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February 12th, 2008

Let the Sunshine on Government Contracts

It is dull but so very important.

It is sub-visible but in your pocket and on your back.

I speak of the hundreds of billions each year of federal government contracts, grants, leaseholds and licenses given to corporations to run our government, exploit our taxpayer assets and lay waste to efficient, responsive public services.
Before he left Washington in 2003 to run for Governor of Indiana, the hyper-conservative Director of Bush's Office of Management and Budget (OMB), Mitch Daniels, endorsed the policy of having all federal departments and agencies place the full text of their contracts, leases of natural resources and other agreements on the Internet.

He placed a notice in the Federal Register inviting comments. Obviously, the large corporate contractors and lessees of minerals and other public resources did not like the idea. After all, information is the currency of democracy. Big businesses, like Dick Cheney's Halliburton, love oligarchies and corporate socialism featuring subsidies, handouts, bailouts and contracted out governmental functions.

Big Bureaucracies in Washington, D.C. were not exactly enthusiastic about applying Supreme Court Justice Louis Brandeis' comment that 'sunlight is the best disinfectant.'

Unfortunately, Daniels' successor at OMB, Bush loyalist and now his chief of staff, Josh Bolten, was totally cold to the proposal. Activity grinded to a halt.

There is new activity on other fronts, however. Congress, in 2006, passed legislation to shed light on the contracting process. Starting in January of 2008, the government website: http://www.usaspending.gov/ started providing the public with the following information:

the name of the entity receiving the award;

the amount of the award;

information on the award including transaction type, funding agency, etc;

the location of the entity receiving the award; and

a unique identifier of the entity receiving the award.

But the essential requirement'placing the entire text of these contracts on the web is the unfinished business of Congress which some Democrats and Republicans are turning their attention to in the coming months. In a meeting, Senator Chuck Grassley (Rep. Iowa) declared his support. Democrat and chairman of the House Judiciary Committee, John Conyers, has also assented. Others from both Parties are on board.

The next step will either be placing the requisite amendment in must-pass legislation or having public hearings to show the American people the advantages as a taxpayer and citizen of expanding their 'right to know.'

Consider the groups who will benefit from such open government:

1. Small business competitors who are often aced out of no-bid contracts and over-ridden by major prime contractors' influence on federal agencies. The quality of competitive bidding and performance should go up.

2. Taxpayers and taxpayer groups have opportunities to review, challenge or oppose where their money is going.

3. The media will be able to report to the public about the doings of contracting and leasing and licensing government in faster and much greater detail.

4. Scholars and students at universities, business schools and law schools will be able to provide analyses, improvements on both the substantive content and proper procedures for making these agreements. Sweetheart giveaways, for example, of minerals on public land and easy avoidance of responsibilities should be reduced. Archives of these contracts will be created for historical reference.

5. Local and state governments and legislatures will find themselves equipped to participate where their interests are at stake and may be encouraged to emulate such openness with their own texts of contracts, leases and so forth.

Already, some states like Texas and Indiana are placing notices of state contracts on their websites.

Last week, Michigan Attorney General Mike Cox, took the initiative by placing on his department's website. 'Track Your Taxes,' http://www.michigan.gov/ag/0,1607,7-164-34391-184786--,00.html) details on his office's spending, 'including every single contract that our department has entered into, including legal services, such as Special Assistant Attorneys General, and expert witnesses.' Mr. Cox added that all vendor contracts, 'the type of service being provided, the term of the contract, the amount of the contract, how much has been spent, and how much is left,' will be online.

Good step forward. But much more at all levels of government is needed, including the full texts and any performance information about delays, incomplete or incompetent work and other qualitative information such as cost over-runs. You may wish to contact your legislators and solicit their support.

Is it 'mission accomplished' when all such outsourcing information is online for everyone to see? Of course not. Information has to be used. This requires that new habits be established.

Reporters, scholars, taxpayer groups and other are not used to this 'beat.' They have to expand their time and resources to get on it. Otherwise, the bureaucrats and the business lobbies will continue with business as usual.

Ralph Nader

February 2nd, 2008

No Debate

It was billed as the great debate that, in the words of moderator Wolf Blitzer, 'could change the course of this presidential race and the nation.'

Situated at the packed historic Kodak Theatre'site of the Hollywood Oscar awards, thousands of people, including anti-war protesters, were outside, where tickets were being scalped for $1,000.

The burgeoning excitement swept up Mr. Blitzer into an introduction reminiscent of a heavyweight boxing title fight. Referring to the 'glamour on this stage
one of the great stages of all time,' he declared that 'this will be the first time that Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama will be debating face to face, just the two of them, one-on-one.' The crowd ROARED!

When it was over two hours later, here is how the reporters, not the columnists, of the New York Times described the showdown: 'Senators Hillary Rodham Clinton and Barack Obama sat side by side here Thursday, sharing a night of smiles, friendly eye-catching and gentle banter
It was almost as if the battle was to see which of them could outnice the other.'

Since neither scored a knockout, a knockdown, and neither stumbled, the audience left without many feeling the pain of their champion being bested. Even the Times' critic, Alessandra Stanley, she of the usual barbed pen, could only marvel at the smooth harmony ideology both candidates decided to adopt. She wrote: 'They let their eyes make nice
As they stood in front of the audience before the debate, Mr. Obama leaned down to Mrs. Clinton and whispered a few words in her ear, as if continuing the fun chat they had just shared backstage.'

The two candidates were unperturbed by any questions from the reporters that they had not answered before or they were soft balls they could hit out of the ball park.

As in all debates involving presidential candidates, the reporters were unwilling or incapable of asking the unconvential questions reflecting situations and conditions widely reported or investigated by their own colleagues.

This phenomenon of invincible reluctance should be studied by anthropologists or psychologists. Examples follow:

I called up Chris Hedges, former New York Times Middle East bureau chief and author for a question he would have asked. He offered this one. 'The Israeli government is imposing severe and continual collective punishment on the 1.5 million people of tiny Gaza, which includes restricting or cutting off food, fuel, electricity, medicines and other necessities. Malnutrition rates among many children resemble the worst of sub-Saharan Africa. Israel's leading newspaper, Haaretz, has reporters and columnists describing these horrific conditions and concluding that the ferocity of the blockade is detrimental to Israel as well as the Palestinians.

'Collective punishment is clearly a violation of established international law. Prominent, former military, security and political leaders in Israel are speaking out against this punishment and calling for negotiations with Hamas. Do you, Senator Clinton and Senator Obama, agree with these Israelis or do you continue to support the policy of collective punishment against innocent men, women and children in Gaza?'

The Nation magazine's columnist, Alex Cockburn suggested this question:

'Senator Clinton, in all your previous debates, you have not criticized the bloated military budget so often documented by the media, Pentagon audits and GAO reports for Congress to be replete with waste fraud and abuse. The Soviet Union is gone. Yet military spending now consumes half of the federal government's operating expenditures.

'Specifically, what would you do to significantly reduce the tens of billions of wasted dollars and eliminate redundant weapons systems?

'And, further, would you abolish the missile defense project, deemed by the American Physical Society and other leading physicists to be technically unworkable? It costs about $10 billion a year with a total expenditure of over $150 billion since its inception under Ronald Reagan, without any indication that it can fulfill the function for which it was designed? Please be specific.'

***

Here are a few questions of my own. 'Senator Obama, you have taught Constitutional law. Has President Bush violated the Constitution, federal statutes and international treaties during his two terms of office? If so, please elaborate and tell the American people what you think should be done about holding the self-described 'responsibility' President accountable under the impeachment authority of Congress and other laws of the land?'

'Senator Clinton, you represent New York, which includes the large banking, brokerage and investment firms colloquially called Wall Street. Eliot Spitzer, became Governor of your state largely on his widely reported reputation for prosecuting corporate crooks who fleeced investors, pensioners and workers of hundreds of billions of dollars. He often remarked that the federal criminal laws were too weak and the Securities and Exchange Commission was too lenient.

'As the Senator from New York, what specifically have you done to advance a strong crackdown on corporate crime with tougher laws and larger enforcement budgets? And, specifically, what do you intend to do as President?'

'Senator Obama, you have often spoken about your health insurance plan as a way to reduce costs. Yet you do not discuss three major cost reduction opportunities. The GAO, the investigative arm of Congress, estimates that ten percent of the entire health expenditures in this country go down the drain due to computerized billing fraud and abuse. This year, that amounts to $220 billion.

'Under a single payer plan, administrative expenses would be cut by about two-thirds. That would amount to hundreds of billions of dollars a year in savings. And the Harvard School of Public Health study estimates about 80,000 people die every year from medical malpractice in hospitals, estimating costs years ago of $60 billion a year. These are large savings in a $2.2 trillion a year health care industry.

'Do you agree and, if so, why have you ignored proposing practical actions in these areas?'

'Senator Clinton, you have long urged more money for children's programs. One way to make this possible is to end or diminish the complex system of corporate welfare'subsidies, handouts, giveaways and bailouts of business corporations. These amount to hundreds of billions of dollars a year, directly and through tax loopholes. Why have you not moved against such spending so that some of the money may go to help needy children? And specifically, what would you do as President to develop standards curtailing runaway corporate welfare programs pushed by corporate lobbyists?'

Is reportorial self-censorship limiting the questions presented to the Presidential candidates? You decide.

Ralph Nader

December 31st, 2007

A New Year's Message from Ralph Nader, Salt Lake City Mayor Rocky Anderson, and Matt Gonzalez, former Board President of the San Francisco Board of Supervisors

"Do you really believe if we replace a bunch of corporate Republicans with a bunch of corporate Democrats that anything meaningful is going to change? This has to stop. It's that simple."

That is our simple New Year's message for 2008.

Millions of Americans will be watching Iowa and New Hampshire to determine whether the Democrats will propose meaningful change. Hillary Clinton is an unacceptable candidate to large numbers of independents, Democrats, and third party members.

As of last June, more than 150 top corporate executives had raised money for Hillary Clinton's campaign. Who Business is Betting On, Fortune Magazine, June 26, 2007. Fortune also reported "safe to swim signs are sprouting up all over Clinton Inc.," and that she touted "what is probably the broadest CEO support among the candidates," even more than Rudy Giuliani. The Nation magazine reported Hillary Clinton's "advisers in her inner circle are closely affiliated with unionbusters, GOP operatives, conservative media and other Democratic Party antagonists." Hillary Inc., June 4, 2007.

If Hillary Clinton prevails, millions of Americans will look elsewhere for change, or stay home.

It's that simple.

Happy New Year.

December 29th, 2007

The Next Step Not Taken

1. Call them small investors, savers or shareholders - corporate crimes, frauds and abuses have battered them in the past decade. Think Enron, Worldcom, Wall Street's brokerage and investment giants and now the big shaky banks. Trillions of dollars have been drained or looted by these corporate bosses while they pay themselves handsomely with other people's money.

Speaking, writing and testifying against these massive unregulated rip-offs of defenseless Americans are two former chairmen of the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) Arthur Levitt and William Donaldson. Openly sharing their urgent pleas for reform are John Bogle, founder of mutual fund indexing and severe critic of excessive, often hidden, mutual fund fees, and Lynn Turner former chief accountant of the SEC.

These men are well known and respected in their fields, have ready access to the mass business media, possess great rolodexes of supportive people all over the country and could raise substantial sums of money. They are part of the monied classes themselves.

And for what? To start a large investor protection and action organization to represent the 60 million powerless and individual investors in our country. Individual investors really have no organized voice, either in Washington, D.C., or the state and local level where public sentiment and demand for action generates the rumble for change.

These experienced, superbly connected men, who have respected each other for years and are frustrated over inaction by those in authority, are not taking the next step.

To demonstrate their credentials, see their books Take on the Street: How to Fight Your Financial Future and Take on the Street: What Wall Street and Corporate America Don?t Want You to Know by Arthur Levitt, and The Little Book of Common Sense Investing and The Battle for the Soul of Capitalism by John Bogle. To document the broader urgency of their concerns, see veteran shareholder rights leader, Robert Monk's new book Corpocracy.

2. It would not take you very long, searching the Internet, to come up with scores of retired high military officers, from Generals and Admirals on down, high-ranking former diplomats and national security officials, who have spoken and written against the invasion of Iraq and the continuing quagmire and casualties that have cost our country so much and destroyed so much of Iraq and its people.

These outspoken, stand-up Americans, include former cabinet secretaries, agency chiefs, and White House special assistants, who have served under both Republican and Democratic administrations.

No one can question the experience and service of these straight-talk, former public officials. They have seen it all. Wealthy, like-minded funders would return their calls. Organized together into a powerful, well funded advocacy organization, these Americans can have a decisive impact on Congress and the White House, because they would be able to reach the American people through the mass media with the truth, and the strategies for peace and justice.

Although active in their pursuit of a sound foreign and military policy that does not jeopardize and bankrupt America, they have not taken this next step.

3. Can you possibly count all the progressives - elected, academic, authors and columnists - who are tearing into the Democratic Party for how often they caved in Congress this year to George W. Bush and his minority Republicans in the Senate and House?

There is nothing new about their complaints. Whether on foreign or domestic policy, whether on the domination of giant corporations over elections, legislatures, regulatory agencies and mass media, whether on the destructive results and portents of corporate globalization and autocratic trade regimes (WTO and NAFTA), progressives have been criticizing the Democrats for years now.

Hear it from Bob Herbert of the New York Times, John Nichols of The Nation magazine, the duos of James Carville and Paul Begala, Mark Crispin Miller and Jim Hightower, Bill Moyers and Anthony Lewis, Senators Bernie Sanders and Sherrod Brown, and Congressman John Conyers and Ed Markey to name just a very few of the grossly disappointed and outraged critics of the establishment Democrats, and their Democratic Leadership Council and their corporate financiers.

But they do not take the next step. Or steps. Either organize into a powerful counter-weight inside the Democratic Party to make progressive demands that cannot be shrugged off, or move to a progressive third party that can either lever its messages to the Democrats or compete with them?

How many years can the bad Republicans and their corporatist allies keep pulling the mainstream Democratic Party toward them and leave progressives with the futility of the least worst form of disastrous corporate government?

There are many influential and knowledgeable people in our country who know what causes are critical to pursue, what redirections are necessary for present and future generations, what assets of persuasion and change to amass. But they are stalled in this state of the next step not taken.

Taking the next step is the difference between talking and acting, between promise and performance, between autocracy and democracy!

Ralph Nader