Blackwater Guards Given Immunity In Shooting

Once again the Bush administration demonstrates its incompetence. Last September 16th, Blackwater guards shot and killed 17 unarmed and innocent Iraqi civilians. Iraqi officials and others were outraged at the unjustified murders, and demanded that the Blackwater guards be prosecuted.

The U.S. State Department sent a team of investigators to find out what happened, but they instantly blew the investigation. According to the Associated Press, those investigators immediately gave all those involved immunity for anything they might say. They did this without even knowing who might be guilty of any crimes. Now, nothing they have said can be used in a criminal prosecution.

The case was then turned over to the FBI, but none of the guards will talk to the FBI. Now it looks like there may not be any criminal prosecution due to the incomprehensible actions of the State Department investigators. No one will say who's idea it was to give the immunity before any investigating was done.

I suspect we all know who is responsible. I think some fool in the Bush administration (perhaps even the head fool himself) decided they couldn't afford another scandal. This is just the kind of blunder the administration has been making since taking office.

Given a choice between being honest or hiding the truth from the American people, Bush and his cronies have always chosen to hide the truth -- even if it means lying. Now they've done it again.

I don't guess we should be surprised by now.

Blackwater Evading Federal Taxes

We've all heard about the problems that Blackwater is having in Iraq with its security operatives killing innocent Iraqi citizens. Now it looks like the company may have other problems as well.

Rep. Henry Waxman (D-California) says Blackwater may have evaded millions of dollars in federal taxes. He says the company is trying to avoid paying Social Security, Medicare and unemployment taxes by classifying its employees as private contractors, instead of company employees.

This came to light when one of Blackwater's employees complained to the Internal Revenue Service (IRS) about being classified as a private contractor. The IRS ruled that the classification was incorrect, and said the man was an employee and not a private contractor. Blackwater agreed to pay the back taxes for this one employee, but made him sign an agreement saying he would not talk to any "politician or public official".

Waxman got hold of the agreement with a subpoena, and was incensed about the secrecy provision. He said, "The nondisclosure agreement is abhorrent on its face. It is deplorable that a company that depends on federal tax dollars for over 90 percent of its business would even contemplate forbidding an employee to report corporate wrongdoing to Congress and federal law enforcement officials."

Blackwater says they are appealing the IRS ruling. Personally, I think the appeal is just a stalling action. They have little chance of winning the appeal (barring interference from the Bush administration).

Both of the other security companies doing business in Iraq classify their agents as employees, and are paying the appropriate taxes. Private contractors are those who supply their own tools and decide for themselves when they will or won't work. Blackwater agents do not supply their own weapons and ammunition, and they must go to work when Blackwater tells them to. They do NOT meet the definition of a private contractor.

It is estimated that between May 2006 and March 2007, Blackwater has evaded $15.5 million in Social Security and Medicare taxes and $500,000 in unemployment taxes. That is just sickening. If other employers must pay these taxes, then Blackwater should be paying them also.

This is a company that seems to think it can make its own rules. They don't follow the rules of engagement that our soldiers must follow in Iraq, and they don't pay their taxes as other American companies do. For them, Iraq is not a job but a get-rich-quick scheme.

Their government contract should be voided, and they should be forced to pay their back taxes -- with penalties.

Van Os Blasts Bush On Blackwater

One of the stories that has made the news lately has been the murder of innocent Iraqis by the hired gunmen from the Blackwater Corporation. These mercenaries are paid huge salaries and are accountable to no one. Their actions are not only indefensible, but have increased the hatred of Americans and made things much harder for our troops in Iraq.

But it is not just Blackwater that is to blame for these atrocities. The Bush administration must accept much of the blame. Bush and his cronies are the ones who privatized much of the war so their corporate buddies could fatten their wallets on the blood of innocent victims.

The legendary Texas attorney and political activist, David Van Os, has now spoken out on the Blackwater travesty. Here is what he has to say:

The ongoing criminal conspiracy known to the mainstream media as the "Bush administration" has subjected we the people of the United States and our Constitution to nearly seven years of perpetual nightmare.

The Bushites' level of contempt for the rule of law, defiance of Constitutional checks and balances, and scorn for the Bill of Rights is unprecedented in the history of our country. So is the degree to which they use government power to promote unfettered playing fields for the great corporate robber barons to run roughshod over the people. All these factors run hand in hand. The history of totalitarian governments provides open roadmaps on how to use the extinction of civil liberties to make a country safe for corporate dictatorship.

Just when we think it cannot possibly get worse, it gets worse. The recent revelations about the murderous activities in Iraq of the private mercenary soldiers in the employment of Blackwater disclose to us more wounds where the Bushite dagger has stabbed deeper still into the guts of our Constitutional democracy.

In a democracy there are not supposed to be private mercenary armies. Under our Constitution only the Congress can declare war. All military forces must be firmly under the control of the people's elected representatives in the Congress in order to ensure that no Julius Caesar can arise to march on the nation's capital with private legions that answer only to him.

It was an exercise of madness for the Congress to have ever allowed the U.S. State Department and Defense Department to hire mercenary private contract forces in Iraq and let them be armed to the gills with full military firepower. In a democracy it is one of the most basic of imperatives that private armies that are not operationally accountable either to the commissioned military chain of command or to the democratic institutions of civilian government cannot be permitted.

As the situation has been allowed to develop, Blackwater's mercenaries are not subject either to the Uniform Code of Military Justice or to the reach of civilian criminal justice back home. In other words they are not subject to the rule of law but are a law unto themselves, backed up by gunpoint.

Benito Mussolini, who ought to know, once described fascism as the marriage of the corporation and the state. How convenient it is for the wealthy owner of Blackwater to have fattened his wealth through the American state handing him a contract to live out his egotistical power fantasies by creating a private army.

How much difference is there between Blackwater's mercenary forces and Mussolini's blackshirts, who marched on Rome to put an end to democratic government in Italy? Do we want to have to find out? Do we want to leave it to the criminal Bushite administration to teach us the answer?

Perhaps more relevant to our own history, is there any difference at all between the Blackwater mercenaries and the hated Hessian mercenaries who augmented British troops in our own Revolutionary War?

This is a monster that cannot be reformed but must be extinguished without delay.

Let your Congressional representatives hear your voice. Let Nancy Pelosi and Harry Reid hear your voice. Demand legislation to cancel the Blackwater contracts and disband the Blackwater private army. Tell Nancy and Harry you don't want to hear any whining about veto-proof majorities or needing 60 votes. Demand that they take a stand for the values of American democracy and history and force the Bushite Cult to resist those values by defending the use of a rogue private mercenary army if that is what they insist on doing. Do it now, please.

David Van Os