Thread: Top 25 Censored Stories of 2006

This article doesn't show all 25 because I believe there is a book for sale re this but these are the ones the site shows.

http://www.indybay.org/newsitems/2006/1 ... 333520.php

Top 25 Censored Stories of 2006

by projectcensored.org

Sunday Nov 26th, 2006 2:56 PM

Several recent studies confirm fears that genetically modified (GM) foods damage human health. These studies were released as the World Trade Organization (WTO) moved toward upholding the ruling that the European Union has violated international trade rules by stopping importation of GM foods. http://www.projectcensored.org/censored ... ndex.htm#2


#12 Pentagon Plans to Build New Landmines The Bush administration plans to resume production of antipersonnel landmine systems in a move that is at odds with both the international community and previous U.S. policy, according to the leading human rights organization, Human Rights Watch (HRW).
Nearly every nation has endorsed the goal of a global ban on antipersonnel mines. In 1994 the U.S. called for the “eventual elimination” of all such mines, and in 1996 President Bill Clinton said the U.S. would “seek a worldwide agreement as soon as possible to end the use of all antipersonnel mines.” The U.S. produced its last antipersonnel landmine in 1997. It had been the stated objective of the U.S. government to eventually join the 145 countries signatory to the 1997 Mine Ban Treaty, which bans the use, production, exporting, and stockpiling of antipersonnel landmines.
The Bush administration, however, made an about-face in U.S. antipersonnel landmine policy in February 2004

http://www.projectcensored.org/censored ... ndex.htm#2

#14 Homeland Security Contracts KBR to Build Detention Centers in the US Halliburton’s subsidiary KBR (formerly Kellogg, Brown and Root) announced on January 24, 2006 that it had been awarded a $385 million contingency contract by the Department of Homeland Security to build detention camps in the United States.

Less attention was focused on the phrase “rapid development of new programs” or what type of programs might require a major expansion of detention centers, capable of holding 5,000 people each. Jamie Zuieback, spokeswoman for ICE, declined to elaborate on what these “new programs” might be.

http://www.projectcensored.org/censored ... ndex.htm#2

#19 Child Wards of the State Used in AIDS Experiments

Children as young as three months old were used as test subjects in AIDS drug trials in New York’s Incarnation Children’s Center. The Center, which is run by Catholic Charities, specializes in treating HIV sufferers, and the drug trials were performed on children with HIV or who were born to HIV-positive mothers. The New York City Health Department is looking into claims that more than 100 children at Incarnation were used in as many as 36 experiments. Most of these experiments were sponsored by federal agencies such as the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases.

#25 Homeland Security Was Designed to Fail

It was billed as America’s frontline defense against terrorism. But badly under-funded, crippled by special interests, and ignored by the White House, the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) has been relegated to bureaucratic obscurity.

There are 15,000 industrial plants in the United States that produce toxic chemicals. According to the Environmental Protection Agency(EPA), about 100 of these plants could endanger up to a million lives with poisonous clouds of ammonia, chlorine, or carbon disulfide that could be released into the atmosphere over densely populated areas by a terror attack. Unprotected chemical plants are possible candidates for future attacks by terrorists. These are some of the most vulnerable pieces of infrastructure in America.

Following 9/11 there was a big push to increase security at all chemical plants in the United States. Democrats put forth a Chemical Security Act, the purpose of which was to codify parameters for site security, ensure safe transport of toxic materials, and prevent further accidents from happening. But Republicans defeated the bill after oil companies pumped millions of dollars into lobbying campaigns to stop it.

Aside from being hamstrung by its reluctant architects, DHS simply has not been able to compete with Iraq in the battle for resources.

Looks like some discussions of the root of our problem. Read this...

Coltan makes its way out of the mines to trading posts where foreign traders buy the mineral and ship it abroad, mostly through Rwanda. Firms with the capability turn coltan into the coveted tantalum powder, and then sell the magic powder to Nokia, Motorola, Compaq, Sony, and other manufacturers for use in cell phones and other products.
Keith Harmon Snow emphasizes that any analysis of the geopolitics in the Congo, and the reasons for why the Congolese people have suffered a virtually unending war since 1996, requires an understanding of the organized crime perpetrated through multinational businesses. The tragedy of the Congo conflict has been instituted by invested corporations, their proxy armies, and the supra-governmental bodies that support them.

The process is tied to major multinational corporations at all levels. These include U.S.-based Cabot Corp. and OM Group; HC Starck of Germany; and Nigncxia of China—corporations that have been linked by a United Nations Panel of Experts to the atrocities in DRC. Extortion, rape, massacres, and bribery are all part of the criminal networks set up and maintained by huge multinational companies. Yet as mining in the Congo by western companies proceeds at an unprecedented rate—some $6 million in raw cobalt alone exiting DRC daily—multinational mining companies rarely get mentioned in human rights reports. Sprocket notes that Sam Bodman, CEO of Cabot during the coltan boom, was appointed in December 2004 to serve as President Bush’s Secretary of Energy. Under Bodman’s leadership from 1987 to 2000, Cabot was one of the U.S.’s largest polluters, accounting for 60,000 tons of airborne toxic emissions annually. Snow adds that Sony’s current Executive Vice President and General Counsel Nicole Seligman was a former legal adviser for Bill Clinton. Many who held positions of power in the Clinton administration moved into high positions with Sony.

The article “Behind the Numbers,” coauthored by Snow and David Barouski, details a web of U.S. corruption and conflicts of interest between mining corporations such as Barrick Gold (see Story #21) and the U.S. government under George H. W. Bush, Bill Clinton, and George W. Bush, as well as U.S. arms dealers such as Simax; U.S. defense companies such as Lockheed Martin, Halliburton, Northrop Grumman, GE, Boeing, Raytheon, and Bechtel; “humanitarian” organizations such as CARE, funded by Lockheed Martin, and International Rescue Committee, whose Board of Overseers includes Henry Kissinger; “Conservation” interests that provide the vanguard for western penetration into Central Africa; and of course, PR firms and news outlets such as the New York Times.

http://www.projectcensored.org/censored ... ndex.htm#2

Greatreporter.com - Black gold: On the Coltan trail
... the tantalum processing plant operated by Bayer subsidiary H.C. Starck. ... of directors lists among others ex-US Secretary of State James Baker III, ...

Black gold: On the Coltan trail

Written by Jason Parkinson
Saturday, 23 September 2006

The manufacturers’ material of choice for mobile phones and consoles is killing the countries it's being plundered from…
Before 1998 columbite-tantalite, coltan, was an obscure natural resource. It is a mixed ore containing niobium (formerly columbium) and tantalum.

In eight years its necessity and value has increased due to rapid advancements in technology. Without coltan the technological industry would slip into crisis, with catastrophic repercussions across the Western world.

The United Nations (UN) proved illegal coltan exports from the main source in the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) has increased child labour and fuelled cross-border conflict throughout Central Africa, the objectives of war shifting from military success to a seizure of resources.

Despite international pressure condemning trade with countries harbouring appalling human rights records, the illegal exports of coltan continue for one reason - Western consumption of the latest mobile phones and computer game consoles.

Used in "super alloys" coltan strengthens, reduces corrosion and increases heat resistance. It is used in surgical implants, gas turbines, jet engines, ballistic missiles and nuclear reactors.

When tantalum is refined it is crushed into a heat-resistant powder and used to make tantalum capacitors, devices that store electrical charge and are capable of rapid release, combating power fluctuations.

It is this unique potential that makes coltan such a valuable resource. Today, tantalum capacitors are used in laptop computers, pagers, mobile phones and game consoles like Sony Playstation.

DRC contains 80 per cent of the world's entire coltan resources, which is mostly situated in the eastern provinces of Kivus and Orientale.

Coltan miners earn $10 to $50 a week, where other Congolese workers can expect $10 a month.

Miners extract the ore in a similar process as the Californian gold miners of the 1800s, digging the ore from craters in riverbeds and swilling the dirt in washtubs, the heavier coltan settling on the bottom.

Although not considered dangerous, evidence is emerging that tantalum causes tumours.

Child labour has increased alongside the escalating demand for coltan. In some areas of DRC 30 per cent of schoolchildren are reported working in mines.

In 1998 525 tons of tantalum was exported to America. Sixty per cent was used purely for the technological industry. That same year Uganda Gold Mining Limited predicted a 14 per cent annual increased growth rate.

The price jumped from $40 a kilo in 1998 to a high of $400 by 2000, steadying at around $100.

After Rwandan and Ugandan troops clashed in the Orientale province capital of Kisangani in May 2000, leaving 600,000 Congolese dead, the UN appointed an investigation panel into the Illegal Exploitation of Natural Resources.

The panel concluded Uganda president Yoweri Museveni and Paul Kagame of Rwanda were becoming the "godfathers of the illegal exploitation of natural resources".

Individuals close to Museveni were reported to be personally profiting, including his brother Salim Saleh.

In 2002, the UN reported most of DRC coltan was mined illegally and exported across the eastern borders into Rwanda, Uganda and Burundi along with other resources like gold, diamonds, cassiterite, cobalt and timber. Other routes saw DRC resources exported through Zimbabwe.

Some 85 Western companies, 18 of which were UK-registered, were accused of "directly or indirectly, deliberately or through negligence" prolonging the 1998 war to enrich individuals and fund warring factions.

Five billion dollars of assets were transferred from the DRC state mining sector to Western business networks linked to political figures and the military.

At the request of countries in the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) the UN panel instigated discussions with the listed companies, declaring in October the cases against them were "resolved" without providing reasons why.

Norman Lamb, Liberal Democrat MP and member of the 2003 Parliamentary All-Party Committee into Illegal Minerals and Conflict, called the UN results an "absolute scandal".

"You have a process in which the Security Council set up a panel of experts," he said. "They come up with allegations that couldn't be more grave, and nothing has happened as a result."

The All-Party Parliamentary Group accused Rwanda, Uganda, Zimbabwe, Burundi and Angola of plundering DRC natural resources, the first three specifically exploiting the coltan reserves. Rwanda was also accused of using prisoners to mine resources in Eastern DRC.

The international companies listed as major coltan manufacturers said they were unaware as to how or who mined the coltan for their products. Among the companies listed were Alcatel, Compaq, Dell, IBM Ericson, Nokia and Siemens. British companies Afrimex and Ventro-Star were also indicted.

By 2003 Angola, Namibia, Zimbabwe, Uganda and Rwanda all had troops in DRC, with Uganda and Rwanda prospering most from illegal resource mining.

A 1999 UN report stated 80 per cent of the $320 million Rwandan military budget was paid for by stolen DRC minerals. By 2001 the Rwandan army profited at least $20 million a month purely from coltan.

The Rwandan government defended their coltan exports, stating it was extracting 1440 tonnes of coltan per year from its own mines. This contradicted the UN report, which showed official Rwandan government statistics of coltan production were 83 tons per year.

To export illegally mined coltan a certain type of exporter is required. One exporter is alleged to be an ex-Russian KGB major who appeared on the April 2006 UN "assets freeze" list.

Rassemblement Congolais pour la Democratie, the government controlling Eastern DRC and the largest coltan resources, granted a monopoly on all coltan exports in 2000. Export contracts were received by Belgian company Cogecom Sprl.

German corporation Masingiro GmbH exported 75 tonnes of coltan to Germany via Ostend Airport between June and September 2001. The coltan was believed destined for the tantalum processing plant operated by Bayer subsidiary H.C. Starck.

Eighty per cent of DRC coltan arrives at the Sons of Gwalia in Australia for processing at the Wodgina and Greenbushes mining plants. Sons of Gwalia listed their two sole tantalum customers as the Cabot Corporation of the USA and Bayer's HC Starck.

According to a 2004 US Geological Survey, America received 450 tons of tantalum imports, 57 per cent of which was imported directly from Australia.

In August 2003, journalist and novelist Alex Shoumatoff gave a speech in New York on the ecological destruction of DRC and its indigenous gorilla population due to illegal logging and mining.

He stated most coltan resources ended up in America, through Pennsylvanian-based Cabot High Performance Materials, who made $100 million a year from grinding coltan into powder for capacitors.

Shoumatoff also implicated the Carlisle Group, the US-based global private equity investment firm fronted by George Bush senior. The board of directors lists among others ex-US Secretary of State James Baker III, ex-US Defence Secretary Frank C. Carlucci, ex-UK Prime Minister John Major and until October 2001 was the home to a $2.02 million investment from the Bin Laden family.
"Carlisle's biggest customer is the American military," Shoumatoff said. "A whole lot of coltan was just used in the attack on Iraq."

Four million people have died as a result of the war in DRC. There are 340,000 refugees in neighbouring countries, two million people are displaced and 18 million Congolese people have no public services. The human rights abuses are uncountable.

The UN and the All-Party Parliamentary Group stated it is the plundering of DRC natural resources that has escalated the war and created one of the worst the humanitarian crises in the world.

In June 2006 Norman Lamb described the 2002 UN report as a "damp squib", stating nothing happened to the companies indicted in the illegal coltan trade.

"The system is wholly floored," he said. "Public money is used to investigate then nothing is done.

"The UN says it has no powers of investigation and it is up to the individual countries to take effective action against those companies."

Lamb said it is the technology industry that is still absorbing a majority of coltan exports. He added companies should be held to account and prosecuted, but believed the only way to change the current situation was a "name and shame" and "consumer pressure" campaign.

Sony has stated their coltan supply does not come from DRC. But the dramatic increase in coltan reliance from the developed world has extended the conflict and has directly attributed to the deaths of millions.

As Labour MP Oona King put it to an Independent journalist in May 2006: "Kids in Congo are being sent down mines to die so that kids in Europe and America could kill imaginary aliens in their living rooms."


http://greatreporter.com/mambo/content/view/1322/2/

© 2006 greatreporter.com

A subsidiary of Presswire Media Ltd.

I found out recently that Boeing is hiring up retiring military brass left and right.

Also, this is a good quote from that site.

Concern over an all-powerful federal government is not paranoia, but active citizenship. As Thomas Jefferson explained, “even under the best forms of government, those entrusted with power have, in time, and by slow operations, perverted it into tyranny.” From John Adams’s Alien and Sedition Acts to FDR’s internment of Japanese Americans, the land of the free has held many contradictions and ironies. Interestingly enough, Halliburton was at the center of another historical controversy, when Lyndon Johnson’s ties to a little-known company named Kellogg, Brown and Root caused a congressional commotion—particularly after the Halliburton subsidiary won enough wartime contracts to become one of the first protested symbols of the military-industrial complex. Back then they were known as the “Vietnam builders.” The question, of course, is what they’ll be known as next

This is long but a must read from that site:

http://www.projectcensored.org/download ... _Group.pdf

This one isn't so long so I'll post.

http://www.projectcensored.org/newsflas ... locks.html

Big Media Interlocks
with Corporate America

By Peter Phillips

Mainstream media is the term often used to describe the collective group of big TV, radio and newspapers in the United States. Mainstream implies that the news being produced is for the benefit and enlightenment of the mainstream population—the majority of people living in the US. Mainstream media include a number of communication mediums that carry almost all the news and information on world affairs that most Americans receive. The word media is plural, implying a diversity of news sources.

However, mainstream media no longer produce news for the mainstream population—nor should we consider the media as plural. Instead it is more accurate to speak of big media in the US today as the corporate media and to use the term in the singular tense—as it refers to the singular monolithic top-down power structure of self-interested news giants.

A research team at Sonoma State University has recently finished conducting a network analysis of the boards of directors of the ten big media organizations in the US. The team determined that only 118 people comprise the membership on the boards of director of the ten big media giants. This is a small enough group to fit in a moderate size university classroom. These 118 individuals in turn sit on the corporate boards of 288 national and international corporations. In fact, eight out of ten big media giants share common memberships on boards of directors with each other. NBC and the Washington Post both have board members who sit on Coca Cola and J. P. Morgan, while the Tribune Company, The New York Times and Gannett all have members who share a seat on Pepsi. It is kind of like one big happy family of interlocks and shared interests. The following are but a few of the corporate board interlocks for the big ten media giants in the US:

New York Times: Caryle Group, Eli Lilly, Ford, Johnson and Johnson, Hallmark,
Lehman Brothers, Staples, Pepsi
Washington Post: Lockheed Martin, Coca-Cola, Dun & Bradstreet, Gillette,
G.E. Investments, J.P. Morgan, Moody's
Knight-Ridder: Adobe Systems, Echelon, H&R Block, Kimberly-Clark, Starwood Hotels
The Tribune (Chicago & LA Times): 3M, Allstate, Caterpillar, Conoco Phillips, Kraft,
McDonalds, Pepsi, Quaker Oats, Shering Plough, Wells Fargo
News Corp (Fox): British Airways, Rothschild Investments
GE (NBC): Anheuser-Busch, Avon, Bechtel, Chevron/Texaco, Coca-Cola, Dell, GM,
Home Depot, Kellogg, J.P. Morgan, Microsoft, Motorola, Procter & Gamble,
Disney (ABC): Boeing, Northwest Airlines, Clorox, Estee Lauder, FedEx, Gillette,
Halliburton, Kmart, McKesson, Staples, Yahoo,
Viacom (CBS): American Express, Consolidated Edison, Oracle, Lafarge North America
Gannett: AP, Lockheed-Martin, Continental Airlines, Goldman Sachs, Prudential, Target,
Pepsi,
AOL-Time Warner (CNN): Citigroup, Estee Lauder, Colgate-Palmolive, Hilton

Can we trust the news editors at the Washington Post to be fair and objective regarding news stories about Lockheed-Martin defense contract over-runs? Or can we assuredly believe that ABC will conduct critical investigative reporting on Halliburton's sole-source contracts in Iraq? If we believe the corporate media give us the full un-censored truth about key issues inside the special interests of American capitalism, then we might feel that they are meeting the democratic needs of mainstream America. However if we believe — as increasingly more Americans do— that corporate media serves its own self-interests instead of those of the people, than we can no longer call it mainstream or refer to it as plural. Instead we need to say that corporate media is corporate America, and that we the mainstream people need to be looking at alternative independent sources for our news and information.

Asia, Middle East & African connections with Mexico & south thrown in for good measure.

3 Pieces to follow: CARLYLE GROUP {bush, baker, kissinger ++}

#1

The Carlyle Group Opens Office in Dubai Paul Bagatelas Named Managing Director for Investor Relations

MENAFN Press - 20/11/2006

Washington, DC/Dubai, UAE – Global private equity firm The Carlyle Group today announced it has opened an office in Dubai, United Arab Emirates, within the Dubai International Financial Centre (DIFC), and has received a license to operate in the DIFC by the Dubai Financial Services Authority (DFSA). Carlyle also named Paul Bagatelas Managing Director for Investor Relations and Senior Executive Officer (SEO) in the Dubai office in the DIFC. The DFSA regulates, approves and supervises all financial institutions within the DIFC. Mr. Bagatelas, who comes to Carlyle from Credit Suisse, starts his new role immediately.

David M. Rubenstein, Carlyle Co-founder and Managing Director, said, “We are delighted to open an office in Dubai, a dynamic and cosmopolitan city at the crossroads of international business. Opening this office and having Paul join the firm is an important part of our global expansion strategy.”

Mr. Bagatelas said, “The Carlyle Group is pleased to launch operations in the Middle East from the Dubai International Financial Centre. Our license from and regulation by the Dubai Financial Services Authority serves as the solid platform and hub from which we will build our local and regional private equity investments. The Carlyle Group is delighted to now participate in the growing investment opportunities inside the Middle East, an important region that is home to some of our most important investors.”

In his new capacity, Mr. Bagatelas will work with Carlyle’s current and prospective investors throughout the Middle East and North Africa (MENA) region.

Prior to joining Carlyle, Mr. Bagatelas was a Director with Credit Suisse in Dubai, as team leader for special coverage in the Middle East. Previously, Mr. Bagatelas was a Director with Citigroup Private Bank in Dubai, Greece and Switzerland. Mr. Bagatelas began his career with the United States Department of State, with assignments in Washington, DC, and at the United States Mission to the European Union in Brussels, Belgium.

Mr. Bagatelas has a master’s degree from the Tufts University Fletcher School of Law and Diplomacy in Massachusetts, and a bachelor’s degree from the Georgetown University Walsh School of Foreign Service in Washington, DC.

Mr. Bagatelas completed the international business program as a Rotary Foundation Scholar at Nyenrode Business University in The Netherlands.



About The Carlyle Group
The Carlyle Group is a global private equity firm with $44.3 billion under management. Carlyle invests in buyouts, venture & growth capital, real estate and leveraged finance in Asia, Europe and North America, focusing on aerospace & defense, automotive & transportation, consumer & retail, energy & power, healthcare, industrial, technology & business services and telecommunications & media. Since 1987, the firm has invested $22.4 billion of equity in 528 transactions for a total purchase price of $94.6 billion. The Carlyle Group employs more than 670 people in 16 countries. In the aggregate, Carlyle portfolio companies have more than $68 billion in revenue and employ more than 300,000 people around the world. www.carlyle.com.
http://www.menafn.com/qn_news_story_s.a ... 1093133781

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#2

March 16, 2005
#2005-13pc (issued by portfolio company)
SEACOR Holdings Inc. and Seabulk International, Inc. Announce Merger Agreement


http://www.thecarlylegroup.com/eng/geo/news-3050.html

About SEACOR

SEACOR and its subsidiaries are engaged in the operation of a diversified fleet of offshore support vessels that service oil and gas exploration and development activities in the U.S. Gulf of Mexico, the North Sea, West Africa, Asia, Latin America and other international regions. Other business activities primarily include Environmental Services, Inland River Services, and Aviation Services. Visit SEACOR on the Web at www.seacorholdings.com.

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About DLJ Merchant Banking Partners

DLJ Merchant Banking Partners (DLJMB) is a leading private equity investor that has a 19-year record of investing in leveraged buyouts and related transactions across a broad range of industries. DLJMB, with offices in New York, London, Houston and Buenos Aires, is part of Credit Suisse First Boston's Alternative Capital Division (ACD), which is one of the largest alternative asset managers in the world with more than $36 billion of assets under management. ACD is comprised of $20 billion of private equity assets under management across a diverse family of funds, including leveraged buyout funds, mezzanine funds, real estate funds, venture capital funds, fund of funds and secondary funds, as well as more than $16 billion of assets under management through its hedge fund (both direct and fund of funds), leveraged loan and CDO businesses.

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About Riverstone Holdings LLC and The Carlyle Group

Riverstone Holdings LLC and The Carlyle Group are the co-general partners of the Carlyle/Riverstone Global Energy and Power Funds I and II, which together comprise $1.5 billion of private equity established to make investments in the energy and power industry globally. Riverstone, a New York-based energy and power focused private equity firm founded in 2000, conducts buyout and growth capital investments in the midstream, upstream, power, and oilfield service sectors of the energy industry. The Carlyle Group is a global private equity firm with more than $19.4 billion under management. Visit www.carlyle.com for additional information.

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Carlyle Group

North America


With offices in Washington, DC, California, Colorado, New York, North Carolina and Mexico City, Carlyle’s funds in North America draw on the local insight of a seasoned team of investment professionals backed by the expertise of the group’s global network.

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#3

http://schema-root.org/commerce/corpora ... yle_group/

cross-referenced news and research resources about

Carlyle Group

... the Carlyle Group, a Washington, D.C., investment partnership formed in 1987 by David Rubenstein , a former aide to President Jimmy Carter; Daniel A. D'Aniello, former vice president of Finance for Marriott Inc.; and William Conway, former CFO for MCI Communications. The Group now manages more than $16 billion in investments through some 300 employees in 12 offices around the world. Investors include the government of Singapore, Kuwait Investment Authority and state pension funds of California and Florida.

Center for Public Integrity: United Defense Industries, L.P.
The Carlyle Group's government ties, both domestic and international, are legion: its investors and advisers include former U.S. President George Bush, former British Prime Minister John Major and former Secretary of State James Baker. Many of United Defense's board members also have ties to Carlyle, others came from the military, and some have both in their backgrounds.

Frank Carlucci, who became a United Defense director in December 1997, is currently chairman emeritus of the Carlyle Group. Prior to joining Carlyle in 1989, Carlucci served as Defense Secretary under former President Ronald Reagan from November 1987 to January 1989. J.H. Binford Peay III became a director in December 1997. A retired general in the U.S. Army, Peay served as the Commander-in-Chief of the U.S. Central Command from 1994 to 1997 and is currently chairman and chief executive officer of Allied Defense Group, a holding company of defense and security businesses. John M. Shalikashvili, a two-term chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff in the Clinton administration, joined the board in 1998 after he retired from the military. Other Carlyle directors on the United Defense Board include Peter J. Clare, formerly of private investment group First City Capital, and Allan M. Holt, previously with private investors Avenir Group and MCI Communications.

Military expertise can be found in United Defense's management as well: Jay Hendrix, the vice president for business development and marketing is a retired U.S. Army general, and United States Marine Repair president Al Krekich is a former vice admiral in the U.S. Navy.

Center for Public Integrity: The Carlyle Group
Who’s on the payroll at Carlyle? President Bush’s father, for starters. Secretary of State James Baker, who represented Bush during the Florida recount, is a managing director. William Kennard, who recently headed the Federal Communications Commission, recently joined Carlyle, as did Arthur Levitt, a former chairman of the Securities and Exchange Commission. And that’s just a few of the dozens of former Cabinet secretaries and other administration officials that are listed as employees of the firm. Their boss is Frank Carlucci, the former Secretary of Defense whose best friend and former college roommate Donald Rumsfeld now runs the Pentagon.
...

The Carlyle group is definitive PROOF of just how currupt our govenment has become. The conflict of interest is so outrageous that this should be the biggest scandel to ever shake Washington....yet everyone, especially the MSM, chooses to turn a blind eye.

http://www.informationclearinghouse.inf ... le3995.htm

More proof America has been conquered without a shot fired.

W