Category: Bureaucracy

Yes, This Photo Needs to be Published

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On the right is a photo of Lance Cpl. Joshua M. Bernard, 21, of New Portland, Maine, in happier times.

Below is a photo of him dying, after being struck by an RPG in Afghanistan.

Secretary of Defense of Robert Gates tried to strong arm the Associated press into not distributing the photograph.

It is Secretary Gates behavior, and not that of the Associated Press which is repulsive.

In Bob Gates world, or for that matter, in George W. Bush’s world, there must be no reporting of the realities of war.

Robert Capa War Photos

Following the Vietnam War, the defense establishment concluded that the only way to deal with bad press is to muzzle the press, hence the press restrictions in Grenada, the Gulf War, the invasions of Afghanistan, and Iraq.

In there world, there is no Bob Capa, documenting, and honoring soldiers at (top to bottom) Omaha Beach, or the Spanish civil War, of the invasion of France in 1940 (I think).

Far from being decision “appalling” and a breach of “common decency,” as secretary Gates suggests, these pictures reveal the sacrifices of our fighting men, and honor them.

People like Bob Gates want to bury this sacrifice, because in showing it for all to see, it will sometimes raise questions about whether that sacrifice is truly justified, and that is not acceptable in the minds of the old men who send the young men to die.

In addition to being a craven way to think, as it implies an unwillingness to support one’s own ideas, it is a slap in the face of the idea that it is civilians who decide when and where we fight, and when it is no longer worth it for us to fight.

This is about REMFs covering their own flabby, generally lily-white, asses.

Lance Corporal Bernard Doing Honor to Himself and the Corps

Krugman is Wrong on Bernanke

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He has come out in favor of Ben Bernanke being reappointed as Chairman of the Federal Reserve.

Krugman’s argument is that Bernanke has been largely successful and effective in his efforts in battling the recession.

There are a number of other notables, such as Nouriel Roubini and Mark Thoma, who agree with Krugman, while Joseph Stiglitz and Calculated Risk suggests that his replacement be seriously considered, and Anna Jacobson Schwartz unequivocally calls for his removal.

Fundamentally, they base this decision on his performance, and it is reasonable to say that each of them have a better grasps of the details of this performance, but it misses the bigger picture: That both as an economy and as a democracy, the United States cannot afford to have another “Rock Star” Fed Chair.

The time of Alan “Bubbles” Greenspan has conclusively demonstrated that.

Ex-performance, the main argument for keeping Bernanke is that not doing so would be too disruptive, and it is the one most frequently made.

This fact demands his replacement at the end of his term.

The issue is not economics, nor his performance, but that a world in which an almost completely unaccountable figure is deemed crucial is simply not acceptable.

Federal Reserve Consumer Protection Theater

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With the Federal Reserve actively lobbying to become the sole protector of consumers in the financial system, it was inevitable that they would have to engage in some consumer protection theater so as to make people forget just how badly they have fumbled this ball over the past 30 years or so:

The Federal Reserve on Thursday proposed sweeping new consumer protections for mortgages and home-equity loans.

The proposals seek to overhaul the timing and content of disclosures to consumers, and to ban controversial side payments to mortgage brokers for steering customers to higher-cost loans.

The cow has left, so now they are closing the barn door, in the hope that they can continue to manage the herd.

The Federal Reserve really does not want a dedicated consumer financial protection agency, because it would engage in real consumer protection, which, based on the record of both the Federal Reserve and its New York bank (*cough* Timothy Geithner *cough*), have not done, choosing instead to pimp for Goldman Sachs and its ilk.

CFTC Showing Some Balls

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The Commodity Futures Trading Commission is considering eliminating waivers on position limits in wheat trading:

The [Senate] subcommittee [on Investigations] released a study in June that showed wheat prices were inflated by index investors last year. It called for the elimination of waivers that allow funds to hold more than 6,500 Chicago Board of Trade contracts at any one time, which would lower the influence of non-agricultural buyers and curb speculation. [CTFC Chairman] Gensler said earlier this month the CFTC, which currently grants waivers for agricultural products, also is considering limits on holdings by oil and gas speculators.

It’s been a while since I’ve seen stuff like this, and I can’t quite remember the word for it….Oh….Yes….It’s called regulation.

Inspector General Says Insufficient Oversight for TARP

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Neil Barofsky, the special inspector general for the TARP, is saying that oversight by the US Treasury Department and the Federal Reserve is woefully inadequate, and he also places the price tag for the bank bailouts at as much as $23.7 trillion.

By way of perspective, the whole US economy (GDP) is about $15 trillion, and the the world GDP is is listed at $65.82 Trillion.

To quote the Bloodhound Gang:

The roof the roof the roof is on fire
The roof the roof the roof is on fire
The roof the roof the roof is on fire
We don’t need no water let the motherf#$%er burn
Burn motherf#$%er burn

We need to amputate the current banking system, and replace it with something that works.

On Having 60 Democrats

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OK, so Al Franken is finally going to be seated.

The question is two fold, what does this mean, and what should this mean?

Ignoring the health issues of Byrd and Kennedy,* which means that Democrats are theoretically able to get cloture in the event of a Republican filibuster.

The question is, “Will they?”

Obviously, managing Senators is like herding cats, so one cannot expect them, particularly on the Democratic side of the aisle, to vote for every bit of legislation.

Voting on cloture, however, should a different thing, though I’ve very little confidence in Senate Leader Reid enforcing this.

As voters, and potential campaign contributors, I would suggest not contributing to the DSCC and instead contributing to individual campaigns, with Dem Senators who vote against cloture healthcare or global legislation getting nothing.

*Which is a lot like saying, “Other Than That, Mrs. Lincoln, How Was the Play?”

Remnants of Future Combat System Grow More Expensive

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The costs of the “Brigade Combat Teams” are escalating, according to the CBO.

When I worked on FCS,* they were called a “Unit of Action,” and I didn’t get it then.

The final word on this is in the final ‘graph of the linked post:

And the kicker? While the BCTs are supposed to be able to deploy faster to meet immediate needs, the report contends that while they will be able to respond more quickly than the Division model currently in use, “they require roughly the same amount of time to transport their equipment overseas.”

FCS, the gift that keeps giving.

*Full disclosure, I worked on the Future Recovery and Maintenance Vehicle, FRMV, “wrecker” variant of the FCS-MGV† from 2003-2006 at United Defense (later BAE Systems after the Carlyle Group sold me to buy Dunkin Donuts).
†Future Combat Systems-Manned Ground Vehicle. These are the ones that are the tanks and APCs. As opposed to the various unnmanned vehicles, networking technologies, etc. that form the full FCS along with the MGVs.‡
‡Yes, I have worked everywhere. Maybe I can’t hold down a job, but more likely this has been my role as “technical hit man”, where you are parachuted in to take care of a specific need.

Wanna Put Social Security in the Stock Market?

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Because that’s what the Pension Benefit Guaranty Corporation (PBGC), the government insurance fund for defined benefit retirement programs, did last year, just before the stock market crashed.

The reason given by the Bush Evil Minion™ Charles E.F. Millard was that the PBGC needed better returns to shore up its trust fund, because of all the companies going bankrupt and welshing on their pension obligations.

It may be true that they actually bought into the idea that they could get better returns, even in a stock market that was clearly overvalued and with an economy already shocked by the housing cost, but my money is that the real reason was that it was an election year, and they saw the signs of a stock market drop, and they wanted to push some money into the market quickly in order to keep everything afloat until after the election.

In either case, it should be noted that the PBGC’s trust fund is like a drop in the ocean compared to that of Social Security, and if they thought that it could effect the markets, just imagine what the multi-trillion Social Security fund would do.

In fact, it’s so large, that it would drive the stock market up upon being invested in the market, and when a large population cohort started to retire, it would drive it down, giving the Baby Boomers that wonderful “buy high, sell low” feeling.

Great Googly Moogly: Larry Summers Wants to be Fed Chairman

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It appears that Barney Frank and Chris Dodd have differences in the future course of regulation.

Specifically, Frank favors giving the Federal Reserve the job of managing “systemic risk” under any new regulations, and Dodd thinks that the Fed, with its history of unresponsiveness and opacity is ill suited to the task.

Well, it now appears that much of the smear campaign against Dodd may have come from Larry Summers, who would be first in line to be Federal Reserve chairman if Obama does not reappoint Bernanke, and so he went after Dodd in order to strengthen Frank’s hand in making the Fed the chief regulator.

I’m beginning to think that anyone who has “friend of Robert Rubin” on their resume should be barred from any position of authority.

Un-dirtyword-believable.

What Have They Got To Hide

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In this case, it’s the Federal Aviation Administration, which has a proposed rule to block public access to raw bird strike data:

The FAA says requests for data from the public “have typically been for specific data fields, individual airports or detailed portions of the database” and that responses from the agency “have addressed each request individually and adequately”.

However, the agency cautions public analysis of bits and pieces of the data could lead to inaccurate portrayals of airports and airlines, which could have a negative impact on their participation in reporting bird strikes.

So, they are saying that think that ordinary people are too stupid to understand the data.

More likely, they are covering something up, like certain airports being having a lot more problems with bird strikes, and the FAA, which is tasked with both regulating and promoting aviation, finds this information inconvenient.

We Forgot How To Make Trident Missile Warheads?

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It appears that someone neglected to properly record how to make a super-secret, and highly toxic, substance called “Fogbank”, which is thought to be a, “thought by some weapons experts to be a foam used between the fission and fusion stages,” of the warhead.

Not only was the old facility to make Fogbank demolished, but, “Vital information on how Fogbank was actually made had somehow been mislaid”, or perhaps never recorded, because the stuff is so super-secret.

Un-dirtyword-believable.

White House Push-Back On Pentagon Insubordination

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Obama’s people are demanding that all Pentagon staffers working on the budget sign a non-disclosure agreement:

…

In an undated non-disclosure agreement obtained by Defense News, the administration tells defense officials that “strict confidentiality” must be practiced to ensure a “successful” and “proper” 2010 defense budget process.

…

The pledge covers any data about the 2010 budget, including: “planning, programming and budgeting system documents and databases, and any other information” that concerns the administration’s internal discussions about “the nature and amounts of the president’s budget for fiscal year 2010, and any supplemental budget request during the current fiscal year.”

…

“Under no circumstances will I disclose such information outside the Department of Defense and other government agencies directly involved in the defense planning and resource-allocation process, such as the Office of Management and Budget,” the agreement said.

I’m not sure if this is just paranoia, a recognition that there are a lot of Bushies burrowed in the bureaucracy who will work against this, or a realization that the Pentagon is completely out of control as an organization.

Maybe it’s all three.

Tom Daschle Withdraws as Head of HHS

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Nominally, he withdrew because of tax questions, but there are reports that this New York Times OP/ED convinced him to withdraw.

When even the New York Times realizes that you have functioned as an über lobbyist and calls you on it as game over.

Matt Taibbi was far more colorful in his description of Daschle and his revolving door porfiteering, “Tom Daschle would suck off a corpse for a cheeseburger.”

Iraq Denies License to Blackwater

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Iraq has notified the State Department of their decision, and the U.S. government will not renew their contract.

Hopefully, this is the start of a more general withdrawal of the use mercenary forces by the U.S. government.

Of course the problem is not limited to combat contractors (mercenaries), it’s also increasingly obvious that the explosion of contractors throughout the bureaucracy has created an explosion of fraud, waste, and abuse.

DNI Would Minimize Contractors

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Adm. Dennis Blair, the nominee for Director of National Intelligence, told the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence that, “one of his first duties if confirmed will be to transfer to federal employees any ‘inherently governmental’ work being done by contractors:

Blair said the government should rely on contract interrogators only in special circumstances, such as when a suspect speaks an obscure dialect.

“My strong preference is that interrogators in the intelligence world be a professional cadre of the best interrogators in the business,” Blair told the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence during his nomination hearing.

Committee chairwoman Sen. Dianne Feinstein, D-Calif., said she supported Blair’s call to reduce the intelligence community’s reliance on contractors. She referred to a 2007 Office of the Director of National Intelligence study that found that 27 percent of the intelligence work force is comprised of contractors, and an individual contractor costs the government $80,000 more on average than a career employee.

“I find this unacceptable,” Feinstein said. “Hiring contractors to interrogate detainees and contract psychologists to evaluate [them] is just the wrong thing for the government to do.”

Now if only we can apply this to the rest of the government, particularly the DoD.

Well, Here is a Story that I Missed

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Enterprising young environmental protester Tim DeChristopher was at a demonstration against hurried auctions of government land next to some of the crown jewels of the National Park system by Bush and His Evil Minions&trade, when an idea hit him: go into the auction, and bid against the people getting the sweetheart deals, and drive the prices up.

He had no money, but he did drive the prices up, and DeChristopher, the now infamous “Bidder 70”, actually won a fair portion of the bids before authorities realized what was up, and they threw him out.

Well, he has been collecting donations online, and he now has the requisite $45,000.00 to make the first payment on the 13 leases that he won, which accounted for roughly 15% of the total acreage that was sold at auction.

He still needs to pay a total of $1.7 million, but it’s a start.

You can donate to him here.

I Think that Someone is Stuck in a Do Loop

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Because it looks like Treasury’s latest plan is to lower mortgage rates to 4.5% for new home buyers, to stop the slide in home prices.

First, you can’t re-inflate the bubble…The speculative frenzy that was at its core is over.

Second, why would someone buy a house at 4.5%, when whoever you sell the house to 20 or 30 years later would buy at a more normal rate, driving the price down.

Basically, it’s an attempt to get people to knowingly buy overpriced homes.

Does it come with a kick me sign for buyers to wear on their back?

And Round One of Waxman – Dingell Is Called for Waxman

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As you may be aware, Henry Waxman is challenging John Dingell for chairmanship of the House Energy and Commerce Committee, and today, the Democratic Steering Committee went 25 to 22 for Waxman.

I think that there are a number of things that may trump Dingell’s seniority (He’s the longest serving Dem in Congress).

  • He has been awful on global warming, because he’s the Big 3 (2½) auto makers’ bitch.
  • The recognition that one of the reasons that the Big 3 (2½) auto makers are in such bad shape is that the Congress never took steps to move beyond the 1970s CAFE regulation, because Dingell is Big 3 (2½) auto makers’ bitch.
  • There is also, I think, a desire for a bit of a shakeup, to better reflect what is now a relatively young Democratic caucus in Congress.
  • The vote was a secret ballot, so there is little chance for retribution.
  • Waxman’s ability to count votes is legendary, and the mere fact that he is challenging Dingell makes people wonder if he already has this sewn up. If so, they do not want to be on the losing side.

Me, I’m rooting for Waxman.

I Believe That This is Called Insubordination

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Well, we now have this report that the Pentagon is doing its level best to subvert the decision making capabilities of the incoming administration:

The uniformed services are trying to lock in the next administration by creating a political cost for holding the line on defense spending. Conservative groups are hoping to ramp up defense spending as a tool to limit options for a Democratic Congress and president to pass new, and potentially costly, social programs, including health care reform.

While it is the right of conservatives to weigh in on the defense budget, the actions of the, “Uniformed Services” appears to be a direct challenge to the idea of civilian control of the military.

Douglas MacArthur was fired for simply saying in a letter to a Congressman that he disagreed with the President’s policy, and these folks are trying to gaslight Obama.