Watch Waxman Hearings Live This Morning!

[CorpGovActivist]

Follow the link from here (the hearing begins at 10 a.m. ET): http://oversight.house.gov/

The witness lists for the upcoming hearings: http://oversight.house.gov/story.asp?ID=1163

Hearing notice and witness list: http://oversight.house.gov/Documents/20070205160839-14629.pdf

Welcome to oversight in the Age of the Internet.

- Dave

[tabasco]

1. Thanks for the heads up! n/t

[Buttercup McToots]

2. Goody Goody...

:popcorn:

[radfringe]

3. K&R - and can listen to it on c-span radio

http://www.c-span.org/Radio/web/schedule.asp

[Norquist Nemesis]

9. Thank you!!!!

Trying to get the link from the gov site to work had become impossible.

[The Count]

4. Cool!

[babylonsister]

5. Thanks so much! nt

[CorpGovActivist]

6. The Description of Bremer...

"Ambassador Paul Bremer will testify for the first time since leaving as head of the U.S.-run Coalition Provisional Authority. He will answer questions about an audit report issued in 2005 by the Special Inspector General for Iraq Reconstruction that concluded that more than $8.8 billion in cash was disbursed without adequate financial controls. Ambassador Bremer will also be asked to respond to allegations that the CPA filled positions with unqualified staff who were politically connected."

[Greeby]

7. Just heard mic checks

:popcorn:

[CorpGovActivist]

8. State Department Refuses to Let New "Point Man" on Iraq Reconstruction to Testify

See the * beside his name today: http://oversight.house.gov/Documents/20070205160839-14629.pdf

Waxman is tearing into this issue right now.

- Dave

[CorpGovActivist]

10. Tom Davis (R) Says Today's Testimony "Old News"

They need a new playbook.

- Dave

[halobeam]

11. Shato sp? speaking now...

status quo is no way to proceed....

[halobeam]

12. Cummings addressed the new budget for defense

not happy with it, to say the least.

[flyarm]

13. why is this not on tv?? cspan 1 ,2 or 3?? i just checked and its not on!!

looks like the white house is controling what we see on cspan ...this sucks!!

fly

[CorpGovActivist]

17. At Any Given Time...

... there are multiple events going on worthy of coverage.

Decentralized distribution of this sort of A/V feed is the way to go, I think. I applaud the committee staff for putting this up off the committee's website, independently of C-SPAN.

As more committees do this, it will be interesting to see if C-SPAN steps up with a centralized repository to archive these.

- Dave

[originalpckelly]

24. I'm curious...

is there a video feed of this anywhere on the committee site? The senate and other committees in the house usually have them.

[CorpGovActivist]

28. Yes, Here

http://oversight.house.gov/story.asp?ID=1164

[originalpckelly]

30. THANKS! Everyone this is the video link, not an audio link so use it!

:woohoo:

[halobeam]

18. we are witnessing the ultimate suppression of media...

on the trial, on the hearings lately, just flat out suppression. disgusting

[ralps]

33. It is on C-SPAN, now & it will be on C-SPAN2 later. Here's the schedule

http://inside.c-spanarchives.org:8080/cspan/schedule.csp

[caledesi]

50. It's ON! Go to cpan2. nt

[sabra]

14. Congressman Issa: If you divide 12 billion over the Iraq population

it's only $600 a person. So it's really no big deal... :crazy:

[halobeam]

19. what a jerk... thinks ppl are so stupid.

[halobeam]

15. Kucinich up!

[radfringe]

16. 10:30ish am Kucinich talking now n/t

[helderheid]

20. Just tuned in - did I miss much?

[CorpGovActivist]

22. With Any Luck...

... it will be archived on the committee's site at the conclusion.

- Dave

[helderheid]

25. thanks. I love DU. :)

[halobeam]

23. opening statements right now..

I missed reference to Carney sp? not "available" to tesify.... need to read up on that..

[helderheid]

26. thanks!

:hi:

[blm]

21. Kick for action by the anti-corruption, open government wing of the Democratic Party.

.

[originalpckelly]

27. HOLY SHIT! A fucking Republican just said the coolest stuff...

sounded just like Joe Scarborough! He talked about the President's interventionist foreign policy, something that conservatives are usually against! He also called Bush on not holding to his campaign promise of a humble foreign policy. It was fucking amazing!

[helderheid]

29. DIRECT link to stream:

http://boss.streamos.com/wmedia-live/groc/16423/200_groc-110oversighthearings_070129.asx

[Marie26]

31. I think this should be the official photo:

"A $33,000 food order in Mosul was billed to the U.S.-led interim government of Iraq at $432,000. Electricity that cost $74,000 was invoiced at $400,000. Even $10 kettles got a 400 percent markup.

Documents unearthed as part of a whistleblower suit against Fairfax, Va.'s Custer Battles reveal for the first time the extent to which the defense contractor is accused of gouging the Coalition Provisional Authority, which governed Iraq following the U.S. invasion of the country in 2003.

For critics of the Bush administration's handling of postwar Iraq, Custer Battles has become something of a symbol of contractor excess during the 14-month period that the Coalition Provisional Authority governed Iraq. The company was able to secure tens of millions of dollars' worth of security and logistical contracts from the CPA -- despite the fact that it didn't even exist until just months before the invasion of Iraq.

Last fall, Custer Battles was suspended from government contracting after Pentagon investigators documented evidence indicating that the company had defrauded the CPA by inflating its costs. The scheme, according to the investigation, involved a series of "sham" companies that were used to produce false invoices and hide the actual costs of items."

http://www.law.com/jsp/article.jsp?id=1109859526942

$9 billion lost? We know exactly where it went.

[midnight]

34. Wow that is alot of cash. Does anyone know the date on this

photo?

[Marie26]

51. Sorry, I don't know

It was taken during the CPA's reign, sometime in 2003-2004. Here's another one.



Above: a guard with $58 million in cash that our government gave to a convicted felon to disburse in Iraq for rebuilding.

NY TIMES

"Robert J. Stein Jr. could not have been clearer about his feelings toward the American businessman who was receiving millions of dollars in contracts from Mr. Stein to build a major police academy and other reconstruction projects in Iraq.

"I love to give you money," Mr. Stein wrote in an e-mail message to the businessman, Philip H. Bloom, on Jan. 3, 2004, just as the United States was trying to ramp up its rebuilding program in Iraq.

As it turned out, Mr. Stein had the money to give. Despite a prior conviction on felony fraud that his Pentagon background check apparently missed, Mr. Stein was hired and put in charge of at least $82 million of reconstruction money in the south central Iraqi city of Hilla by the Coalition Provisional Authority, the American-led administration that was then running Iraq.

http://neoprogblog.blogspot.com/2006/02/oh-and-while-were-screwing-things-up.html

[Blackhatjack]

41. Wraps himself in the noble soldiers serving in Iraq.....

This should be good since there are no adequate answers to the questions he is about to be asked, except for massive greed, graft, corruption and outright theft.

[Marie26]

54. There is no defense

But I'm sure that won't stop him from trying. Spin, spin, spin.

[radfringe]

32. kickity kick

[Hubert Flottz]

35. I can hardly hear the people speaking at the link...

http://oversight.house.gov /

I have the sound system and the control on the player maxed out and still can't hear it! Maybe the sound is froze up? It's four above zero here!

[radfringe]

36. radio link coming in fine at c-span

http://www.c-span.org/Radio/web/schedule.asp

[Hubert Flottz]

38. Thank you!

Loud and clear!

[goodhue]

37. works for me

It's three below here

[Norquist Nemesis]

39. Finally! Opening comments done; Witness statements next

*sigh* Hope they hold close to the time on the witness statements

Swearing them in

[Norquist Nemesis]

40. Bremer opening statements first

(Isn't he Bush's cousing or related somehow?)

[Blackhatjack]

42. Oh I see, the operation was a success.... so no need to ask any questions..n/t

[Norquist Nemesis]

45. CPA did everything 'right'; It was the Iraqi's fault that there were

failures and shortcomings. Oh, goody! Isn't he sweet to fill in the blanks of "what the audit did not say". Whatever would we have done without him!

:banghead: :banghead: :banghead: :banghead: :banghead: :banghead: :banghead: :banghead: :banghead: :banghead: :banghead: :banghead: :banghead: :banghead: :banghead: :banghead: :banghead: :banghead: :banghead: :banghead: :banghead: :banghead: :banghead: :banghead: :banghead: :banghead: :banghead: :banghead:

[OmmmSweetOmmm]

43. BS meter on Bremer -- Paying Iraqi's? Wouldn't most of them been Baathist's

and those people were put out in the cold?

[Marie26]

44. He paid US defense contractors

w/that money, not Iraqis. It was total graft & fraud.

[OmmmSweetOmmm]

46. Exactly. eom

[Blackhatjack]

47. No evid of fraud, or stolen money, .... so why are we here? n/t

[Marie26]

56. Ugh.

Who said that?

[Norquist Nemesis]

48. Tierney bringing up hiring practices issue!

:popcorn:

Talking about people being hired just out of college and paid $100,000 dollars. Staff qualifications, political leanings, etc. "Who did the hiring?"

Bremer: (clears throat)...

[sabra]

49. Congressman Mica is spewing so much nonsense

[helderheid]

52. KOOCH!

[bdamomma]

53. this is on c span 2 now being televised

Dennis is up.

[blogslut]

55. KUCINICH: "Let me refresh your memory, Mr. Bremer"

Where did the money go, dickhead?

[CorpGovActivist]

57. One of the Highlight Moments n/t

[conscious evolution]

58. I missed it all

But I read these http://oversight.house.gov/contact.asp

Anyone have a link to an archive of the hearing?

[LSK]

59. Repeating right now on CSPAN2