On the same day that bitter rivals Boeing and Lockheed Martin became as tight as blood brothers, “joining hands to produce rockets for the US military” — David Sirota makes this tidy list of the incestuous Bush corporate clansmen:
“Ridge, Ashcroft and Giuliani are particularly shameless,” Sirota writes on his blog. “They went from using their platforms to raise fears of terrorism, to then going into industries that are making a millions off those fears”:
JOHN ASHCROFT: Goes from Attorney General to K street lobbyist/consultant for corporations on security issues.
RUDY GIULIANI: Goes from Mayor of New York to high-paid consultant for the pharmaceutical industry. He also does security consulting work. … more below:
More from Sirota’s list:
TOM SCULLY: Goes from head of Medicare, to health care lobbyist immediately after using his government office to help pass the health care industry-written Medicare reform bill through Congress.
BILLY TAUZIN: Goes from chairman of the committee that oversees the drug industry, to the head of the drug industry’s lobbying association.
ARI FLEISCHER: Goes from top White House spokesman to opening “Ari Fleischer Communications” – a firm the New York Times reported on 7/14/03 “that will advise corporate executives.”
CHRIS WRAY: Goes from Bush’s top corporate cop to top corporate criminal defense lawyer.
Of Note: David Sirota, a fellow at the Center for American Progress, made his debut today as the official blogger for Working for Change.
Unfortunately this has been going on, on both sides, Demo and Repub, but it appears that this administration is clearly ahead on points and money making opportunities. It seemed to me that there was supposed to be a one year waiting period before anyone from the Adiminstration could begin lobbying, but I guess that only held true for the Clinton Administration. Isn’t it wonderful that so many of our public minded servants pushed through so many wonderful bills that would enrich their corporate Master’s and therefore enrich themselves when they enslaved what little integrity they had left. The worst is Dr. Sen. William Frist, who’s father created HCA, the largest Hospital chain in the country and then pushed down the throats of the American public the Medicare reform act, which only truly provides about 250bn dollars to the recipients of Medicare. It actually is a Corporate welfare bill worth 600bn dollars and guess what? Bill “let them eat cake” Frist’s Daddy’s corporate giant is going to receive somewhere in the vicinity of 150bn dollars out of that bill. Now that is politicing, get elected to the Senate, write a bill that enriches your family and then decide being a corrupt Senator is not enough, he wants to be President so he can get even more money and that nice 200K a yr for life on top of whatever he gets for being elected to the Senate. And of course he will get a nice CEO benefit package from HCA after he retires from PUBLIC screwing the people Service. Damn I can only hope that the Great Spirit has a very special place for these criminals and when they get there it is exactly what they deserve.
Standard employer/employee ethical requirements for public servants require a minimum of one year before an ex-employee can take a position with even as “semblance” of conflict of interest. Of course, someone has to care enough to prosecute.