Private IRS Collectors Costing Us Money

Well, that's just super. The Republicans' very strange desire to privatize everything once again proves to be less efficient than if it was just left alone. And these guys were sent out to get $1 billion, why did they only come back with $49 million? Can the Bush administration do anything right?

[Excerpt]

Collectors Cost IRS More Than They Raise

The Internal Revenue Service expects to lose more than $37 million by using private debt collectors to pursue tax scofflaws through a program that has outraged consumers and led to charges on Capitol Hill that the agency is wasting money for work that IRS agents could do more effectively. . .

Read more at: Washington Post

12 US Military Electrocutions: In Their Own Showers

Photo from source, ABC News

I'm double-dipping into ABC News stories tonight, because these stories--while clearly here in the mainstream media--are not getting enough attention. Here we have another of those pitfalls of privatization--the mantra of the new Right. How can it be that a company can be hired by our government to build facilities, and that those facilities can be so substandard that soldiers are being electrocuted in their showers? And twelve of them?

Top that off with the fact that the company in question is KBR, an off-shoot of Dick Cheney's Halliburton, and it's just that much worse. This is only the most recent in the Bush Administration's privatization policy scandals. Does anyone out there really think the Republicans should still be in charge?

[Excerpt]

Hidden Danger: Soldiers Dying From Electrocution

. . .little did the staff sergeant know that when he stepped into the shower at his military base in Baghdad two months ago, he was putting his life at risk.

Maseth, 24, of Shaler, Pa., outside Pittsburgh, was electrocuted on Jan. 2 when an improperly grounded electric water pump short-circuited and flowed through the pipes. Since the coiled hose was touching his arm, he was hit with an electrical jolt and went into cardiac arrest and died. . .

Read more at: ABC News

Blackwater Prices Human Life at $20,000?

Photo from source, ABC News

One of the more disturbing things we've learned about the Iraq War (occupation) is the outsourcing of services once performed by the military itself. "Privatization" of everything from cooking to cleaning are now done--at greater cost--by private firms. I'm not sure how this is justified to be honest, but it gets even worse when they farm out "security." And we've also found out that the contracted security agents (once known as mercenaries) seem to be accountable to no one.

Blackwater, is doing something when they "inadvertently" kill a civilian, to say the least. The very least, as it turns out.

[Excerpt]

Exclusive: Blackwater 'Blood Money' Angers Iraqis

At least two Iraqi families of victims killed by Blackwater security guards in September tell ABC News they have refused compensation offered by the company.

The father of a 9-year-old boy, who says his son was one of the 17 civilians killed when Blackwater guards, escorting a diplomatic convoy, opened fire at Baghdad's Nisour Square on Sept. 16, says he is trying to file a lawsuit against the company. He told ABCNews.com that Blackwater offered him $20,000 through an Iraqi prosecutor, but he refused the money. . .

Read more at: ABC News

Hat tip to Stupid Monkey Planet for the link.