Very interesting facts....I'm surprised the "local" moderators who seem to follow a strict party line haven't removed some posts yet.
There are plenty of sources out there for people to educate themselves about all the "goings on" with our leaders at the moment. Unfortunately they seem to be content with swallowing all the BS their party feeds them and letting the party leaders and fanatical party idiots like Rush L, and O'leary do their thinking for them. What a shame it is to choose to remain ignorant.
By the way, did anyone catch the news about Richard Perle "offering" to resign as chairman of the a Pentagon advisory panel?
>>>>"GLOBAL CROSSING PLAN
He agreed to help Global Crossing, a bankrupt operator of an international fiber-optic network, win U.S. approval to sell a 61.5 percent stake to Hutchison Whampoa Ltd. and Singapore Technologies Telemedia Pte.
Perle said earlier he would be paid $125,000 for his advice and another $600,000 if the government approved the deal.
The deal ran into problems with the Committee on Foreign Investment in the United States, which counts Rumsfeld and other top national security advisers as members.
The committee can block mergers and acquisitions it feels could harm U.S. interests, and it raised concerns that Global Crossing's network would be controlled by a company with strong ties to China. Hutchison is majority owned by Hong Kong's richest man, Li Ka-shing. "<<<<<
All this talk about Vice-President Dick "Dick" Cheney's war profiteering is absurd. Mr. Cheney has been dead for quite some time now. He expired early in the Bush presidency and was replaced by a highly-functional - but not perfect - mechanized model. Has nobody noticed the lack of facial and vocal expression and lack of human emotion, sympathy, and decency? Am I the only one?
Right now I'm seeing repeated reports that Cheney is still being paid by Halliburton $1m a year in uncollected fees that he will get when he leaves office. When I track down the source I will post it.
I was being sarcastic. Enrichment of oil buddies must not be too huge a motivating factor if they'll drop the contracts over a few people screaming about it.
Seems like that's a question that those wanting to say this is an oil deal should answer. The burden of proof is on the accuser.
No, you made a claim. I'm asking you to support it. I doubt you can, but that doesn't mean it's someone else's job to support the refutation of your claim.
No, you made a claim. I'm asking you to support it. I doubt you can, but that doesn't mean it's someone else's job to support the refutation of your claim.
You made the claim. Support it or don't make it.
The inherent accusation of this thread is that there's a connection between the war and Cheney and Halliburton. Look at the friggin' topic.
And if you want backup for my claim that the Cheney/Halliburton/war connection is mostly crap if not completely crap then look at how Halliburton was just put out of the running for a $600 million contract.
There is a logical chain in a conspiracy, a sequence of events that must happen. I'll lay out the Cheney/Halliburton/war conspiracy for you in simple, easy-for-bunge-to-understand terms:
1) Halliburton likes to make money (preferrably while killing babies
2) Cheney was a Halliburton bigwig who retains ties to Halliburton
3) War in Iraq would mean ousting Hussein, which would mean that the big rebuilding contract would be open
4) Using Cheney's position as VeeP, Halliburton would get the big contract and satisfy #1
Now #4 is ruled out and the logical train breaks down. Why would Cheney push for war with the motive of making Halliburton some coin off rebuilding only to see Halliburton be pushed off the gravy train?
Is this the only contract? Of course not, but it's the one being discussed. We can't just assume that other billion-dollar contracts are out there. Do some research.
If you want to assert that this war is about republicans wanting to enrich their oil buddies MAKE THE CASE.
Challenging an accusation is not making an accusation, so by the very structure of this whole thing the burden of proof isn't on me. I'd like to see you get arrested only to have the judge say, "Well prove you aren't guilty."
Now, if I were to say you are trying to make the case because you are not intelligent I would then be making an accusation that I would have to back up.
1) Halliburton likes to make money (preferrably while killing babies
Holy Shit! Groverat just defended Halliburton! The only way to justify this while assuming you have an IQ above 30 is to realize that you don't care about the US, its laws or its people. You are defending a company with many illegal operations and whose main profits come from stealing tax money from americans through dramatically overcharging. Talk about anti-american; you actually support companies that take advantage of taxpayers and break laws. Classic. Your true colors are shining through. I hope that you are just not bright enough to ever know what you are talking about, but I'll give you the benefit of the doubt and assume you just don't give a shit about americans and the laws we live by.
Quote:
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)
Comments
There are plenty of sources out there for people to educate themselves about all the "goings on" with our leaders at the moment. Unfortunately they seem to be content with swallowing all the BS their party feeds them and letting the party leaders and fanatical party idiots like Rush L, and O'leary do their thinking for them. What a shame it is to choose to remain ignorant.
By the way, did anyone catch the news about Richard Perle "offering" to resign as chairman of the a Pentagon advisory panel?
>>>>"GLOBAL CROSSING PLAN
He agreed to help Global Crossing, a bankrupt operator of an international fiber-optic network, win U.S. approval to sell a 61.5 percent stake to Hutchison Whampoa Ltd. and Singapore Technologies Telemedia Pte.
Perle said earlier he would be paid $125,000 for his advice and another $600,000 if the government approved the deal.
The deal ran into problems with the Committee on Foreign Investment in the United States, which counts Rumsfeld and other top national security advisers as members.
The committee can block mergers and acquisitions it feels could harm U.S. interests, and it raised concerns that Global Crossing's network would be controlled by a company with strong ties to China. Hutchison is majority owned by Hong Kong's richest man, Li Ka-shing. "<<<<<
http://story.news.yahoo.com/news?tmp...q_usa_perle_dc
http://www.msnbc.com/news/892259.asp?0na=x23455K4-
Originally posted by NoahJ
Halliburton is out.
http://www.msnbc.com/news/892259.asp?0na=x23455K4-
So we'll filely see a brand "new" company, maybe headquartered in the Camen Islands, get the contract
There are some significant findings here.
The absolute adminsitration-oil link is all but established.
After taking some political heat, Halliburton is stepping out of the kitchen
from "MS"(BLAH!)NBC.
Tt sounds as if there was controversy here. They didn't just get dropped or drop-out for non-political reasons.
Perhaps their motives aren't so sinister...
If it was obvious and would get them into trouble they'd likely hide it or shut the contract down as far as oil goes.
But its not that they're "sinister"...That characterisation is too simple, its more complicated than that.
There could easily be forces in government pushing for oil and some of this, at least indirectly, gets into policy.
Groverat, how many contracts are there going to be? And at what amounts?
Seems like that's a question that those wanting to say this is an oil deal should answer. The burden of proof is on the accuser.
maybe Scott Ritter has the answer?
Originally posted by groverat
Seems like that's a question that those wanting to say this is an oil deal should answer. The burden of proof is on the accuser.
No, you made a claim. I'm asking you to support it. I doubt you can, but that doesn't mean it's someone else's job to support the refutation of your claim.
You made the claim. Support it or don't make it.
Originally posted by alcimedes
maybe Scott Ritter has the answer?
No, the 14 year old girl had it. Ritter was just meeting up with her to compare notes...honest!
That was a late night attempt at humor for scott who always seems to enjoy poking fun of Ritter.
Originally posted by bunge
No, you made a claim. I'm asking you to support it. I doubt you can, but that doesn't mean it's someone else's job to support the refutation of your claim.
You made the claim. Support it or don't make it.
The inherent accusation of this thread is that there's a connection between the war and Cheney and Halliburton. Look at the friggin' topic.
And if you want backup for my claim that the Cheney/Halliburton/war connection is mostly crap if not completely crap then look at how Halliburton was just put out of the running for a $600 million contract.
There is a logical chain in a conspiracy, a sequence of events that must happen. I'll lay out the Cheney/Halliburton/war conspiracy for you in simple, easy-for-bunge-to-understand terms:
1) Halliburton likes to make money (preferrably while killing babies
2) Cheney was a Halliburton bigwig who retains ties to Halliburton
3) War in Iraq would mean ousting Hussein, which would mean that the big rebuilding contract would be open
4) Using Cheney's position as VeeP, Halliburton would get the big contract and satisfy #1
Now #4 is ruled out and the logical train breaks down. Why would Cheney push for war with the motive of making Halliburton some coin off rebuilding only to see Halliburton be pushed off the gravy train?
Is this the only contract? Of course not, but it's the one being discussed. We can't just assume that other billion-dollar contracts are out there. Do some research.
If you want to assert that this war is about republicans wanting to enrich their oil buddies MAKE THE CASE.
Challenging an accusation is not making an accusation, so by the very structure of this whole thing the burden of proof isn't on me. I'd like to see you get arrested only to have the judge say, "Well prove you aren't guilty."
Now, if I were to say you are trying to make the case because you are not intelligent I would then be making an accusation that I would have to back up.
See how logic works? It's not too difficult.
Originally posted by groverat
...they'll drop the contracts over a few people screaming about it.
Prove it.
Originally posted by groverat
1) Halliburton likes to make money (preferrably while killing babies
Holy Shit! Groverat just defended Halliburton! The only way to justify this while assuming you have an IQ above 30 is to realize that you don't care about the US, its laws or its people. You are defending a company with many illegal operations and whose main profits come from stealing tax money from americans through dramatically overcharging. Talk about anti-american; you actually support companies that take advantage of taxpayers and break laws. Classic. Your true colors are shining through. I hope that you are just not bright enough to ever know what you are talking about, but I'll give you the benefit of the doubt and assume you just don't give a shit about americans and the laws we live by.
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)
Originally posted by giant
Classic. Your true colors are shining through.
Was there ever any doubt?
Originally posted by giant
Holy Shit! Groverat just defended Halliburton!
Did I "defend" them or explain their motivation? Does Halliburton not like to make money?
You guys are getting shrill and desperate. Perhaps you should take a break from the internet.
"Adolf Hitler was a human being who ate food, drank water and inhaled oxygen to survive."
"OH MY GOD YOU HATE JEWS AND WANT A SECOND HOLOCAUST!"
Originally posted by groverat
You guys are getting shrill and desperate. Perhaps you should take a break from the internet.
King of the 'disguised' personal attacks gets edgy...perhaps it's you who should take a break?
Humor: 1. The quality that makes something laughable or amusing; funniness: could not see the humor of the situation.
2. That which is intended to induce laughter or amusement: a writer skilled at crafting humor.
3. The ability to perceive, enjoy, or express what is amusing, comical, incongruous, or absurd. See Synonyms at wit1.