Bush admin's rampant cronyism and conflicts of interest

[ProSense]

Bush reading program gets failing grade

By BEN FELLER, AP Education Writer 2 hours, 26 minutes ago

WASHINGTON - A scorching internal review of the Bush administration's billion-dollar-a-year reading program says the Education Department ignored the law and ethical standards to steer money how it wanted.

The government audit is unsparing in its view that the Reading First program has been beset by conflicts of interest and willful mismanagement. It suggests the department broke the law by trying to dictate which curriculum schools must use.

It also depicts a program in which review panels were stacked with people who shared the director's views, and in which only favored publishers of reading curricula could get money.

In one e-mail, the director told a staff member to come down hard on a company he didn't support, according to the report released Friday by the department's inspector general.

"They are trying to crash our party and we need to beat the (expletive deleted) out of them in front of all the other would-be party crashers who are standing on the front lawn waiting to see how we welcome these dirtbags," the program director wrote, the report says.

more...

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20060922/ap_on_go_ca_st_pe/reading_first_5

Bush's cybersecurity chief quits

By TED BRIDIS, Associated Press Writer 2 hours, 13 minutes ago

WASHINGTON - The Bush administration's cybersecurity chief, who worked under an unusual agreement with a private university that does extensive business with the office he manages, is leaving his job.

Donald "Andy" Purdy Jr. will step down as acting director of the National Cyber Security Division, part of the Department of Homeland Security. A government spokesman, Jarrod Agen, declined to comment on Purdy's plans, but colleagues circulated an invitation to his farewell party next week.

Purdy worked at Homeland Security under a two-year contract with Carnegie Mellon University that expires Oct. 3. Under the contract, the government paid Purdy $245,481 in salary and benefits each year, not including travel reimbursements; Carnegie Mellon paid him an additional $43,320 a year.

His contract drew congressional scrutiny after The Associated Press reported in June that Purdy's cybersecurity division has paid Carnegie Mellon $19 million in contracts this year, almost one-fifth the unit's total budget.

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20060922/ap_on_go_pr_wh/cybersecurity_chief_1

[Karenina]

1. Kick!

:kick: