt bottom 80% of the population, and even more so the exploitative parasitism of the bottom 40% is so evil that any chance to make restitution is meritorious.

All those billions of depraved taxation money have been returned to the moral forces of Republicanism by the heroes of the Bush administration."

Yes. What's remarkable about those who emulate Ayn Rand's heroes in theory is how much they resemble her villains in practice. I think about the Bush Administration sitting in its Cabinet room and I can only think of Wesley Mouch and company sneering at everyone wiser or with more integrity or talent than them.

Watching the criminality of the Bush League, it's quite hard not to take Karl Marx's equating of capitalism with cronyism and crime much more seriously. Nothing that has happened in the last eight years would surprise hard core Marxists at all - the lying, the stealing, the cronyism, the contradicting doctrines, the exceptionalism, and so on. None of it.

What we might have seen is the eradication of capitalism as a viable economic philosophy. Certainly the only breed of it with any credibility now is the "full cost accounting" of the "green economics" and "ecological services" gurus. They are more like classical economists with a more fundamental and deeper look at the things that nature does for us humans.

Neoclassical and neo-con seem to just be forms of fraud now. I wonder when they will control less than half of the IMF Special Drawing Rights? When other economic views will be more represented there or at the World Bank? The stakes are very large, much larger than $15B. We're talking tens of trillions if this is a fundamental shift of value measures.