Let's Run It Like A Business

That's always the talk. Let's see what's really happening.

Republicans joined longtime Democratic critics in Congress on Tuesday to berate the Pentagon for withholding information about the Halliburton Corporation's disputed billing under a $2.5 billion contract for Iraqi oil site repairs and fuel imports.
Saying the Pentagon is acting as if "it has something to hide," Representative Christopher Shays, Republican of Connecticut, said at a hearing that he would support issuing a subpoena to the Pentagon next week if the administration did not provide long-requested documents relating to the contract, which was awarded to Halliburton in early 2003 without competition.

And who makes the rules here, the corporations or the people.

The redactions violated the commitment to transparency and regretfully make it appear D.O.D. has something to hide," Mr. Shays told a panel of Defense Department officials at the hearing. He accused the Pentagon of "deferring completely to the contractor's absurdly expansive view of what constitutes proprietary information and must be shielded from view." ..............At the subcommittee hearing on Tuesday, Mr. Waxman said that in a recent private briefing, Pentagon officials had disclosed that Kellogg Brown & Root had been allowed to dictate the redactions. Pentagon officials said at the hearing that the department's general counsel had advised them that details of the audits, including alleged overcharges, could not be released without the contractor's permission. Independent experts on contracting have disputed that view.

Is this the best way to spend our dollars in the war on terror or the fight for freedom and democracy or whatever it is today?