The Washington Independent - U.S. news and politics - washingtonindependent.com: Stories by Matthew Blake

Hearing: U.S. Embassies Isolated, Ugly

Matthew Blake — Wed, 23 Jan 2008 22:21:06 GMT

The U.S. Embassy in Baghdad has become a symbol of failed diplomacy in Iraq. Last year the House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform documented horrific labor practices and human trafficking committed by building contractor First Kuwaiti in building the 104-acre, $740 million embassy. And more recently the committee and Justice Department have investigated the unfinished embassy’s nonexistent fire safety system and dubious electric wiring.

After exposing the scope of the embassy’s problems, the committee was, sort of, at it again today. Instead of going forward the latest allegations of rogue State Department officials and broken water sprinklers, the issue at hand was the failed mission of U.S. embassies across the world.

National security subcommittee chair John Tierney, a Massachusetts Democrat, romanticized the aesthetically pleasing embassies of the Cold War era that encouraged interaction between diplomats and their surrounding community. Now, Tierney lamented, "Our concerns with security have led us to build new embassy compounds of cookie-cutter boxes surrounded by walls located on the outside of town."

Tierney’s assertions were supported by a Center for Strategic and International Studies report presented to the committee by Marc Grossman and Thomas Pickering, each a former Undersecretary for Political Affairs at the State Department. Not surprisingly, Grossman and Pickering hammered home that State needs more money to hire hire and train personnel. They also acknowledged that diplomacy can’t happen if the diplomats are fortified from living, breathing society. "The key factor is that locations away from urban centers must be avoided whenever possible," Grossman told the committee.

From that perspective, the Baghdad Embassy is but the most extreme example of problems from the "Standard Embassy Design" program Congress created after the U.S. Embassy bombings in Kenya and Tanzania. The Baghdad embassy is ensconced in the U.S. military green zone and is intended to be an entirely self-sufficient compound.

Jane Loeffler, a professor at the University of Maryland and architectural historian, testified that standard design "dots the global landscape with embassies that resemble big box stores" which doesn’t exactly put America’s best foot forward.

In a hearing that included three other witnesses and a rotating cast of lawmakers, Loeffler was the only one to connect standard design protocol problems with private contracting. "It gives direct control to individual contractors, weakens the government’s negotiating role, and minimizes the contribution of architects and other design professionals." Loeffler also pointed out that State’s Overseas Building Operations abandoned the 50 year-old peer review panel for Embassy projects in 2004- right before Baghdad embassy construction inauspiciously began. "Instead it created a panel of industry representatives who vied for OBO contracts and rubber-stamped the director’s policies."

In an interview afterward, Pickering was confident that more money for State would alleviate the problems of privatizing future embassy-building projects. "We’ll be able to make better, more selective use of the contractors," Pickering said. Pickering also pointed that the problems in Baghdad are unique. "It’s in a war zone so it shouldn’t be a pattern- I hope it’s not a pattern."

Waxman Decides Steroid Line Up

Matthew Blake — Thu, 24 Jan 2008 23:06:13 GMT

Reporters everywhere are sharpening their best baseball metaphors for Feb. 13 when ace pitcher Roger Clemens responds to allegations of steroid use before the House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform. In the meantime committee chair Henry Waxman (D-CA) has been arranging and rearranging times for Clemens and other essential Mitchell Report characters to provide sworn depositions. Here is the latest line-up:

Andy Petite, January 30th. Petite was teammates with Clemens at the Yankees and, according to the report, received performance enhancing drugs from trainer Brian McNamee. Petite says the accusations are true.

Clemens, February 5th. The Yankees pitcher will presumably deny accusations made by McNamee that he injected Clemens with steroids and human growth hormone. Clemens is the focus of the investigation due to his high profile but also because he is the only player mentioned in George Mitchell’s findings who has explicitly disputed the report.

McNamee, Feb. 7th. McNamee was the key source in Mitchell’s investigation, detailing his clubhouse injections of Clemens and other ballplayers. His interview with committee staff is expected to reiterate the most salacious aspects of the report- and contradict Clemens.

Kirk Radomski, Tentatively Feb. 1st. Radomski was a clubhouse employee for the Mets in the 80’s and 90’s who pleaded guilty last spring to a federal grand jury for money laundering and illegally distributing steroids and human growth hormones. He has since cooperated in telling Mitchell just whom has received his drugs

Chuck Knobaluch, Feb. 13th. Of the five witnesses called to testify, former Yankee Knoblauch- also implicated by McNamee- is the only one declining to give a sworn deposition. Waxman said he will subpoena Knoblauch to testify under oath at the committee hearing.

If all goes well, Knoblauch will join Clemens, Petite, McNamee and Radomski for what should be an awkward day for Major League Baseball and a ratings bonanza for C-Span.

State of the Union Liveblog

Tue, 29 Jan 2008 01:53:46 GMT

Washington Independent staff and friends are gathering around CSPAN's online stream in preparation for the State of the Union Address. Our Hill reporter Mike Lillis just told me the White House has not released the transcript for Bush's speech, but you can check out the 36-page outline here. (LM)

More to come.

9:07: Is that Bernard Kerik or Nouri al-Maliki? (SA)

9:09: Bad joke #1, about legacy: 45 seconds in. (SA)

9:11: One of our computers, where we're streaming C-SPAN, is frozen on a screencap of Bush. Does that mean I have to take continuous drink? (SA)

9:12: Bush calls his $600 check-plan a "robust" solution to our economic woes. (LM)

9:14: He's talking about the economy now and how we're all worried at our kitchen tables. Now he's pushing Congress to give out those incentive checks, sort of like giving candy to toddlers. (MK)

9:12: "Jobs are now growing at a slower pace." Really? (SA)

9:15: I thought shady brokers and lack of regulation played a hand in the subprime fallout -- nope, taxes. (LM)

9:17: Bush just dropped his "no more earmarks" card. (LM)

9:17: Earmarks under a Democratic Congress? No way, Jose! About those previous six, we'll call it even. (SA)

9:18: Anti-earmark executive order threat. The bombs leave the silos in 5 minutes! (SA)

9:18: First time he mentions foreclosure! He wants to reform Freddie Mac, Fannie Mae, and so on. This is supposed to help more people keep their homes. Somehow, I don't think someone with a subprime loan should wait by the phone...(MK)

9:19: The Washington Independent is looking for smart contributors who know about health care. (LM)

9:21: No Child Left Behind is "succeeding" because it is a "good law" (LM)

9:22: God, his speeches suck without Michael Gerson. (SA)

9:24: Liberate poor children trapped in failing schools! They will greet us with sweets and flowers! (SA)

9:25: Bush: I'm against duty-free. You pay tax on those airport cigarettes, Byung-Hun!

9:26: First reference to terror is about... Columbia. This man is off his game.

9:27: I'm pretty sure earlier this month Congress cut billions in federal funding to high-tech physiciss research. I'll report back. (LM)

9:28: Ah, so he's not serious about carbon emissions at all. Did I fool myself? (SA)

9:29: How can you get a patent on human life? (LM)

9:30: Bush just took a detour into promoting private health-care plans, "We must trust patients and doctors to make better decisions." It was interesting as a half-hearted effort to remind people that despite the Democratic Presidential debate talk of national health care, it is a foreign concept to Republicans. Indeed, For Bush, the most pressing health care industry problem sounds like lawsuits against doctors and HMO's. (MB)

9:30: Hey, dude, it's 9:30. Say SOMETHING about the wars already. You know, your legacy?

9:32: Volunteered in record numbers? Is that why your 2002 volunteerism initiative failed?

9:33: A Katrina reference! That happened? Bush must flash back to that moment -- when his presidency collapsed once and for all -- like if he was survived a Vietnam firefight. Which he did, I guess, by not going to Vietnam.

9:33 Fans of faith-based initiatives were looking forward to what Bush had to say about the program tonight, after failing to mention it last year. They were hoping for a little more than this: a plea to permanently extend Charitable Choice, which makes it easier for faith-based groups to compete for social service grants. One advantage: it's free. (HY)

9:34: Bush crows about charitable foundations, but actually the House Oversight committee has been investigating veterans charities and numerous other foundations for fraud. The investigation could result in these foundations having to itemize exactly how they're spending their money on IRS filings. (MB)

9:35: Bush just made a general call to find a balanced way to deal with immigrants here without documents. Any new ideas? No. (LR)

9:36: There we go. The Bush doctrine survives beyond the grave. "We trust people when given a chance will choose a path of freedom and peace." Yeah, what happened with that? (SA)

9:37: "There is one thing we and our enemies agree on." Torture? (SA)

9:38: Bush's examples of stirring liberty start with Georgia and Ukraine. The only stirring example of liberty mentioned in regard to Iraq is ink-stained fingers...have their been any other stirring examples of liberty in Iraq? (MB)

9:41: Have you notice that Bush only ever talks about Afghanistan at State of the Union addresses? (SA)

9:42: In Iraq, the surge solved everything. The end. (SA)

9:42: 30 minutes into the speech, and I'm wondering about one thing: did Condi and Spellings conspire to wear white? (HY)

9:43: Hey, he acknowledged that the Anbar Awakening happened before the surge! Ah, 80,000 Iraqis fighting the terrorists in the CLCs, the men we've armed and funded like we did the Afghan mujahideen in the 80s. Don't worry, this time it'll all turn out differently. (SA)

9:43: Attacks in Iraq are down! Except now that they're climbing back up. (SA)

9:44: Did someone just scream 'you rock!!', at the 2008 State of the Union? (LM)

9:44: Bush dares to mention Provincial Reconstruction Teams in Iraq, which veers close to the political reconciliation side of the surge. He wisely doesn't elaborate as it's not clear if these team have made any difference in providing electricity, water and safe roads to the neighborhoods the U.S. military has cleared. The teams are so far best known for their lack of Arab speakers. (MB)

9:46: Al-Qaeda is on the run in Iraq, like to Mosul, where they murdered five brave Americans today. Is it or isn't it progress that he no longer talks about victory, but about lowered violence? I'll bet that's what those five irreplaceable Americans wanted to die for. (SA)

9:46: The goal for 2008: to get U.S. troops back into a supporting role in Iraq. Remember when that was the goal in 2004 to 2006?

9:47: There is a standing ovation when Bush announces 20,000 troops are coming home. There is a standing ovation when Bush gives Army commanders a "solemn pledge" that he'll give them what they need in Iraq. What if they say it turns out they need 160,000 troops to keep fatalities down? (MB)

9:49: "Sunni, Shia and Kurds are beginning to come together." Lie. The parliament passed "a de-Baathification law." Yeah, and the Sunnis hate it. "Reconciliation is taking place." Lie.

9:51: Failure in Iraq will "embolden the extremists." No, that wasn't an apology. And how much bolder can they get? They're extremists! (SA)

9:52: It looks like Speaker Pelosi is too engrossed in a book (or the new budget) to give her eyes and ears to the SOTU. (MB)

9:52: I'm just the economics gal here, but when he starts mentioning Iran, am I supposed to get nervous? (MK)

9:54: Wasn't that airplane in LA thing crap? (LM)

9:55: OK, now he's lying about thwarted terrorist attacks. (SA)

9:56: Warrantless domestic surveillance! Forever! It turns out the all-seeing eye of the powerful might be another thing we "share with our enemies." (SA)

9:56: Bush is above giving rational why telecoms deserve "liability protection." You need more a specific reason, I think, why Sprint should not be sued beyond protecting against the dangers of the new century. (MB)

9:57: We aren't doing anything in Sudan, though...(LM)

9:57: "America opposes genocide in Sudan." So there. Genocide stopped. Over 400,000 Darfuris suddenly rise from the dead. (SA)

9:57: I don't think America is leading the fight against global poverty and hunger and disease. That would be Bill Gates. (MK)

10:00: New hiring preferences for military spouses?? (HY)

10:02: As it turns out our "liveblog" might be a bit delayed. We're watching a stream on CSPAN. (LM)

10:02: "Our greatness lies not in our government." Certainly not now. (SA)

10:03: Is that it? (LM)

10:03: That's it? Where are the ordinary heroes in the bleachers the presidents always point to? I really miss that. (MK)

10:15: Gripping post-debate analysis: Where are the flights of fancy? Exploring Mars by 2016? Bush didn't seem to be having fun. The only pet issue discussed seemed to be a fleeting reference to tort reform. (MB)

Signing Statements Take Heat Off War Contractors

Matthew Blake — Tue, 29 Jan 2008 19:40:22 GMT

With little fanfare yesterday, President Bush signed the National Defense Authorization Act for 2008, which lays out $696 billion in Pentagon spending. The President publicly praised some parts of the bill, like a 3.5 percent pay raise for the troops, but he didn't like other things. So he's going to ignore them.

In a White House press release, Bush cited four provisions of the bill that "could inhibit the President from carrying out constitutional obligations...as Commander in Chief." That includes Section 841, which sets up a commission on wartime contracting in Iraq and Afghanistan. The eight-member commission would be appointed by the President and Congress to investigate federal agency's practice in handing out contracts, and waste, fraud and abuse committed by private contractors.

So the Justice Department and Congress's House Oversight Committee will continue with probes into how specific contractors like Blackwater and Haliburton have profited from Iraq. But it looks like there will not be a tidy, comprehensive independent commission report detailing the relationships established between these companies and the Departments of State and Defense.

State Dept. Says Embroiled Embassy Almost Done

Matthew Blake — Wed, 30 Jan 2008 05:08:46 GMT

Illustration by: Matt Mahurin

For two years, stories about the U.S. Embassy in Baghdad have talked about its looming size -- a 104-acre expanse -- and extreme isolation. More recently, though, the stories have turned to sensational reports of human trafficking, slave labor conditions and a dangerously unsafe structure.

The allegations have been strong enough to put the entire project in doubt. Yet the State Department has plowed ahead and is finally saying that the embassy will soon be completed -- far away from the glare of continuing Justice Department and congressional investigations.

Department spokesman Rob McInturff said in an interview with The Washington Independent that within the next few weeks the State Dept. will issue a "Certificate of Occupancy." This impending occupancy might seem unlikely considering a Washington Post article two weeks ago that pointed out the building's entire fire safety apparatus was broken.

McInturff explains, however, that First Kuwaiti Building and Contracting Co., the embassy contractor, has inspected the fire system and assures State everything is fine. Now the department simply needs to proofread their work. " It's a process of dotting the i's and crossing the t's for the final inspection ," McInturff says.

Embassy completion will probably be a little more contentious than a series of bureaucratic formalities. Nonetheless, it appears State is hoping to cross the finish line without having to confront the recently uncovered scandals.

Beginning last summer, the House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform laid out the case that the State Department made a terrible mistake in awarding a $592-million contract to First Kuwaiti to build the embassy in Baghdad's green zone. And instead of admitting things had spiraled out of control, State was apparently stonewalling investigations.
The Justice Department responded by launching a criminal probe into the subcontracting deals made by First Kuwaiti. Justice also began an investigation of James Golden and Mary French, the State Department officials managing embassy construction.

Meanwhile the oversight committee pushed forward scrutiny of the State Department's Inspector General Howard "Cookie" Krongard, who had refused to acknowledge labor and contracting problems on the embassy site. Krongard had developed a reputation for blocking all investigations in State Department contractors, including Blackwater, a major security and military contractor. In November, Krongard told the committee that his brother was not on the Blackwater advisory board, but when presented evidence that suggested otherwise, changed his story. A publicly embarrassed Krongard, who still face perjury charges, resigned in December.

His resignation was followed two weeks later by that of State Overseas Building Operations Director Charles Williams. In July Williams promised the committee that the embassy would be completed in September. When September came, however, State admitted project completion would be indefinitely delayed until 2008. Golden, Williams project manager, is also no longer around. McInturff explained in an interview that his contract has expired.

Yet while the key people who allegedly mismanaged embassy oversight are no longer in the jobs, many remain skeptical that the whole truth will come out.

Scott Horton, a senior project consultant of the non-profit advocacy organization Human Rights First, suspects that the U.S. Embassy in Baghdad could be the next in a line of Iraq contracting scandals that makes headlines -- only to fade away. Human Rights First published a study last week that only one prosecution of an Iraq contractor has taken place. "It basically has to be a throbbing, red-hot case to maintain public scrutiny and Justice Department interest," Horton said.

David Phinney, a Washington-based journalist, whose stories about labor conditions on the embassy compound in online publications including CorpWatch and AlterNet, helped spark the oversight's committee inquiry, is also skeptical. "The Justice Department is backlogged for years in Iraq cases," Phinney said.

For the scope of its ambitions and subsequent problems, though, the embassy is a case like no other. State awarded the Lebanese based-First Kuwaiti a contract in July 2005 to build the largest embassy in the world, a self-sufficient community with everything from apartment buildings, water and waste treatment facilities and a power station to a gym, cinema and swimming pool. The entire compound was to be completed for a fixed price of $592 million, a sum based on State's standard embassy design -- though that money has proved inadequate to fiance the compound's many facets.

To complete the massive undertaking at that price, First Kuwaiti turned to contract labor from the Philippines, India and Pakistan. These workers could be hired for far less money than local people- who might also be reluctant to work openly for the U.S. government, employment that can prove dangerous in Baghdad. However, those worker's governments do not let citizens travel to Iraq.

In testimony before the House Oversight Committee, John Owen and Ray Mayberry, former First Kuwaiti employees and U.S. citizens, recounted the apparent solution to this problem. Workers would get on planes with passports stamped for Dubai, but the flight would be re-routed to Baghdad. Mayberry, who was hired to be an emergency medical technician, said the workers he talked to thought they were going to work in Dubai hotels but were instead physically forced to go to Baghdad.

Then, Mayberry testified, First Kuwaiti would confiscate their passports and put them to work 12 hours a day, seven days a week. They were housed 25 people to a trailer that was typically 40 FT. by 10 ft., not receive basic equipment like shoes and would often have to work dazed by painkillers. For this, Mayberry said, workers told him they were paid between $10 to $30 a week. And according to an Iraq Multinational Forces Inspector General report, many workers had to send the equivalent of a year pay as a fee to a work recruiter who had put them on the wrong plane in the first place.

Perhaps not surprisingly, the embassy has now failed numerous tests of its security, electric wiring and fire safety systems. The structure was billed as blast resistant, but last May part of the building was destroyed by mortar fire. Amb. Ryan Crocker subsequently ordered Golden out of Baghdad when he worked with First Kuwaiti to prevent an investigation into the attack. In other words, the man who had been in charge of managing the project was not allowed to see the project.

An internal State Department conflict has also developed over the fire system -- where the official line contradicts a report by the State Dept.'s Fire Protection Division that "the entire installation is not acceptable." Intramural battles most notoriously occurred in the Inspector General's office, where Krongard killed staff probes into allegations made by Owens, Mayberry and others. He traveled to Baghdad in September to investigate labor abuses and reported that, "Nothing came to our attention."

When Krongard resigned, Oversight Committee Chair Henry A. Waxman, (D-Calif.), said, "It removes an enormous distraction." So is the committee moving full-speed ahead? "It is definitely an active, ongoing investigation," says Waxman spokeswoman, Karen Lightfoot.

What bears monitoring is how the investigation can continue to circle back to the waste, fraud and abuse that happened when the embassy was oversight-free. "What you're trying to do now is shut the barn door while the horse is out," said Dina Rasor, the founder of the Project on Government Oversight who recently started the Follow the Money Project to investigate where war funds are going.

Lawernce Korb, a Senior Fellow at the Center for American Progress, is more confident. "Waxman's committee will pick it up," Korb asserted. "The State Dept. will find out they need more money and they'll ask for more money and [the committee] will investigate what they're going to spend this money for."

In other words, as long as State keeps making mistakes, justice will be served.

How Soon is Soon?

Matthew Blake — Wed, 30 Jan 2008 22:19:55 GMT

I reported that the State Department is confident the U.S. Embassy in Baghdad will be ready for occupancy soon and it's really just a matter of completing a bureaucratic process. State's proclamation is noteworthy given that department officials anonymously say that the entire fire safety system is broken. At the same time, State has not set a date. When I called back today to ask about a timetable, I was eventually referred to a Jan. 23 press briefing with Deputy Spokesman, Tom Casey. Casey's exchange with an unidentified reporter is the department's final word on the subject:

QUESTION: (Inaudible) detail to your comments earlier today about the completion of the United States Embassy in Baghdad.

MR. CASEY: You know, I did have a chance to talk to [State Dept. Assistant Secretary of Administration] Pat Kennedy about this a little while ago. Basically what I gave you this morning is where the process stands. We have yet to issue a certificate of occupancy for the building. That's the last step before people can actually start to move in. There is still a number of items that are on the so-called punch list, the list of things that you go through to check and inspect before a certificate of occupancy can be issued. I know, as well, Pat reminded me that our fire team is en route to Baghdad. This is a group of people who have not been involved in the construction of the Embassy itself who are going to do a inspection of the fire safety elements of the new building which, of course, had been an issue and that I think people discussed before. So we are moving forward with this process. Again, I just want to reiterate what I did say this morning, is we don't intend to issue that certificate of occupancy or take possession of this building until we're sure that it meets all the standards that we set out for it in the process.
QUESTION: And what's your latest prediction for completion, punch list, moving in?

MR. CASEY: Well, again, we want this to happen as soon as possible, but I'm not going to try and offer you a date right now

To recap: The State Dept. is saying that there's no need to go back and make substantial improvements. They're checking things off a list now, but they won't pin themselves to when this will be over beyond Spokesman McInturff's, "a few weeks."

CEO Raises Under Scrutiny

Matthew Blake — Fri, 01 Feb 2008 19:58:32 GMT

Most CEO's don't wake up in the morning, look at themselves in the mirror and say, "Regardless of my company's overall performance, I deserve a raise!" In reality their companies usually hire consultants that determine CEO pay. And now those consultants are under scrutiny.

Yesterday Rep. Henry A. Waxman, D-Calif and chair of the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee, sent a letter to the top 250 Fortune 500 companies asking who these consultants were and how they determine executive pay. Do the consultants do other work for the company? Are multiple consultants hired or just one? Is their boss the CEO? Do shareholders know about any of this? Company employees?

Despite public hand-wringing over the fact that CEO's of the largest companies make about 600 times more about the average employee, the people recommending these salaries, however, are largely a mystery. A December Oversight Committee hearing reported that CEO's at 113 of the top 250 companies, had consultants who performed other roles with the corporation. In other words, the consultant may be telling their boss whether they deserve a raise.

With the looming recession, their might be growing public momentum to probe the otherwordly pay of CEO's. Indeed, the oversight committee's general investigation will hold a hearing on the well-compensated CEO's of companies responsible for the subprime mortgage crisis.

So these could be high-anxiety times even for the super-rich.

All Oversight Is Local

Matthew Blake — Mon, 04 Feb 2008 23:42:54 GMT

Rep. Tom Davis (R-Va.), a ranking member of the House Oversight and Government Reform committee, announced Thursday that his 14th year in Congress would be his last. Davis was first elected in 1994, one of many Republicans who won on Newt Gingrich's "Contract with America" platform that year. He may have been one of the lesser-known foot soldiers in that "Republican revolution," when the GOP took control of the House for the first time in 40 years, but his impact could prove more lasting than almost any other congressman.

Davis chaired the House Government Reform Committee from 2003-2007. This gave him the power to investigate and subpoena anything government-related. A lot was going on: faulty Iraq intelligence information, Guantanamo Bay, Abu Ghraib, possibly industry-influenced energy energy and Medicare legislation. But the committee mostly chose to ignore these and other controversial issues. "Davis wasn't interested in calling attention to the weaknesses of the GOP caucus or the Bush administration," said Craig Holman, the legislative director of Public Citizen, a government watchdog group.

Davis instead wielded his broad power to investigate an eclectic mix of subjects. His most high-profile action was holding a dramatic, ESPN-televised, hearing where the committee grilled baseball stars about steroids.

Otherwise, Davis focused about a quarter of his hearings on issues specific to Washington and his suburban constituency in Virgina's Fairfax County. That total includes hearings where Davis urged the Pentagon to move more quickly in rewarding contracts to Fairfax County-based companies. The result of Davis's tenure, from the perspective of many House Democrats and good government groups, is that Congress has fallen years behind in scrutinizing the Bush administration.

It didn't have to be this way. On Davis's retirement announcement, The Washington Post noted he lacked either the ideological stridency or confrontational demeanor of his Contract with America cohort. "You got to remember about that Congress is that they were bullies," Holman says. "Tom Delay was a bully. Davis wasn't."

Davis spokesman Brian McNicoll said his boss worked hard to counter the Democrat's contempt for the committee that had developed under his predecessor, Rep. Dan Burton (R-Ind.). The oversight chairman has the power to issue subpoenas without consulting the full committee, and Burton served more than 1,000 subpoenas to Clinton administration officials between 1998 and 2002. "He is the most proud of the fact the committee functioned in a bipartisan fashion again," McNicoll says about his boss.

Henry A. Waxman (D-Calif.), the current chairman of the House Oversight Committee, agrees that Democrats could work with Davis. "Tom Davis's departure will leave a big hole in our committee and in Congress," said Waxman's spokeswoman, Karen Lightfoot. "He is a tremendously effective member, a skilled consensus builder, and a great friend to many of us."

Yet just because they could work with Davis didn't mean they often did. In November 2005, Waxman told the The Boston Globe, "When Clinton was in office there wasn't an issue to small to hold a hearing on and embarrass the Democrats. Now there isn't a scandal big enough to ignore." Then-House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif), said to The Washington Post a month later, "The House has absolutely zero oversight."

Democrats pointed out that while Burton issued 1,052 subpoenas for Clinton White House officials, Davis's committee issued three for Bush White House officials. Their frustration led to a January 2006 report by Waxman's minority staff entitled, "Congress's Abdication of Oversight." It enumerated issues that Congress should be investigating but wasn't -- including the Bush administration's manipulation of intelligence information on Iraq, the possible torture of detainees, rewarding no-bid contracts, the leaking of Valerie Plame's identity, warrantless eavesdropping and the influence of industry lobbyists in environmental, energy and health care law, The report concludes that Davis's committee has created an "accountability gap" where allegations of serious misconduct remain mired in the allegations stage.

But Davis was undeterred by this report. In what turned out to be his final year as committee chair, he released a 104-page report called, "Oversight Matters!"

"True," Davis wrote in the report, "It's not the politically charged, inquisitorial gotcha oversight that some might prefer. But effective, constructive oversight is much more a matter of due diligence and digging than depositions and sensational disclosures." So what was the committee diligently digging up?

Davis held 68 full committee hearings in his last two years as committee chair. Thirteen dealt with matters specific to Washington and its suburbs -- from metrorail service to the District's underfunded school system.

Other probes did examine under-exposed national problems, like fraud in the Interior Department and inconsistent administration of flu shots. Davis's oversight on war contracting, especially the rewarding of contracts to technology companies, was another matter.

He did hold several hearings on government contracting, including some critical of no-bid contracts quickly rewarded after Hurricane Katrina. But with committee Democrats calling to slow down and reassess contractors, Davis took the opposite tack. Hearings like "Modernizing the Federal Acquisitions Workforce," concluded that the problem was that the Pentagon hadn't been given clearance fast enough for contracts. "Davis kept trying to put in procurement legislation that accelerated the contracting process under the guise of reform," said Dina Rasor, founder of the Project of Government Oversight, a non-profit that investigates government misconduct.

For Davis, defense contracting may have been personal. Two months after Davis was named oversight chairman, his friend and former business partner Donald Upson became a consultant with ICG, a company that advises technology firms how to win government contracts. One of Upson's first hires was Jeannemarie Devolities, who would soon marry Davis.

ICG would arrange for its clients to have dinner with Davis, to meet in his office and even testify before the committee on the value of private contractors. Upson once wrote a letter to the Pentagon on committee letterhead demanding that his client, Art Intel, Inc, a Reston, Va. satellite service company, keep a $2.2. billion government contract in danger of being terminated.

Davis has maintained he never wrote that letter, and said that Upson never abused their friendship to obtain favorable treatment for his clients. Indeed, Davis had other, more banal, motivations like the billions of dollars that contractors like Lockheed Martin, Haliburton and Booze Allen Hamilton pump into Fairfax Country's economy. Since 2001, about 70 percent of commercial office leases in Northern Virginia have gone to defense contractors.

Nevertheless, Davis will leave Congress with his reputation intact as a cooperative moderate with some oversight accomplishments. It's a matter of debate how much more Democrats and watchdog groups could have expected from him.

"It's all relative," said Thomas Mann, a senior fellow at the Brookings Institution and co-author of "The Broken Branch: How Congress Is Failing America And How To Get It Back On Track." "The committee is doing a lot more investigations now, but they held legitimate hearings and asked tough questions under Davis."

"Davis was cordial," says Rasor, "but he just halted investigations if it meant looking at the White House and Dick Cheney."

Rescuing the FDA

Matthew Blake — Tue, 05 Feb 2008 22:07:56 GMT

An obscure, bureaucratic report last November concluded that the Food and Drug Administration is on the brink of collapse. The findings improbably led to congressional hearings, additional audit and then a New York Times editorial Sunday that, "The near unanimity about the agency’s weaknesses — among Congressional Democrats and Republicans, industry and consumer groups, and authoritative independent analysts — is striking." So now House Democrats are saying that the report's authors, a three-member advisory panel of the F.D.A. Science Board's Subcommittee on Science and Technology, and not George Bush should determine the agency's budget.

Four prominent legislators- John Dingell, Mich. chair of the Energy and Commerce Committee Henry A. Waxman, Calif., chair of the Committee on Oversight and Government Reform, Bart Stupak, Mich., energy's investigations subcommittee chair, and Frank Pallone Jr., energy's health subcommittee chair- wrote a letter today requesting the advisory panel submit their own fiscal-year 2009 budget. The budget should "provide the resources needed to allow the agency to avert the kind of catastrophe described in the Science Board's report." The President's budget does include a 5.7 percent funding increase for the FDA, which the letter complains, "barely covers the cost of inflation."

So what is this looming catastrophe? The report concluded that, "F.D.A.'s inability to keep up with scientific advances means that American lives are at risks." The President and Congress have exponentially increased the agency's responsibilities in approving drugs and investigating contaminants without providing the money and scientists to get the work done. In fact, the F.D.A. computer system is so unreliable that the agency produces handwritten reports on possible dangerous products.

Democratic charges of executive branch incompetence are not unique. What is unique is that leading Democrats are handing government agency advisory panelists the chance of their careers to defy the White House.

Shut the Door on Open Government Act

Matthew Blake — Wed, 06 Feb 2008 15:39:20 GMT

President Bush may love freedom, but he continues to express reservations about freedom of information. In today's Washington Post, Elizabeth Williamson picks up on a part of the President's 2009 budget proposal that tweaks a month-old law requiring government agency's prompt response to Freedom of Information Requests.

The Open Government Act requires government agencies to respond to Freedom of Information Act requests within 20 days or get fined. If the agency- be it the State Department or EPA- doesn't produce the FOIA documents, an omsbudsman at the National Archives and Record Administration investigates what's going on.

Bush wants to move the omsbudsman over from the National Archives to the Justice Department- the agency that represents other agencies when citizens sue them for not responding to FOIA queries. And since 9/11, Justice has explicitly told agencies refuse as many FOIA requests as possible in the name of national security.

Bush signed the law in December after it passed the Senate and House by unanimous consent. Sen. Patrick Leahy, D-Vt., now says he is following it in a way contrary to its intent. Apparently the intent wasn't to further complicate FOIA requests.

Steroid Saga Takes Turn for Dramatic, Gross

Matthew Blake — Thu, 07 Feb 2008 20:25:12 GMT

Congress's sweeping probe into performance enhancing drug use in baseball now seems more like a public feud between Roger Clemens and his ex-personal trainer Brian McNamee.

McNamee walked into the House's Rayburn office building this afternoon carrying seven-years old bloody syringes, vials and gauze pads. His lawyer's promised that this unseemly trash is the treasure proving his client truthfully accused Clemens of using steroids and human growth hormones.

McNamee presumably told Congressional investigators the same thing under oath this afternoon. Clemens responded by flying back to Washington today for an impromptu talk with House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform Chairman Henry A. Waxman, D-Calif., and ranking Republican Tom Davis, R-Va.

Clemen's lawyer, Lanny Breuer- who last appeared before the oversight committee representing Haliburton, said McNamee's production of doping paraphernalia strains credibility. Breuer might have a point, considering McNamee did not tell George Mitchell when Mitchell was working on his Justice Department report on performance enhancing drugs in baseball. In fact, McNamee withheld the evidence until yesterday- the day after Clemens talked to investigators.

A McNamee lawyer has declared that "it's war" between his client and Clemens. Another Clemens lawyer, Rust Hardin, fired back today that it's, "a psycho thing, his sitting on syringes for nine years."

The oversight committee has pressed on with issuing subpoena's and calling hearings saying steroids in baseball is an important public health issue. Will they draw their focus on nailing Clemens (or McNamee) or will they refocus on how doping undermines Major League Baseball, sets a bad example for the kids, etc.? Tune in next Wednesday when McNamee, Clemens and his Yankee teammates give televised testimony before the committee.

Watchdogs Undermined by Political Appointees

Matthew Blake — Mon, 11 Feb 2008 16:09:10 GMT

Illustration by: Matt Mahurin

The inspectors general for 64 federal agencies are the government's frontline against waste, fraud and abuse. It sounds like a salutary public service. But the performances and experiences of inspectors general vary alarmingly and now Congress is reassessing an office created after Watergate to rein in the executive branch.

In two weeks, the Senate will debate the Inspector General Reform Act of 2007, according to aide for Sen. Claire McCaskill (D-Mo.), a bill co-sponsor. Meanwhile, the House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform collected a survey last week from the majority of inspectors general, listing the recommendations they have made during the Bush administration that have gone unimplemented.

The Senate legislation -- the House passed a Reform Act in November -- would "ensure that IGs remain autonomous and operate independent of the agencies they oversee," said Beth Petite Lavine, spokeswoman for Sen. Charles Grassley (R-Ia.) a bill co-sponsor. The oversight committee is looking at what happens when the agencies allow the investigations but ignore the findings.

Both efforts are part of a sentiment expressed by Democrats and Republicans in Congress who focus on oversight as well as by analysts who study the federal bureaucracy: the White House-appointed leadership at federal agencies is undermining the watchdogs. "This is a crisis," argued Kenneth Gold, director of Georgetown University's Government Affairs Institute, "The IG's power has diminished."

Beverley Lumpkin, an investigator for the non-profit Project on Government Oversight, agrees. But she emphasizes it's more than a blame-Bush situation. "Things are not much worse in the Bush administration," Lumpkin said, "It's been a problem for 20 years. Administrations take advantage of the fact that agency heads control so much."

Advocates for inspector general reform argue that there are essentially three ways the office of inspector general has been politicized and consequently lost its bite. The first is the matter of a rogue inspector general stonewalling his own staff's investigations. In the past year, six inspectors general have been investigated by a committee of their peers for allegations like stopping staff investigations on administration political appointees, cutting back on staff while giving themselves a raise and abusive treatment of employees.

The most well-known case is that of the State Department IG, Howard "Cookie" Krongard. Krongard resigned shortly after deceiving the House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform about knowing whether his brother was on the Blackwater advisory board. Blackwater was one of several State Department contractors Krongard had ordered his staff to stop investigating.

While Secretary of State Condoleeza Rice didn't seem to mind that Krongard stopping investigations, agency heads have taken action on IG's who started them. The CIA's John Helgerson appears to be the latest IG to be undermined in this way. Helgerson issued scathing reports on issues like the intelligence agency failing to anticipate 9/11 and the agency's disregard for humane interrogation practices. So the Central Intelligence Agency turned the tables last October, and started investigating Helgerson on the premise of helping him do his job better.

Last week with no public explanation, the CIA director, Gen. Michael Hayden, announced the appointment of an ombusdman for Helgerson. "This is especially troubling," said Brian Miller, inspector general of the General Services Administration, "because it may tend ultimately to subvert the independence of inspectors general."

Miller knows about going up against an agency head. GSA Administrator Lurita Doan told Miller last year that he was terrorizing employees by scrutinizing whether they were getting the best deal on the $56 billion worth of contracts purchased by GSA. Doan subsequently wrote an e-mail to GSA regional administrators stating, "Everyone now understands we have challenges with our OIG. ... This is going to require a lot of work to fix and I'm going to need your help."

"Psychologically it is extremely hard for people who take their jobs seriously and want to improve GSA to work in a climate where the agency head is openly hostile to the duties those people must perform," said David Farley, a spokesman for the GSA's office of inspector general.

Doan also took the extraordinary step of reducing Miller's budget. One key provision of the Senate legislation, according to McCaskill's aide, is that inspectors general would be able to send their budget proposal straight to Congress and the White House. Another key provision would set up an "integrity council," independent of the White House, with the ability to discipline IG's not aggressively investigating their agencies.

The legislation doesn't tackle the third obstacle to effective IG's, when the agency is simply looking the other way. That was the problem Clark Kent Ervin experienced as the first inspector general of the Department of Homeland Security. "This administration has tended more to ignore recommendations than to actively fight or obstruct investigations," Ervin said.

Sen. John F. Kerry may have cited Ervin's scathing audits during the 2004 presidential campaign, but DHS ignored them. After publicly feuding with the White House, Ervin left in December 2004.

Still, a good deal of work by inspector generals is implemented. Roll Call newspaper reported last year that IG's provided the government $9.9 billion in potential savings from audit recommendations and $6.8 billion in investigative recoveries. And some IG's are neither thwarting investigations nor being thwarted. "Everyone in town agrees that Glenn Fine at the Justice Department and Earl Devaney at Interior are great," said Lumpkin, of the Project of Government Oversight.

Lumpkin added that the public doesn't know about the work of a lot of other good ones because the administration is interfering with it. And this, she said, "is a problem that's reached it's boiling point."

Congress Cares About The Health of Kids

Matthew Blake — Tue, 12 Feb 2008 16:44:40 GMT

Illustration by: Matt Mahurin

That's the message coming from the House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform's hearing this morning, "Myths and Facts About Human Growth Hormone, B12, and Other Substances." It's the undercard to tomorrow's Roger Clemens v. Brian McNamee hearing, where the two are expected to give opposite stories under oath about Clemens' past steroid use.

Today, however, is the committee's effort to frame their baseball steroid probe around a public health issue, as opposed to talking tough to all-stars. "The media seems to think this is some publicity stunt," said Elijah Cummings, D-Md., "We're concerned about young men and women taking these substances to emulate star athletes."

Cummings and his colleagues have been asking four medical experts questions about the effectiveness and side effects of Human Growth Hormone or HGH. Along with baseball stars, lawmakers are also chiding Sylvester Stallone this morning for recently recommending HGH for people over 40.

More later on what the committee's crash-course on performance enhancing drugs.

Human Growth Hormone 101

Matthew Blake — Tue, 12 Feb 2008 18:35:36 GMT

No baseball all-stars or their personal trainers took questions at today's House oversight committee hearing. Instead, the committee spent the morning dutifully learning about the Human Growth Hormone and vitamin supplement industries.

When George Mitchell released his report on baseball steroid use in mid-December, Chariman Henry A. Waxman and ranking member Thomas Davis, R-Va., immediately called for public hearings and sworn depositions from baseball stars and their trainers that alleged performance enhancing drug use. They have since narrowed their main hearing tomorrow to the he-said, he-said feud between Yankee pitcher Roger Clemens and his ex-personal trainer, Brian McNamee.

Pundits have accused the committee of stargazing. But they tried to lay the groundwork today for what they hope to more globally gain by probing whether Clemens or McNamee is lying. Four human growth hormone and vitamin clinical experts answered questions about the effects of HGH and other supplements.

Some helpful clarifications emerged. Dr. Todd Schlifstein, who works for the New York University Department of Rehabilitation Medicine, said HGH cannot be effectively used alone to enhance athletic performance. Meaning, Schlifstein testified, that if an athlete is using HGH they have to be using anabolic steroids to make the HGH do its job.

HGH is also a growing e-commerce force, as the four experts talked about how its distributed over the internet with loose scientific facts and celebrity endorsements.

"There's two billion dollars a year for these hucksters," said Thomas T. Perls, an Associate Professor the Boston University School of Medicine. Perls testified that there is essentially an internet "cult" for hormone-increasing drugs.

Schlifstein concurred that the public is getting rooked. "They're getting information from the same place that's trying to sell them something," he testified.

Which is where Congress might come in.

"The federal government may be able to specifically address the network that is distributing propaganda to young people," argued Brian P. Bilbray, R-Calif. "This is a predatory activity."

Young athletes wanting to get stronger and old people wanting to look younger were cited by both panelists and lawmakers as the most vulnerable to HGH. In his remarks, Waxman elaborated how the FDA must also play a role in regulating HGH and preventing the many fraudulent growth hormone products flooding the market.

So the committee made the case that they're looking at a legit public health issue. And if they have to cite over-sized celebrities as examples, so be it.

"There is unfortunately a tendency for the good-looking body in the run way being connected to steroid and human growth hormone," said Darrell Issa, R-Calif. Issa cited as examples Stallone, Hulk Hogan, California Gov. Arnold Scwarzengger and former Minnesota Gov. Jesse Ventura.

"We have had at least two governors who had incredibly good looking bodies that maybe contributed to their elections," Issa concluded.

But should there be an asterisk behind Ventura's 1998 electoral triumph?

Juice for Congressional Oversight

Matthew Blake — Wed, 13 Feb 2008 14:46:34 GMT

I will be posting frequently today on House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform's hearing, "The Mitchell Report: The Illegal Use of Steroids in Major League Baseball, Day 2." The witness line-up has been stripped down in facilitate maximum confrontation:

Roger Clemens, who was voted the greatest pitcher of all-time by ESPN in 2006, and says he never took steroids

Brian McNamee, Clemens personal trainer for five years, who told George Mitchell he gave Clemens steroids.

Charlie Scheeler, an investigator on George Mitchell's staff.

It is widely speculated that Clemens will go down in flames today- either retracting his bold declarations of innocence or setting himself up for a perjury charge. On the other hand...

Brian McNamee's credibility has been increasingly called into question. And as ESPN.com's Howard Bryant explains in an excellent analysis piece, questioning McNamee means questioning Mitchell.

Mitchell, Bryant points outs, has thus far been above reproach. But his report would have been not much more than a really long term paper on baseball's "steroids era" if the federally investigated McNamee had not been given immunity to spill the beans.

Will McNamee damn Clemens or Mitchell? Will the committee circle back to the broad, public health issue of educating young athletes about steroids? Will Chairman Henry A. Waxman, D-Calif., staff reveal previously unknown evidence, which it often does? Stay tuned.

Perjury for Clemens?

Matthew Blake — Wed, 13 Feb 2008 15:52:29 GMT

C-SPAN 3 streaming audio is a virtual adventure...but one thing clearly emerged from the opening statements by Henry Waxman and Tom Davis: Clemens lied in his sworn deposition.

Clemens Not Guilty, Says Clemens

Matthew Blake — Wed, 13 Feb 2008 15:58:12 GMT

"If I'm guilty of anything it's of trusting people too much."
- Clemens' opening statement

Clemens is now being grilled by Maryland Dem. Elijah Cummings for describing Andy Petite as honest but then inisinuating Petite is lying about Clemens taking HGH. Clemens said Petite "misheard" and "misremembers" conversations the two friends had.

Roger Clemens Is A Public Health Issue

Matthew Blake — Wed, 13 Feb 2008 16:21:22 GMT

"The good news is that everybody understand dangers of steroids and HGH," ranking Republican Tom Davis of Virginia says to the witnesses. And then he moves to grill Clemens.

This statement seems to abandon the pretense that today's hearing will educate us about the effect on steroids on athletes. It's the personal drama of Clemens v. McNamee, which admittedly makes for totally engrossing C-SPAN 3 streaming audio.

McNamee Under Fire

Matthew Blake — Wed, 13 Feb 2008 16:34:57 GMT

Rep. John Tierney (D-Mass.) gets Brian McNamee to establish on the record that he wasn't truthful to federal investigators during the compilation of the Mitchell Report. McNamee lied about the number of times he injected Clemens and Chuck Knoblauch, "in part to protect these players."

Tierney also brought up how McNamee deceived police in 2001 when he was accused of rape.

McNamee admits he lied then, too.

Tierney Corners Clemens

Matthew Blake — Wed, 13 Feb 2008 16:48:05 GMT

Clemens put in his sworn deposition that "I've never researched human growth hormone. I couldn't tell you the first thing about it."

Yet Clemens admits his wife, Debbie, was injected with HGH by McNamee and developed circulation problems.

Tierney: "You want us to believe that McNamee injected your wife without your knowledge?"

Currently, Indiana Republican Dan Burton is taking the tack of calling McNamee a weirdo for keeping syringes and vials in his apartment for seven years.