$50 million to promote Thunderbirds questioned
April 18th, 2008
Goldfein, at the time commander of the Air Warfare Center at Nellis Air Force Base and now the vice director of the Pentagon’s Joint Staff, was found to have gone to great lengths to see the contract awarded to SMS, while senior Air Force leaders socialized with the company’s partners. According to the report, Goldfein even arranged for President Bush to videotape a testimonial that was included in the SMS contract proposal.
The report offers a searing, blow-by-blow account of how a relatively mundane Air Force contract spun out of control, highlighting conflicts of interest in the selection process, officers stacking the deck in favor of friends, and others influencing a system designed to eliminate such favoritism in spending taxpayer dollars.
“The investigation found that the December 2005 award to SMS was tainted with improper influence, irregular procurement practices, and preferential treatment,” according to a redacted copy of the report, which is scheduled for release this week. “Lower priced offers from qualified vendors and capabilities in-house were bypassed in an apparent effort to obtain services from (redacted), president of SMS, who had a long-standing relationship with senior Air Force officers and members of the Thunderbirds.”
Goldfein and four other officers whose names have not been released have received administrative punishments for the episode, and investigators are continuing to look at the contracting processes at Nellis Air Force Base amid “irregularities” and “systemic weaknesses” that plagued the unit.
Goldfein declined to comment, and a Nellis spokeswoman said Thursday that base officials aren’t commenting. Similarly, an e-mail from the Review-Journal seeking reaction from a Thunderbirds spokeswoman went unanswered. The crack aerial team is scheduled to perform this weekend in Wilmington, N.C.
Goldfein told investigators he “never interfered with the evaluation or selection process and never directed anyone to do or not do anything.” Other members of the selection team said the process was “fixed” from the beginning.
Tags: air, show, wilmington
April 18th, 2008 at 5:36 pm
Depends — are those hospitals disseminating misleading medical information?Edit fixed (major!) typo.
April 18th, 2008 at 6:26 pm
54k extacy tablets for $2.7m?Who the hell buys $50 pills?
April 18th, 2008 at 7:17 pm
..but you can deduct expenses to advertising, right?
April 18th, 2008 at 8:07 pm
I want my tax money back! I wanted my money to go towards falsifying reports on the environment - not on promoting the Iran War!
April 18th, 2008 at 8:58 pm
“Israel’s statehood is based on an unjust ideology which causes indignity and suffering for those who are classified as non-Jewish by either a religious or ethnic test.To hide this primordial immorality, Israel fosters an image of victimhood. Provoking violence, consciously or unconsciously, against which one must defend oneself is a key feature of the victim-mentality. By perpetuating such a tragic cycle, Israel is a terrorist state like no other.” –Oren Ben Dor
April 18th, 2008 at 9:48 pm
Why bother? Fox News will do it pro bono.
April 18th, 2008 at 10:39 pm
The rapture index is up 1 to 160!http://www.raptureready.com/rap2.html
April 18th, 2008 at 11:30 pm
negative to one side is positive to someone else. Think “Haliburton”
April 19th, 2008 at 12:20 am
So? That’s less that one year’s income for him.It should be worth it to be rid of that harridan.
April 19th, 2008 at 1:11 am
but whats the ROI?
April 19th, 2008 at 2:01 am
Well typically in this market its been in the range of negative $400 to negative $300 billion or so.
April 19th, 2008 at 2:52 am
these are quite inflated, it seems
April 19th, 2008 at 3:42 am
Who watches cricket?
April 19th, 2008 at 4:33 am
Actually, it often is - what happens a lot of the time is they drive out other hospitals, which means that the Catholic Church’s somewhat bizarre medical ethics get applied to the healthcare of non-Catholics.
April 19th, 2008 at 5:24 am
Well, it apocalypse is near if you price it in dollars. Have you seen the currency collapse going on in global markets. The OTC derivatives panic and price lock up in the sub prime. The billion dollar write downs by every bank in spite of the several 100 billion in liquidity the Fed has pumped in over the last 4 months.