- There's going to be so much money flowing that Joe Allbaugh
might even be convinced to bring his influence-peddling operation stateside
again. In fact, if you were ever planning to become a Republican or give
money to Republicans, by all means, do it now. Because all of the GOP patronage
and pay-for-play operation that we've seen up till this point was probably
just a prelude to what's coming.
-
- Just set together a few pieces of the puzzle.
-
- FEMA Director Michael Brown got his job as a political
patronage position, with no relevant experience and the last item on his
resume getting fired from a job as a manager of horse shows. Last year
he was caught giving out FEMA money as political pork with an eye to the
2004 elections. But that shouldn't surprise since people who get hired
as part of patronage operations do their jobs as part of the patronage
operation. That's the idea.
-
- Now, look at this article from Tuesday's Times about
the boom town atmosphere in Houston as people and business from New Orleans
flood into the city ...
-
- Oil services companies based here are racing to carry
out repairs to damaged offshore platforms in the Gulf of Mexico; the promise
of plenty of work to do sent shares in two large companies, Halliburton
and Baker Hughes, soaring to 52-week highs last week. The Port of Houston
is preparing for an increase in traffic as shippers divert cargoes away
from the damaged ports of Pascagoula, Miss., and New Orleans.
- Some of this is just the grim irony of politics and geography.
Houston is a nearby port town deep into the oil business. It's also the
capital of Bushland.
-
- But see where we're going here. We have a thoroughly
politicized FEMA, encased within an administration that ran the Iraqi reconstruction
in such a way that they managed to give graft and cronyism a bad name.
$10.5 billion is just a small down payment on the money that's going to
go into draining and rebuilding New Orleans, constructing a much more durable
and comprehensive system of pumps and levees around the city, patching
up the coastlines of Mississippi and Alabama. And did we mention the important
Senate race next year in Florida? And then there's the Port of New Orleans.
And the oil facilities in the Gulf.
-
- Of course, if you want to get down into the minutiae,
remember it was Joe Allbaugh who got his college buddy Michael Brown the
patronage job at FEMA; when Allbaugh got into the Iraqi contracts racket
he handed FEMA over to Brown. And the guy that helped Allbaugh set up his
new influence-peddling shop out of a wing of his DC office? Right, Haley
Barbour, who's now Governor of Mississippi.
-
- Like I said, I bet we see Allbaugh pretty soon deciding
that his services are required closer to home.
-
- The White House is already laying the groundwork for
centralizing all authority over contracting within the executive branch,
which for all intents and purposes means the White House. No oversight.
No transparency. Halliburton ready at the trough.
-
- Like a friend of mine said earlier this evening, it really
is going to be the biggest slush fund of all time.
-
-
- http://www.talkingpointsmemo.com/archives/week_2005_09_04.php#006422
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