Government Rewards Business Buddies

Wired article on Bush cronies making money off Katrina.

"Companies with ties to the Bush White House and the former head of FEMA are clinching some of the administration's first disaster relief and reconstruction contracts in the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina.

At least two major corporate clients of lobbyist Joe Allbaugh, President George W. Bush's former campaign manager and a former head of the Federal Emergency Management Agency, have already been tapped to start recovery work along the battered Gulf Coast. "

This is not to say that companies who are in that business should not be involved, it's to highlight the fact that people in power are there because of their ties to big business. They serve their connections to corporations before they think of the people in need of help. How fast did they figure out how to get oil from our reserves in Alaska and from European reserves? Much faster than they got food and water to the people in New Orleans.

When you point out to Bush fans how much you hate Cheney and his former company Halliburton, they never see it objectively. They see his Vice Presidency and his being former CEO of Halliburton as two independent coincidences. Why would one have anything to do with the other? And once they can not see that connection, all other subsequent connections between governental decisions and the corporations that fund them go uncontested. Thus, no anger.

Just like the way they view "handouts". Welfare to a Republican is the ultimate waste in goevernment. Why just give away money? But a no-bid contract to a company the VP used to run, that is a necessity. Or a tax break for the rich or trying to get rid of estate taxes, these are needed to spark our economy. But keeping the economy going by looking after everyone, especially the less fortunate, that is waste. You can only sustain long term improvements in our socity by taking care of everyone, not just the top 10%, who by the way, are pretty good at taking care of themselves.