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Impeach George Bush
Cheney Still Taking Money from Haliburton
Contributing to the war-profiteering mess, Cheney's still getting $1,000,000 / year from Haliburton who was awarded a non-competetive multi-billion dollar contract for reconstructing Iraq.
Source: the Guardian, 2003-07-02
Candidate: Dick Cheney
Halliburton, the Texas company which has been awarded the Pentagon's contract to put out potential oil-field fires in Iraq and which is bidding for postwar construction contracts, is still making annual payments to its former chief executive, the vice-president Dick Cheney.
The payments, which appear on Mr Cheney's 2001 financial disclosure statement, are in the form of "deferred compensation" of up to $1m (£600,000) a year.
When he left Halliburton in 2000 to become George Bush's running mate, he opted not to receive his leaving payment in a lump sum but instead have it paid to him over five years, possibly for tax reasons.
An aide to the vice president said yesterday: "This is money that Mr Cheney was owed by the corporation as part of his salary for the time he was employed by Halliburton and which was a fixed amount paid to him over time."
The aide said the payment was even insured so that it would not be affected even if Halliburton went bankrupt, to ensure there was no conflict of interest.
"Also, the vice president has nothing whatsoever to do with the Pentagon bidding process," the aide added.
The company would not say how much the payments are. The obligatory disclosure statement filled by all top government officials says only that they are in the range of $100,000 and $1m. Nor is it clear how they are calculated.
Halliburton is one of five large US corporations - the others are the Bechtel Group, Fluor Corp, Parsons Corp, and the Louis Berger Group - invited to bid for contracts in what may turn out to be the biggest reconstruction project since the second world war.
It is estimated to be worth up to $900m for the preliminary work alone, such as rebuilding Iraq's hospitals, ports, airports and schools.
The contract winners will be able to establish a presence in post-Saddam Iraq that should give them an invaluable edge in winning future contracts.
The defence department contract awarded to the Halliburton subsidiary, Kellog, Brown & Root (KBR), to control oil fires if Saddam Hussein sets the well heads alight, will put the company in an excellent position to bid for huge contracts when Iraq's oil industry is rehabilitated.
KBR has already benefited considerably from the "war on terror". It has so far been awarded contracts worth nearly $33m to build the detention camp at Guantanamo Bay in Cuba for al-Qaida suspects.
Asked whether the payments to Mr Cheney represented a conflict of interest, Halliburton's spokeswoman, Wendy Hall, said: "We have been working as a government contractor since the 1940s. Since this time, KBR has become the premier provider of logistics and support services to all branches of the military."
In the five years Mr Cheney was at the helm, Halliburton nearly doubled the amount of business it did with the government to $2.3bn. The company also more than doubled its political contributions to $1.2m, overwhelmingly to Republican candidates.
Mr Cheney sold most of his Halliburton shares when he left the company, but retained stock options worth about $8m. He arranged to pay any profits to charity.
· Robert Bryce is the author of Pipe Dreams: Greed, Ego, Jealousy and the Death of Enron
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User Originated Comments:
From: Save again
2007-08-26 00:00:00
all who feel helpless about what to do to get even
with this republican gut gang,here is a legal
way.stop spending money and drive the economy to
the break.buy only what you
need.food,rent,utilities. insurance.and thats
it.hold off on a new car,dont buy every new thing
that comes out.sit and wait for another 14
months.then!!!and this is good as robert bird
senitor from virginia would say here me
now!!!!here me just picture it now not only will
you drive the republicans up the wall when the
economy is going bad the war is going bad we lost
the house majority then we take or should i say
win the election we dont want to stoop to taking
like the republicans the less that you give your a
taker.win the election and with all the money you
dont blow from now till then celibrate to high
heaven and go reward yourself for your steadfast
determination not to buy now.and remember waiting
is half the fun and all good things are worth
waiting for.i mean this will work any other ideas
i have are illegal,and should be.laws that were
made protecting life and liberty when this country
started out and god blessed america.whos god?
your god whom ever he is.remember money is the
root to all evil.lets pull the roots on the
republican weeds.hold your money now and reward
yourself big in november 2009 and remeber as the
republicans get to feeling desperate and start the
flinging of thier mud that it is just out of
frustration of not getting thier way.and dont take
your eyes off of them for a minute.especialy at
the elections.they will raise thier left hand to
the lord and pick your pocket with thier right
hand.
From: dave
2007-08-26 00:00:00
if i had my way we would leave haliburton in
iraq and get the military out.but that isnt
likely,so lets catch these crooks in wrong doing
by impeaching the president and vice president and
have war trials for both.then any leads that come
up during the trials can be followed up on and
make halliburton and kbr pay back all earnings
they dade during the war.
From: MICHAEL LEE SMITH
2005-07-16 03:45:40
terrific articles, one and all. hitler also
believed that the bigger the lie, the more likely
the people would believe it. does this also sound
familiar?
From:
2005-07-16 03:36:16
cheney can go fuck himself!
he needs to be
shown some of the more interesting uses of
a
cattle-prod. people like him
should be
charged for the air that they breathe. keep on
fighting the good fight and
give em
hell!
michael lee smith
From: R. K. R. K. Craig
2005-01-21 22:33:50
how will this country ever recover, from the
criminal activity of this presidentcy? if we the
working men and women, are the backbone of this
country, the next four year's will crush us all!
how many more of our children will die; fighting a
non existing war, to bring democracy to a people
who place no value on human life!
let us truly hope mrs. clinton will be as
fine a president as bill was.
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