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Ear to the Ground

What Does Blackwater Have to Do?

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Posted on Mar 4, 2010
pithhelmet.wordpress.com

The company formerly known as Blackwater Worldwide has been mired in scandal ever since its guards massacred some Iraqi civilians, but the government work keeps coming. Sen. Carl Levin has asked the Pentagon to think carefully about awarding a $1 billion contract to the company now known as Xe.

Reuters via Yahoo:

In letters to Defense Secretary Robert Gates and Attorney General Eric Holder, Senate Armed Services Committee Chairman Carl Levin said there was evidence of misconduct in a previous subcontract awarded to a Blackwater affiliate to conduct weapons training for the Afghan National Army.

There was evidence, the Democratic senator wrote, that Blackwater may have used a front company for the contract, made false official statements and misled Department of Defense officials in its proposal documents.

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By rollzone, March 5, 2010 at 8:29 am Link to this comment

hello. these thugs were hired because they are very good at what they do. questioning their tactics appears incredulous, alike a competing lobbyist is paying the good Senator to attack their funding. i am more interested on full disclosure of the machinations of government, than the hired mercenaries used to enforce it. article confirms we got what we paid for.

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By Jim Yell, March 5, 2010 at 7:05 am Link to this comment
(Unregistered commenter)

Of course the problem is central to our situation. For the wealthy and well connected there is no punishment for crime. At the worst there is a couple of years in a country club prison and then back to the good time with your bank acounts and investments intact. Rich pubic servants may lose their jobs if they cross the wrong corporation, but still leave with their unearned government retirements and health care. Military Brass, the office chair kind, leave the Pentagon and go straight into the Military-Industrial Complex where they are allowed their military benifits, while servicing the corporate interests.

That is why we can get no reform of the corruption and we now have a majority in the court who are working to remove any vestige of an orderly society and to bring about a dictatorship. And, yet some still ask “why are things so bad?” This is the result of having let Nixon have a pardon. The protected officials removed from accountablity for crimes, a big mistake, a fatal mistake.

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By Xntrk, March 4, 2010 at 10:22 pm Link to this comment

The previous name of this company, coupled with the new name really tells the whole story.

Most people know what ‘black water’ is. It’s the stuff that is so nasty it has to go to the sewage treatment plant. Unlike ‘gray water’, it cannot be recycled.

If you rename the company Xe [remember, in most languages, X is pronounced Sh] that makes the new name Xe=She.

Now we have Blackwater recycled as Xe-It all makes a macabre kind of sense. Or perhaps, a very dirty joke on the US taxpayers.

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By gerard, March 4, 2010 at 7:53 pm Link to this comment

Xe-Blackwater is taking the American people by the scruff of our necks, bending us down to the ground and rubbing our noses in the filth, stench and degradation of war—and we are paying them to do it.

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