More than half of those to review Pentagon strategy for contractors. have, you guessed it!

[G_j]

ties to defense contractors..

http://theglobalreport.org/?section=news&news_section=13#Pentagon%20panel%20has%20contractor%20contacts

Pentagon panel has contractor contacts


Feb. 28- More than half of the panel members appointed to review the Pentagon's latest four-year strategy blueprint have financial ties to defense contractors with a stake in the planning process, a USA TODAY analysis shows.

Congress created the 20-member panel in 2006 to analyze the Defense Department's four-year plan, known as the Quadrennial Defense Review. Lawmakers called for the committee to provide an independent "alternate view" of the Pentagon's plan, which shapes future military policy and spending on weapons and other needs.

A dozen of the unpaid panelists were appointed by Defense Secretary Robert Gates and eight by the top Republican and Democrat members of the House and Senate Armed Services committees. Eleven work for defense contractors as employees, consultants or board directors, records show.

"The Pentagon often talks about its cooperation with industry, but this makes you wonder who's wearing the pants in this relationship," said Mandy Smithberger, national security investigator for the Project on Government Oversight.

[Lasher]

1. Fox panel oversees henhouse

The panel's co-chairmen — former Defense secretary William Perry and former National Security adviser Stephen Hadley — each work for the defense industry. Perry is chairman of the board of LGS Innovations, a division of Alcatel Lucent, which won nearly $70 million in defense contracts last year, and Hadley is on the board of Raytheon, which won more than $15.8 billion, according to government contracting data. Neither responded to requests for comment. Four other members — former diplomat Richard Armitage, retired admiral David Jeremiah, retired general Jack Keane and retired major general Robert Scales — run consulting companies that list some of the nation's largest defense firms as their clients. Jeremiah and retired general George Joulwan are also members of the board of directors of General Dynamics, a defense contractor that makes tanks, ships and other weapons while also providing intelligence services.

"It's pretty straightforward," Jeremiah said. "You disclose any affiliation that you have, they are reviewed by legal counsel, and if there's one where there is a problem, it is resolved in one of several ways. You can be recused from the discussion of that particular item."

That's not sufficient, said Janine Wedel, a George Mason University professor and author of a book on government contracting. "It's the ultimate irony when an entity ostensibly set up to provide impartial oversight is in fact rigged to be much less impartial than what it is supposed to be overseeing," she said.

http://www.usatoday.com/news/military/2010-03-01-pentagon_N.htm

Not sufficient, what an understatement. There should not be a single person on this panel who has even a remote potential for a conflict of interest. This is just disgusting.

[G_j]

6. "It's pretty straightforward"

yea, we get it all right!

[Lasher]

8. It's so easy to defeat 'precautions' such as these.

I'll recuse myself but you vote for that billion dollars my company wants. Then when it's time for you to get recused, I'll scratch your back with that new military base that your company is set up to feed on for the next hundred years. At the very least, there is bound to be quite a bit of empathy for military contractors in general from a panel that is comprised of military contractors.

[Greyhound]

2. Makes as much of exactly the same sense as everything else this White House has done.

:kick: & R

[Lasher]

9. The panel was created in 2006.

But as far as I know this White House has not done anything to shut it down or change its composition.

[maryf]

3. No surprise

Sadly...K&R

[Solly Mack]

4. k/r

Snort

[blindpig]

5. They wouldn't have it any other way....

literally.

k&r

[tekisui]

7. The revolving MIC door.

[G_j]

10. the gift

that keeps on giving

[maryf]

11. kick nt.