Questions surround Obama nominee's contractor ties

Questions surround Obama nominee's contractor ties

The head of the Senate Armed Services committee said Thursday that he needed more information on how the nominee for deputy secretary of defense would handle conflicts of interests in his Pentagon post.

Click to expand...

Lynn was a senior vice president at Raytheon, which has billions of dollars in Defense Department contracts. It is is the maker of the Army's Patriot missile system and the Navy's Tomahawk missile and is developing a global positioning satellite communication system for the Air Force.

As deputy secretary, Lynn would be involved in the process of budgeting and acquisitions, in addition to running the day-to-day operations of the Defense Department.

Click to expand...

"The committee will await the administration's assessment as to whether the new rules will preclude Mr. Lynn, who was a registered lobbyist for a defense contractor, from participating in key Department of Defense decisions, and if so, whether a waiver will be forthcoming and what the scope of the waiver will be."

Click to expand...

Looks like we're going to be seeing some lobbyists working in his admin. So much for the ban, that only lasted 2 days!

So even more "hope and change"....



He thus far has proven his campaign was nothing but lipservice.....

This is why the entire notion onf a "Ban on Lobbyists" is idiotic platitudes made to make the masses feel good but isn't anything legitimate.

You need to pick people that have experience and knowledge in their field to fill a position.

Many successful, talented people that have experience and knowledge in a field have likely worked for some of the top employers in that field in some capacity.

So you either have to accept that fact and hire the best possible, or go for a lesser candidate that has a lesser or no tie with said employers.

This is what happens when you make every corporation the big bad boogie man that must be hated.

Reverend_Hellh0und said:

So even more "hope and change"....

He thus far has proven his campaign was nothing but lipservice.....

Click to expand...

Except for all the Bush policy reversals he's already done.

I totally agree with the ban on lobbyists. But if you are going to ban then, then ban them. Punishing the low level staff while not enforcing the rule with high level staff is just stupid.

This largely is superfluous considering the fact that many officials that consummate the ties between governmental organizations and the military-industrial complex are not lobbyists but either co-employed through both government and companies like Raytheon, or are offered some kind of "incentive" package.

As most people have already said, it's not a very significant "decree".

They check him out as well as they checked out Barney Frank and the Fannie Mae scandal.