President Bush said Friday the United States will expect Vice President Dick Cheney’s former company to pay back money that it is suspected of overcharging the government on contract work in Iraq. "If there’s an overcharge, like we think there is, we expect that money be repaid," the president told reporters. A Pentagon audit found Cheney’s former company may have overcharged the Army by $1.09 per gallon for nearly 57 million gallons of gasoline delivered to citizens in Iraq, senior defense officials say. "I appreciate the Pentagon looking after the taxpayers’ money," the president said. "They felt like there was an overcharge issue." Bush said the Pentagon put the issue "right out there on the table for everybody to see and they’re doing good work. We’re going to make sure that as we spend money in Iraq, that it’s spent well, it’s spent wisely. "Their investigation will lay the facts out for everybody to see," Bush said.
Fair enough, do this a few things and it’ll blunt the Dean claims about the snugness of the administration with Halliburton et al.
I'm curious about the fact that Halliburton has apparently changed its name to "Cheney's Former Company, Inc." Did anyone but me notice that the old, unused, Halliburton name didn't occur once in the entire AP article?
Given the usual political playbook, it doesn't matter at this point what CFC, Inc. does or the government does. Give the money back? They're guilty and they got caught. Resolve the overcharges, showing where the additional costs were? The fix is in, courtesy of Cheney. Go out of business? They did it to protect Cheney. Put all the corporate officers in jug? They took the fall for Dick. Get the idea? |
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