"Only dull people are brilliant at breakfast"
-Oscar Wilde		 Brilliant at Breakfast title banner "The liberal soul shall be made fat, and he that watereth, shall be watered also himself."
-- Proverbs 11:25
"...you have a choice: be a fighting liberal or sit quietly. I know what I am, what are you?" -- Steve Gilliard, 1964 - 2007

"For straight up monster-stomping goodness, nothing makes smoke shoot out my ears like Brilliant@Breakfast" -- Tata

"...the best bleacher bum since Pete Axthelm" -- Randy K.

"I came here to chew bubblegum and kick ass. And I'm all out of bubblegum." -- "Rowdy" Roddy Piper (1954-2015), They Live
Friday, July 18, 2008

Perhaps this will put an end to the idea that the private sector does everything better
Posted by Jill | 7:03 AM
For over two decades, we've heard that privatization is the way to go; that the private sector does everything better than the government ever can. This belief has persisted despite the success of federal programs like Head Start, and yes, even Social Security and Medicare.

Even after WorldCom, Enron, Countrywide, and now the IndyMac bank failure, the myth of corporate competence always being superior to that of government persists. And even though Republicans have given lip service to being supportive of, even worshipful of, the military, they've done what they can to outsource that too.

But how is it possible to defend the profit motive when it bumps up against endangering the very troops that they've been using as political props for the last seven years?

Shoddy electrical work by private contractors on United States military bases in Iraq is widespread and dangerous, causing more deaths and injuries from fires and shocks than the Pentagon has acknowledged, according to internal Army documents.

During just one six-month period — August 2006 through January 2007 — at least 283 electrical fires destroyed or damaged American military facilities in Iraq, including the military’s largest dining hall in the country, documents obtained by The New York Times show. Two soldiers died in an electrical fire at their base near Tikrit in 2006, the records note, while another was injured while jumping from a burning guard tower in May 2007.

And while the Pentagon has previously reported that 13 Americans have been electrocuted in Iraq, many more have been injured, some seriously, by shocks, according to the documents. A log compiled earlier this year at one building complex in Baghdad disclosed that soldiers complained of receiving electrical shocks in their living quarters on an almost daily basis.

Electrical problems were the most urgent noncombat safety hazard for soldiers in Iraq, according to an Army survey issued in February 2007. It noted “a safety threat theaterwide created by the poor-quality electrical fixtures procured and installed, sometimes incorrectly, thus resulting in a significant number of fires.”

The Army report said KBR, the Houston-based company that is responsible for providing basic services for American troops in Iraq, including housing, did its own study and found a “systemic problem” with electrical work.

But the Pentagon did little to address the issue until a Green Beret, Staff Sgt. Ryan D. Maseth, was electrocuted in January while showering. His death, caused by poor electrical grounding, drew the attention of lawmakers and Pentagon leaders after his family pushed for answers. Congress and the Pentagon’s inspector general have begun investigations, and this month senior Army officials ordered electrical inspections of all buildings in Iraq maintained by KBR.

“We consider this to be a very serious issue,” Chris Isleib, a Pentagon spokesman, said Thursday in an e-mail message, while declining to comment on the findings in the Army documents.

Heather Browne, a KBR spokeswoman, would not comment about a company safety study or the reports of electrical fires or shocks, but she said KBR had found no evidence of a link between its work and the electrocutions. She added, “KBR’s commitment to the safety of all employees and those the company serves remains unwavering.”


Note that she doesn't say what level that commitment is.

I wonder what Congressional Republicans and the gasbags of right-wing talk radio would be saying if a company intimately linked with, say, Al Gore had been responsible for shoddy electrical work that had killed American soldiers. And yet, when the company is associated with a Republican Vice President, there's nary a peep of outrage.

Because after all, Jesse Jackson used the "n" word, and isn't that more important than the fact that an American corporation is killing American troops rather than doing its job correctly?

Labels:

5 comments
Bookmark and Share
5 Comments:
Anonymous Anonymous said...
My husband does this kind of work for a living(general contracting/construction)and he says the really shitty thing about this story is that preventing this sort of problem is EASY. And it costs little if anything to do it.

IMO it's not just "shoddy work",it's a complete lack of giving a shit.
7/18/08, 8:31 AM  
Blogger D. said...
a mom anon: "IMO it's not just "shoddy work", it's a complete lack of giving a shit."

Um, yeah.

The libertarian stance on privatization is that private sector businesses will do better because (1) they are leaner, meaner, and more efficient than bloated, bureaucratic ol' Government, because (2) it profits them and (3) their reputations are at stake.

Except that reputation is even less quantifiable than "goodwill" (there's a formula for goodwill in accounting precisely because it's not quantifiable), and quite a few businesses ignore what can't go on the balance sheet.

Yes, this situation was preventable, but someone would have had to take time.
7/18/08, 1:22 PM  
Blogger Joyce said...
Um. Wasn't KBR a subsidiary of Halliburton until very recently?

Just saying.
7/18/08, 2:27 PM  
Blogger Fran said...
Yes - subsidiary of Halliburton.

Are we surprised?

The "private sector" is the crack cocaine of this administration and so many on the right.

Like any good addiction, the chase for the next good hit is the thrill, not the hit.
7/18/08, 6:02 PM  
Blogger Citizen Carrie said...
I had a conversation about this with my dad last year. My dad, who was a retired civilian worker at an air force base, said a lot of private contractors could put in the low bid because the cost of final government inspection was not factored into the quote. He was of the opinion that you just don't turn all of the work over to the private contractor to perform - a representative of the government had a duty to supervise the entire operation. Sounds like there's dereliction of duty in Iraq from the U.S. government too.
7/18/08, 6:21 PM  
Post a Comment
<< Home