Talk:War profiteering

Hmm... where/how to put this one: Margie Burns, "All in the (Profiteering) First Family," Prince George's Journal (Maryland), April 15, 2004:

• "St. Louis-based Engineered Support Systems Inc. (EASI), where William H.T. Bush, an uncle of George W. Bush, joined the board of directors in 2000, is a major military contractor."
• George H.W. Bush and the Carlyle Group: "Carlyle recently sold $335 million in stock from its chief military subsidiary."
• Neil M. Bush: "obtained a $60,000-per-year contract from a principal in D.C.-based New Bridge Strategies, a private firm set up to generate contracts in Iraq."
• Marvin P. Bush: "A controversial $327 million contract awarded in January by the US Coalition Provisional Authority (CPA) in Iraq potentially benefited Winston Partners, the [MPB's] private investment firm."

• "Other companies in Winston Partners' portfolio, including AMSEC, where Bush's partner, L. Scott Andrews, sits on the board of directors, also benefit from federal contracts. The new CEO of AMSEC, Michael Braham, formerly worked for L. Paul Bremer, now head of the Coalition Provisional Authority in Iraq."

"These business links suggest that Ahmed Chalabi, a London-based Iraqi exile, has ties to the White House along with his known ties to Vice President Dick Cheney and the Pentagon. At a House Government Reform Committee hearing on Iraq contracts on March 11, some congressmen began to raise questions about private connections behind some of the contracts. However, committee Chairman Tom Davis, R-Va., cut off the questions before witnesses could answer.

"It looks more than ever as though Bush planned all along to invade Iraq, but whatever his motives, it is certain that the war benefits his own family."