"I find it strange the laws apply to me" - rummy said

[donsu]

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/06/19/AR2006061901090.html


The topic was the largest defense procurement scandal in recent decades, and the two investigators for the Pentagon's inspector general in Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld's office on April 1, 2005, asked the secretary to raise his hand and swear to tell the truth.

Rumsfeld agreed but complained. "I find it strange," he said to the investigators, on the grounds that as a government official "the laws apply to me" anyway.

It was a bumpy start to an odd interview, as Rumsfeld cited poor memory, loose office procedures, and a general distraction with "the wars" in Iraq and Afghanistan to explain why he was unsure how his department came to nearly squander $30 billion leasing several hundred new tanker aircraft that its own experts had decided were not needed.

-snip-

"DOD is simply not positioned to deliver high-quality products in a timely and cost-effective fashion," the comptroller general of the United States, David M. Walker, said in a little-noticed April 5 critique. The Pentagon, he said, has "a long-standing track record of over-promising and un-delivering with virtual impunity."
-snip-
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would turning the Pentagon into an apartment bldg. stop "virtual impunity"?

or perhaps Sen. and Reps that are able to say NO to rummy and the pentagon would stop "virtual impunity"?

or perhaps stuffing "virtual impunity" down rummy and the brass' throats might stop "virtual impunity"?

sigh

but WAIT! "virtual impunity" IS A MONEY MAKER, it won't be stopped.

[Virginia Dare]

1. They don't even try to hide their tyranny...

it's an open book.

[donco6]

2. $30 billion. Jeez.

And I have to write a separate justification report to the feds to explain a $12.00 difference in my federal Title grants.

[MsAnthropy]

3. That's not what he said

You are misinterpreting his statement. He was whining that he had to be sworn in because as a government employee he's supposed to tell the truth ANYWAY. That's totally different--but equally ridiculous--than your interpretation. He spouts enough nonsense on his own without DU having to make shit up.

[donsu]

4. here is some more from the article

Then-Inspector General Joseph E. Schmitz, who resigned last year to take a job with a defense contractor, told senators at a June 2005 hearing that the transcript of Rumsfeld's interview was deleted from his 256-page report on the tanker lease scandal because Rumsfeld had not said anything relevant.

-snip-

Some of the blame, Walker suggested, should be laid at Rumsfeld's office, which "does not seem to be pushing" for the dramatic overhaul of the Pentagon's system needs.

The tanker procurement scandal is the poster child for these problems. The Air Force in 2004 canceled its plan to lease the tankers from the Boeing Co., amid allegations of improper collusion with the company. Former Air Force procurement officer Darleen A. Druyun and one of the interlocutors at Boeing were sent to prison; subsequent investigations showed that Druyun manipulated other large Air Force contracts to benefit military contractors.
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[Karmakaze]

5. First, let me make it clear - Rumsfeld is a war criminal...

and a plain old bastard to boot.

Having said that you are misreading what the article said. It did not say that Rumsfeld found it strange that the laws apply to him, the article said that, when asked to swear to tell the truth, he found THAT strange BECAUSE as a government official the laws applied to him.

That is still bad in my book, because he was basically complaining about having to swear to tell the truth, but it was NOT how you are describing it.