Tuesday, December 07, 2004

Your security dollars at work
Josh Marshall has a long exerpt on from an article on the many cases of overbilling and corruption in the reconstruction of Iraq. Some of the outrages will be familiar and some will be new. This one opened my eyes for reasons probably not intended by the good Mr. Marshall.
In another example, a military assistant to a Pentagon employee gambled away part of a $40,000 grant issued to help coach an Iraqi sports team, the report found.

Among the millions of unemployed adults in Iraq, is there really no one who can coach a team? It's bad enough that the contractor embezzeled the money, but why was this contract given in the first place? I suppose the phrase "assistant to a Pentagon employee" indicates another tier of corruption -- kickbacks, office nepotism, or somesuch. That too should be investigated, but I really want to know why our money was being wasted in this way.

No comments: