--- Doug Pensinger <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: > Gautam wrote: > > > If NPR's _only_ public funding was from federal > grants > > that it won competitively, that would be fine. > But it > > doesn't - it gets special allocations and special > > privileges that aren't on the open market. It > > competes not through bidding, but through the > > political process - through getting Congressmen to > > vote in its favor. That's not competition. > > Halliburton isn't winning federal _grants_, it's > > winning contracts from the federal government > through > > open bids, pretty much in the same way it wins > them > > from private companies for which it contracts. > > What competition is there for a _grant_? > > How much competition was there for the Iraq > contract(s)? > > -- > Doug
Plenty. You ever tried to apply for one? It's not easy, and it's not fun. As for the Iraq contracts, the contracts were in fact open for bidding. In fact a few years ago Halliburton lost the contract for defense support (I can't remember to whom) and it won it again under the Clinton Administration. I'm assuming you don't think _that_ was the product of corruption. There simply was no corruption on those contracts. Dan Drezner proved it quite conclusively. Saying there was is an insult to all of the hard-working members of the United States civil service who work to the best of their ability to award such contracts fairly. Anyone who knows the government procurement system (as I do) knows that it isn't even possible to rig the bidding if you want to. ===== Gautam Mukunda [EMAIL PROTECTED] "Freedom is not free" http://www.mukunda.blogspot.com __________________________________ Do you Yahoo!? Yahoo! Search - Find what you�re looking for faster http://search.yahoo.com _______________________________________________ http://www.mccmedia.com/mailman/listinfo/brin-l
