May 25, 2006

Another Government Scandal

By Jack Lee, Post Scripts...

Just when you think the confidence in American government couldn't get much lower, this happens. Oh, I'm not talking about another Congressman's indictment for bribery or even the new corruption investigation targeting the Speaker of the House, Denny Hastert, we're actually getting used to such things. What we don't expect are the really, really, dumb things like this: Our government just spent 1.75 billion to buy computers made in China? Actually, this is beyond dumb, it's a slap in the face to U.S. manufacturers and more importantly to the U.S. taxpayers who want their money spent at home! If anybody ought to benefit from our tax dollars it's Americans and perhaps our 10 million illegal workers, but not workers in China! Does it make you feel any better that the label on the computer said, "IBM"? No, I didn't think so.

Remember a few years back, when Ohio was outsourcing the overhaul of their DMV computer system and they hired the low bidder from India? India was 18 million under the next bidder, so Ohio gave them the contract and the GOP had a hissy fit! This pressure eventually forced the Democrat Governor to rescind the contract, which was actually a pretty good deal for Ohio since only one other company bid and it was way higher. There was also no national security risk involved. Ohio then used several smaller American firms to do the job, even though it was a more piece meal effort, it cost more and the end product was just mediocre. But, the GOP was admament the tax money had to go to Americans. So, you have to wonder how could this GOP administration, from the President to the Senate to the Congress, could allow this fat computer contract to go to IBM when they knew the computers would be made in China?

Now comes perhaps the worst part. There is some evidence to suggest the Chinese computers were designed to spy on their users. According to the article in the Sidney Morning Herald, "The US State Department will disconnect 900 new Chinese-made computers from its most top secret network for fear that they may have been fitted with spying equipment." Let me repeat that, they had these Chinese computers hooked up to our most top secret network and they had not been inspected for bugging devices. Republican congressman Frank Wolfe, said the purchase was a mistake". No kiddin, Frank? Well, the good news is at least one person in Congress has a firm grasp on the obvious!

"This decision would have had dire
consequences for our national security."

"It is no secret that the United States is a principal target of Chinese intelligence services," said Wolfe. But, apparently it is a "secret" to some in high government places who placed this order and allowed these computers to be hooked up to top secret installations, without doing any sort of security checks on them first.

The entire Chinese order comprised of 16,000 computers. They must now either be tediously checked for bugging devices (very expensive) or scrapped ... well, there's another fine example of your tax dollars at work. Congressman Frank Wolfe concluded his comments about this incident by saying, "This decision would have had dire consequences for our national security." Oh, brother (faint sigh) sometimes the more you know, the more you wish you didn't know, but this is the price of our vigilance necessary to keep this nation on track.

Posted by Melody at May 25, 2006 07:14 AM

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Posted by: Jordan Frazer at May 25, 2006 09:48 AM

Posted by: Anthony Watts at May 27, 2006 08:34 AM

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