Cracks In The Ideology
Every once in a while I read a quote that's so monumentally stupid I recoil. You may have read about the recent woes the Coast Guard has had refitting ships; modernizing and extending its cutters was intended to upgrade their capabilities. Alas, somehow it went wrong, and the eight ships "refitted" so far have been removed from service, as dangerous cracks in the hull plating appeared under stress. Steel bands were wrapped around the ships to try and keep them together, but they were sidelined anyway.
It's another clusterfuck courtesy of Northrop-Grumman and Lockheed-Martin, who currently receive a very large slice of your tax dollars. A few congressoids got enthusiastically in favor of the program after being bribed (oops, sorry, lobbied). N-G and L-M take their 30-50% cut for doing nothing but handing it to a subcontractor. That sub was Bollinger Shipyards, whose colossal fuckup this predominantly is.
So back to stupid. There's no explanation for how Bollinger managed to get their engineering calculations so very, very wrong. The Coast Guard's own engineers predicted the problems (by doing, you known, math stuff). Bollinger's explanation?
Bollinger, it turned out, had overestimated how much stress the modified boats could handle, a miscalculation it cannot fully explain. “The computer broke for some reason,” said T. R. Hamlin, a senior Bollinger manager. “Whether it was a power surge or something, who knows?” The cursory oversight by the Coast Guard meant the mistake was not caught in time.
The computer broke? A fucking power surge? Who knows? Apparently the Coast Guard didn't even bother to fill up the oversight positions on the procurement panel. My cynical, Occam's-razor take on that? The fix was in, and there wasn't any point in overseeing a damn thing. The engineers who knew the difference between a lunchbox and a torpedo moved on to someplace they could make a difference.
So I search for "bollinger shipyards republican", on a hunch -- which these days we can also define as a "certainty". Yep, there it is. Hit #1:
Donald T. “Boysie” Bollinger is Chairman of the Board and Chief Executive Officer of Bollinger Shipyards, Inc., a family-owned business established in 1946 by Boysie’s father. Bollinger Shipyards, Inc. is a full service marine construction and repair operation headquartered in Lockport, Louisiana with 12 divisions in Louisiana, two divisions in Texas, and activities extending into the international market.Boysie Bollinger participates at both national and state levels in the political area. He served as a delegate to every Republican National Convention since 1976, and was the State of Louisiana’s Finance Chairman for the George W. Bush for President Campaign and Campaign Chair for his General Election. Boysie Bollinger was State Finance Chairman of the Louisiana Republican Party on three occasions and served on the Louisiana Republican State Central Committee.
Boysie Bollinger currently serves on the National Petroleum Council. He previously served on the President’s Export Council under the administration of President George H.W. Bush. He is past Chairman of the Governor’s Maritime Advisory Task Force, on the board of the Governor’s Advisory Commission on Military Affairs, and former Chairman of the Board of Commissioners, Port of New Orleans.
Great. Your tax dollars at work. And for half of you (perhaps less these days) -- welcome to your ideology at work.
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Epiphany #1:
Epiphany #1:
Political corruption in Lousiana. Ooooo (whoda thunkit)
Epiphany #2:
Something done in La. that leaks and/or sinks.
(Rinse wash repeat)
Ross:
Ross:
You seem surprised at corruption in Louisiana, and at incompetence in government contracting.
But you're just pretending, because you know both can be counted on like the sunrise/sunset cycle.
My biggest problem with this entire thing is the quality of the response from T.R. Hamlin. Of course, it's possible you're not telling the whole story, but I doubt that. If, after having been quoted as you cited above, Hamlin's next response was to have put a gun in his/her mouth and pulled the trigger, then it would all make sense.
When corruption and incompetence occurs (as it always does), I think we should at least expect some entertainment out of it. We like being lied to, and in fact seem to insist upon it. If the corrupt and incompetent don't feel compelled any longer to even attempt to craft an interesting lie about their foibles, where's the fun in all of this skullduggery? Where's the fucking work ethic in today's kleptocrats?
I'd write my congresscritters to complain, but since they're probably off somewhere, being "lobbied to completion" like 90% of our legislative overlords, I wouldn't be right to expect a response.
I don't see this as a particularly partisan affliction. It's endemic to the ruling class, whichever party's in power at any given level of government.
And, not that he necessarily needs such a thing just yet, in defense of the unfortunately nicknamed "Boysie" Bollinger, I'd point out that at least he's working to prevent the re-election of William "Sticky Fingers" Jefferson, which seems an unalloyed good move. On the downside, he's doing so by trying to buy Karen Carter, his opponent, so I have to remain ambivalent.
In my opinion, the Military
In my opinion, the Military/Industrial complex is as big a threat to the US military as Jihadis or the Chinese.
The big question is, will the US military eventually be destroyed by external forces, or internal forces?
I guess that's the same question we're asking about our culture and society too.
Ignore Eisenhower's warning at your own risk.
Proof, as if it were needed,
Proof, as if it were needed, that rank corruption's not party-specific, and, more important, that voters are so stupid as not to care:
"Cold Cash" Jefferson wins re-election
Not that voters necessarily had a clear-cut choice between corrupt and clean in this case, mind you.