Senator Claire does it again!

Word out today shows our own former-auditor, now-Senator Claire McCaskill wrote a letter, along with another Senator, Susan Collins (R, Maine) saying "the Pentagon has done little to collect at least $100 million in overcharges paid in deals arranged by corrupt former officials of Kellogg Brown & Root, the defense contractor, even though the officials admitted much of the wrongdoing years ago, two senators have complained in a letter to Defense Secretary Robert M. Gates."

It went on: "The letter also said that the Army had almost completely failed to move away from the monopolistic nature of the logistics contract that has paid the contractor, now called KBR, $31.3 billion for logistics operations in Iraq, Kuwait and Afghanistan.

Yow. You go, Senator! Stand up for us. Get that money.

And while this is terrific, what's particularly disturbing is that this seems to point out that our government has not only turned too much over to "the military-industrial complex", as President Eisenhower warned us, all those decades ago, but it's far worse than that: "Their letter is likely to revive allegations that the Pentagon has become so close to KBR, and relies so heavily on it, that there is little inclination or incentive to discipline the company, in response to either Congress or critics outside the government."

So our government, through the Pentagon, is so closely tied to KBR and private corporations that the people representing us don't stand up for us against outright wrongdoing on the part of the companies.

God help us.

These Senators are also pressing for the DoD and the Pentagon to competitively bid more work, in order to both save money and get the most for our finances.

It only makes sense but they aren't cooperating.

"To the irritation of KBR’s critics, the Army has generally upheld the bills the company has submitted to the military, even when the Pentagon’s own auditors have questioned the amounts."

The situation is as bad as has been suggested and suspected. The cynics are proven right.

At least we have Senators McCaskill and Collins to push for the right thing.

It looks as though we need to elect more auditors to Congress. Between this letter and her refusal to create wasteful, expensive "earmarks", she sure seems to be doing the right things.

Link to story:
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/05/04/world/americas/04contract.html?_r=1&th&emc=th