LA Times Blog: Blackwater's chairman and the GOP

[RamboLiberal]

You saw a lot of Erik Prince on TV the last couple of days, spending considerable time calmly fending off inquiries from agitated Democratic congressmen about his security company's suddenly controversial activities in Iraq. One explanation may be that Prince, the head of Blackwater, U.S.A., has a lengthy political pedigree as a Republican.

Members of the House Oversight Committee, which is chaired by Rep. Henry Waxman (D-Beverly Hills), accused Blackwater employees of being "cowboys" who acted recklessly during their contracted security duties for the State Department in Iraq. It also came out that Blackwater, which has lost some three dozen employees in Iraq hostilities, has a 100% success rate in protecting VIPs under its contract.

This may shock some, but it also turns out that the target of the committee's angry questions was a 38-year-old former Navy SEAL who has donated $230,000 to federal campaigns and causes in the last decade. Almost all of that money has gone to Republicans, according to a check of Federal Election Commission records by The Times' campaign finance expert, Dan Morain.

Prince's latest donation was in July, when he gave $20,000 to the National Republican Congressional Committee. California recipients of Prince’s $1,000 checks include Reps. Jerry Lewis and Duncan Hunter, a current GOP presidential candidate, and former Rep. Richard Pombo.

http://latimesblogs.latimes.com/washington/2007/10/bwater.html

[Kagemusha]

1. So what's this guy's angle? That Prince was questioned solely because he's GOP?

a Republican supporter, that is. (Subject line is only so long.) Is the writer pushing that political reasons is the only reason Democrats have ire towards him?

[MasonJar]

2. The reason he was never questioned before January is now evident.

[spanone]

3. prince wasn't the least bit intimidated by the congress committee

the fix is in.