Another Private Contractor Story
Posted: 29 September 2010 Filed under: Military, News, War | Tags: Afghanistan, Contracts, Defense Contracts, Iraq, US Troops 9 Comments »From the VOMITORIUM
These types of stories…horror stories….about the private contractors that the US uses thanks in part to the privatization of certain fields during the Reagan days….just keeps giving us nightmares…….
The most memorable one in my mind is that of KBR in Iraq…a subsidy of Halliburton…..was responsible for the electrocution deaths of several American soldiers while taking a shower….and then there are the killings and fraud and out right theft that is part of the Blackwater (sorry, that is Xe, now) saga…yet another private contractor that is screwing the American people as hard as they can…..
Newser is reporting on another contractor fraud, this time in Afghanistan….
The contractor that supplies the military with Afghan translators is putting American lives at risk by sending out unqualified translators, a former employee charges. Paul Funk—who used to oversee the screening of Afghan linguists for Mission Essential Personnel—tells ABC News that the company inflated grades and tolerated cheating on exams to hit staffing targets. He says some 28% of translators sent out by the company between November 2007 and June 2008 failed to meet the required standard of proficiency. Funk, who has filed a whistleblower lawsuit, says he complained to the company about “corrupt” practices, including candidates who had stand-ins take over-the-phone exams in order to secure jobs that pay upwards of $200,000. Military personnel and embedded journalists say they have witnessed unacceptably poor translators working in Afghanistan. The company rejects Funk’s accusations and says it will answer them in court. The US military has confirmed that the company, which holds contracts worth up to $1.4 billion, is under investigation.
This is a constant thing….my guess it is only the tip of an iceberg that NO one in Washington wishes to confront…….
Privatization has not saved the US much money nor has it been more efficient nor has it made the country safer…..what it has done is allow the private contractors to steal billions….and yet the Repubs still embrace privatization….leads me to ask whose payroll are they really on? I mean guards at embassies use to be Marines and they made about $45,000 a year and then they were replaced with “security consultants” making $1000 a day…now you tell me where that saves the country any cash….
This is old news. The lawsuit against MEP was dismissed by a federal judge. ABC screwed the proverbial pooch on this one:
http://abcnews.go.com/Blotter/lost-translation-lawsuit-mep-dismissed-whistleblower-paul-allowed/story?id=11713555
Gee thanx…I must have missed it…..and who screwed the pooch in the electrocution suits……it is just one of many that the privatization has given us……explain how the government saves any money by this?
I understand what you’re saying, but (for instance) we’ve seen that the overloading of anything with bureaucracy – including the CIA – simply destroys its effectiveness. Governments do that when they run things.
The truth is that if you forget all the crap legislation that does nothing more than keep legislators employed and spend the money on employing really ABLE people to manage (oversee and monitor, not micromanage) these things in house, but using outside contractors, you WILL get a better result, but not if it’s run by the same inept jerks it would have been run by if it was done all “in house”. However good you may think they are, they are simply NOT up to the standard required and that’s why corporations just run rings around them – it’s because they can!
On top of that, the penalties for failing to live up to the obligations of a government contract should be absolutely FEARSOME!
I think we have already talked about the electronic fence on the border built by Boeing that did not work and they government paid them again to fix the problem…..so I agree penalties should be FEARSOME!
I do not understand why our Reps do not call for some sort of upgrade in the private companies…they are wasting money but I guess if these companies pay you under the table it is not in the cards that they be held accountable……
Exactly… so it all comes back to the corruption and ineptitude of government… nothing new there then, eh?
I like the term “impotent” to describe government…..but yes it is…..
Oh, I don’t think impotent is all that appropriate – the people get f*cked by the politicians all the time, don’t they?
Good point…I may have to re-think that statement…..