The Progress Report November 12, 2004

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Fri, 12 Nov 2004 08:56:43 -0800

Progress Report: 'Some General Questions for Alberto Gonzalez'

" American Progress Action Fund "

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The Progress Report

by Christy Harvey, Judd Legum and Jonathan Baskin

 

November 12, 2004

ALBERTO GONZALEZ Some General Questions

HALLIBURTON A Girl's Best Friend

UNDER THE RADAR Go Beyond The Headlines

 

ALBERTO GONZALEZ

Some General Questions

 

On Wednesday, President Bush nominated his long-time friend and

current White House counsel Alberto Gonzales to be attorney general.

Gonzales " has been a Bush confidant for nearly a decade. " But it's not

enough for President Bush to have confidence in Gonzales. As Sen. Herb

Kohl (D-WI) said during Ashcroft's nomination hearings, " not only must

the president trust his attorney general, the nation must also trust

him, for, after all, the attorney general is America's lawyer. " The

nation can't trust Gonzales if they don't know where he stands on

important issues. To find out his positions, the Senate Judiciary

Committee must ask him some tough questions. Here are our suggestions:

 

DO YOU THINK THERE ARE CIRCUMSTANCES IN WHICH TORTURE IS LEGAL?:

Gonzales was involved in drafting and approved an August 2002 memo to

the president which included the opinion that laws prohibiting torture

do " not apply to the President's detention and interrogation of enemy

combatants. " The memo also said that an interrogation tactic only

constituted torture if it resulted in " death, organ failure, or

serious impairment of body functions. " In light of the Abu Ghraib

prison scandal, it would be irresponsible to have an attorney general

who believes torture is legal.

 

WOULD YOU INSIST ON STRICT COMPLIANCE WITH THE GENEVA CONVENTIONS?: In

a 1/25/02 memo to the president, Gonzales wrote, " the war against

terrorism is a new kind of war " and " this new paradigm renders

obsolete Geneva's strict limitations on questioning of enemy prisoners

and renders quaint some of its provisions. " The Constitution says that

when the United States signs an international treaty it is " the

supreme law of the land. " The attorney general, our nation's chief law

enforcement officer, should understand that.

 

WOULD YOU RECUSE YOURSELF FROM THE VALERIE PLAME INVESTIGATION?: The

Justice Department is currently investigating which senior

administration official – in violation of federal law – told columnist

Robert Novak that Valerie Plame was a covert CIA operative. Gonzales

has appeared before the federal grand jury investigating the case. As

White House counsel, Gonzales also advised White House staffers and

the president about how to handle the inquiry. As someone who advised

potential defendants (and someone who could potentially be called as a

witness at trial) it would be highly inappropriate for Gonzales to

oversee the investigation.

 

WOULD YOU RECUSE YOURSELF FROM ALL ENRON-RELATED MATTERS?: For more

than a decade, Alberto Gonzales was an attorney for Vinson & Elkins,

the firm that represented Enron. When Gonzales ran for reelection to

the Texas Supreme Court, he " received $6,500 in campaign contributions

from the company. " The Justice Department is currently prosecuting top

Enron executives – including former CEO Ken Lay. John Ashcroft recused

himself from the Enron investigation " because of contributions he

received from the company's executives during his campaign for the

Senate. " Nevertheless, Gonzales – who had a far more extensive

relationship with Enron than Ashcroft – continued to be involved in

Enron-related investigations as White House counsel.

 

WOULD YOU RECUSE YOURSELF FROM ALL HALLIBURTON-RELATED MATTERS?: The

Justice Department has launched three investigations of Halliburton:

for allegedly overcharging the military $61 million for fuel, for

allegedly bribing Nigerian officials to win a contract, and for

allegedly doing business with Iran through an off-shore subsidiary.

Halliburton was a major client of Vinson & Elkins while Gonzales was a

partner at the firm. In 1999, as a member of the Texas Supreme Court,

Gonzales accepted a $3,000 contribution from Halliburton just before

the court was to hear an appeal of a case where " a Halliburton

employee had won a $2.6 million trial verdict " against the company.

Gonzales did not recuse himself.

 

WHY DIDN'T YOU GIVE GOV. BUSH ALL THE FACTS ABOUT DEATH PENALTY

CASES?: As chief legal counsel for then Gov. Bush in Texas, Gonzales

was responsible for writing a memo on the facts of each death penalty

case – Bush decided whether a defendant should live or die based on

the memos. An analysis of these memos by the Atlantic Monthly

concluded that " Gonzales repeatedly failed to apprise the governor of

crucial issues in the cases at hand: ineffective counsel, conflict of

interest, mitigating evidence, even actual evidence of innocence. " In

the case of Terry Washington, a mentally retarded 33-year-old,

Gonzales's memo " failed to mention that Washington's mental

limitations, and the fact that he and his ten siblings were regularly

beaten with whips, water hoses, extension cords, wire hangers, and fan

belts, were never made known to the jury. "

 

HALLIBURTON

A Girl's Best Friend

 

According to newly released State Department documents, " top U.S.

officials exerted pressure " on Kellogg Brown and Root (KBR), a

Halliburton subsidiary in Iraq, to buy overpriced fuel from a Kuwaiti

company despite knowing cheaper and more effective options existed. In

December 2003, U.S. Ambassador to Kuwait Richard H. Jones ordered KBR

to contract with Altanmia, a firm " favored by Kuwait's government, "

but with " no prior experience of transporting oil. " Later that month,

Defense Department auditors announced that KBR, in collusion with

Altanmia, " may have overcharged the government by $61 million, " a

matter now under joint investigation by the Pentagon and the Justice

Department. Spurred by that and other revelations of corruption –

including one official demanding his Kuwaiti hotel buy his wife a new,

" diamond-encrusted " watch – Rep. Henry Waxman (D-CA) called for

further congressional hearings on the government's " special treatment "

of Halliburton and Altanmia.

 

OFFICIALS UNFAIRLY INFLUENCE CONTRACTS: E-mails included in the new

documents suggest Jones and other U.S. officials " unfairly influenced

the contracting process, which is supposed to be free from bias to

protect taxpayer dollars. " Administration officials " repeatedly have

asserted that only career government contracting officers got involved

in contracting matters " involving Halliburton, but the new documents

show U.S. officials not only intervened, but did so " to pressure U.S.

contracting officials to drop efforts to find cheaper fuel " and work

exclusively with a Altanmia. Evidence? On 12/6/03, Jones wrote to an

unnamed official: " Tell [KBR] we want a deal done with Altanmia within

24 hours and don't take any excuses. " The work became part of

Halliburton's existing $2.5 billion no-bid work to restore Iraq's oil

industry.

 

THERE WERE CHEAPER OPTIONS: Waxman points out the government pressured

Halliburton to work with Altanmia despite knowing that " importing fuel

from Halliburton's subcontractors in Turkey could be done at less than

half the cost. " In one e-mail dated Dec. 6, a career civil servant

with the Army Corps of Engineers complains she is being politically

pressured " to go against my integrity and pay a higher price for the

fuel than necessary…My ethics will not allow me to direct KBR to go

sole source to a contractor when I know there are other potential

sources that can provide the fuel to the people of Iraq, " she wrote.

Her efforts to stop the contract from going through were thwarted.

 

KICKBACKS AND BRIBES: Ironically, even as Jones was pushing KBR to

contract with Altanmia, the officials at the Kuwaiti firm were

complaining that KBR " repeatedly tried to extract bribes in exchange

for fuel contracts. " In the summer of 2003, Altanmia officials

approached the U.S. embassy and " complained that Halliburton was

planning to exclude it from a competition for a follow-up contract

because it had refused to pay Halliburton executives kickbacks and

bribes. " Altanmia General Manager Waleed Al-Humaidhi told State

Department officials it was " 'common knowledge' that Halliburton

officials 'solicit bribes openly.' "

 

MORE ALLEGATIONS OF CORRUPTION: The documents are a veritable laundry

list of complaints about Halliburton's corrupt behavior in Iraq. Among

the more egregious complaints: " that anyone visiting [KBR's] seaside

villas at the Kuwaiti Hilton who offers to provide services will be

asked for a bribe " ; that KBR trucks were used to " backhaul " stolen

crude oil out of Iraq for personal gain; and that Tom Crum, KBR's

Middle East chief, demanded the Kuwaiti Hilton staff buy his wife a

diamond-encrusted Cartier watch after she lost her own in the middle

of the night. Another document alleges a senior level Iraqi employee

of KBR was fired in August 2003 for complaining to company managers

about corruption.

 

 

Under the Radar

 

IRAQ – REBELS OPERATING FREELY IN IRAQ: According to military and

political analysts, the reach of Iraqi insurgents has grown so wide

across Iraq that it is increasingly " unlikely that the United States

can establish the stability needed for credible elections in January

even if its forces succeed in Fallouja. " The city may be recaptured

within days; there is, however, a " law and order vacuum in many Sunni

Muslim areas where there are no American or Iraqi forces and

insurgents can operate with impunity. " According to one analyst,

" There are large areas of countryside that are controlled 24 hours a

day by the mujahedeen, where people do not see U.S. forces. " He added,

" You need to be able to replicate the density of troops now in

Fallouja right across the Sunni Triangle, at least, and in Baghdad,

and we don't have enough soldiers to do that. "

 

MEDIA – SO MUCH FOR A FREE PRESS: Iraq's media regulator has a message

for its " free " press: " stick to the government line on the U.S.-led

offensive in Fallouja or face legal action. " According to Reuters, the

U.S. set up Iraq's Media High Commission after the fall of Saddam to

promote an independent media after years of strict governmental

control of the press. In a statement – which happened to bear the

letterhead of the Iraqi prime minister's office – the commission said

all media organizations operating in Iraq should " differentiate

between the innocent Fallouja residents who are not targeted by

military operations and terrorist groups that infiltrated the city and

held its people hostage under the pretext of resistance and jihad. "

Reuters reports it also stated the media must " set aside space in your

news coverage to make the position of the Iraqi government, which

expresses the aspirations of most Iraqis, clear. " If media

organizations did not comply, it ominously warned, " we regret we will

be forced to take all the legal measures to guarantee higher national

interests. "

 

SCIENCE – THE PRICE OF DISAGREEMENT: The Wall Street Journal reports

there's been a new casualty in the administration's assault on

science. The Food and Drug Administration removed Curt D. Furberg, a

professor at Wake Forest University, Winston-Salem, NC, from an FDA

advisory panel because he publicly questioned the safety of Pfizer

Inc.'s painkiller Bextra. Furberg, a leading expert on drug analysis,

was told " that he no longer will participate in the meeting in which

the committee will examine the safety of Cox-2 inhibitors, the class

of drugs that includes both Bextra and Vioxx, a painkiller that Merck

& Co. recently withdrew from the market. " Furberg was told by the FDA

that his invitation was rescinded " because he was quoted in the New

York Times as saying Bextra appeared similar to Vioxx and that Pfizer

sought to suppress that information. "

 

INTELLIGENCE – NO PRESIDENTIAL PUSH FOR REFORM: Don't hold your breath

waiting for the president to push for reforms in the intelligence

community. The Los Angeles Times reports, " Despite his public support

for restructuring the nation's intelligence community, President Bush

has done little to ensure that reforms modeled on the recommendations

of the bipartisan Sept. 11 commission pass in the coming lame duck

session of Congress. " The problem? Bush doesn't want to challenge

Pentagon officials, who currently control " 80% of the nation's

estimated $40 billion annual intelligence budget. Under the

restructuring plan based on the 9/11 commission's report and approved

by the Senate, much of that control would shift to a new national

intelligence director. " Thus, while Bush claims completing

intelligence overhaul is a top priority, " House and Senate supporters

of major restructuring say they have seen no sign this week of

high-level White House involvement to force a House-Senate compromise

on the competing versions of the reform bill. "