The other blockbuster of the weekend was a Time magazine scoop regarding a certain VP and his former oil company.
Cheney’s relationship with Halliburton has been nothing but trouble since he left the company in 2000. Both he and the company say they have no ongoing connections. But Time has obtained an internal Pentagon e-mail sent by an Army Corps of Engineers official — whose name was blacked out by the Pentagon — that raises questions about Cheney’s arm’s-length policy toward his old employer. Dated March 5, 2003, the e-mail says “action” on a multibillion-dollar Halliburton contract was “coordinated” with Cheney’s office. The e-mail says Douglas Feith, a high-ranking Pentagon hawk, got the “authority to execute RIO,” or Restore Iraqi Oil, from his boss, who is Deputy Defense Secretary Paul Wolfowitz. RIO is one of several large contracts the U.S. awarded to Halliburton last year.
The e-mail says Feith approved arrangements for the contract “contingent on informing WH [White House] tomorrow. We anticipate no issues since action has been coordinated w VP’s [Vice President’s] office.” Three days later, the Army Corps of Engineers gave Halliburton the contract, without seeking other bids.
If there’s an innocent explanation for all of this, I can’t think of it. More importantly, the White House can’t either.
The immediate denial to CNN didn’t make a lot of sense.
The senior official told CNN the e-mail was a typical “heads-up” memo from one government agency to another that “a decision has been made, we’re about to announce this contract, and as a courtesy we are alerting the White House of a public announcement. This is a standard practice.”
Now I haven’t seen the document, but it sounds very much like a “heads-up” memo between the Pentagon and the Army Corps of Engineers. But that really isn’t the point. The controversy surrounds the explanation that Halliburton’s lucrative no-bid contract was “coordinated” with Cheney’s office.
And if this is all “standard practice,” one has to wonder why. When Defense contracts were executed during Clinton’s presidency, was Al Gore charged with “coordinating” them? Of course not.
Cheney’s office told Reuters that he had “no involvement whatsoever in government contracting matters.” That’s a categorical denial, but considering Cheney’s already tarnished credibility, how can anyone give him the benefit of the doubt? After all, he’s already lied about having “severed” all his ties with Halliburton, so it’s not unreasonable to question his word this time.
This one won’t go away too quickly. The Kerry campaign has seized on it and will host a conference call with reporters this afternoon with Sen. Pat Leahy (D-Vt.) and former Deputy Defense Secretary John White in the hopes of keeping up interest in the story and moving the ball forward a bit. The story already seems to be generating far more interest overseas than domestically, so hopefully Kerry can encourage the U.S. press to catch up.