Old Fogey's Quotes on Corruption and Incompetence

"As events would have it, though, our nation is led by men who have carefully avoided both war and literature. By men devoid of a sense of the nation's and their own moral fallibility. By men who have led us into a moral desert and aren't even looking for a way back home."
Harold Meyerson in WaPo editorial
Into a Moral Desert
[Actually, they have led us so far into that moral desert finding the way home will be difficult for anyone]

"It's a gravy train, and there's little work to it."
Jim Schollaert, a former State Department trade specialist, referring to tariff suspensions to benefit specific corporations
A Quiet Break for Corporations
[Talk about Welfare Queens! I wonder what the total cost of the breaks for large businesses are. I suspect the figure would astound most Americans]

"It was amateur hour."
Army Reserve Capt. A. Heather Coyne, regarding her impression of Coalition Provisional Authority, the civilian occupation office headed by L. Paul Bremer III in Iraq
The Road to Disillusionment
[Kind of reminds me of FEMA during Katrina. Can't these guys do anything right?]

"As the mantra at Halliburton camps goes, 'It's cost-plus, baby.' "
Julie McBride, a former Halliburton employee who alleged the company inflated its profit by overstating the number of soldiers using Halliburton recreation facilities
Ex-Workers Testify About Halliburton: Responsibility Questioned at Hill Hearing
[I've given up trying to decide whether Bush administration incompetence or corruption explains its failures. There's an ample dose of both]

"He betrayed his constituents, he betrayed the body and there's no place for him in the Congress."
Rep. Deborah Pryce (R-Ohio), referring to Bob Nye, who pleaded guilty to federal corruption charges
A GOP Call for Ney to Resign
[It seems to me Nye's biggest betrayal to the GOP was to be caught during a mid-term election cycle]

"Ours is an era short on common sense and long on contortions to either fit the letter of the law or to reach the dodgy state of plausible deniability."
Editorial in NYT
Outsourcing Ethics
[Presidents help set the moral tone of the nation. For Kennedy the tone called for sacrifice for the common good. For Bush it is that greed is good and the means justify the end. What a legacy!]