Well dwelling in my outrage over the conditions at walter reed hospital documented by the Post and 'round the 'sphere I thought it had one thing written all over it: private contracting. So a little google search was in order. I was amazed to discover a few things about the hospital as well as our media.
Catch 'ya on the flip side
The first thing I did was a google news search for walter reed private contractor maintenance. Click on it - there is one, count 'em one, on google news. Why the hell has our fearless press not actually checked who's responsible for this mess. Even after the $800 hammers of the 80's do they not understand how defense contracting works? However they did give it passing mention in this WaPost article. But, Jebus, take the cocktail weenies out of your mouth and follow the money you sorry sonsabitches!
Anywho, after remembering why the press sucks, I checked google web hits and came across this Washington Business Journal article from last November:
While federal outsourcing isn't new, "the Bush administration has been more aggressive in outsourcing all nonessential services," says Ray Bjorklund, chief knowledge officer for FedSources, a McLean market research firm. "The concept is to go ahead and outsource that stuff so you can concentrate on the core mission."
The Army started a basewide review of Walter Reed in June 2000. The sweeping evaluation of more than 1,100 jobs finally narrowed its focus to an estimated 350 mostly blue-collar maintenance jobs.
Busted, this is a maintenance issue. Who took over the work? Read on (sorry it's not halliburton - that would be just too lucky)
IAP Worldwide will assume much of the base's support work, including postal services, military police support, administration and budget support, network support, housing management, transportation functions, grounds maintenance, utility systems, heating and cooling services, hospital housekeeping, laundry service and warehouse operations.
Really it just another sweetheart deal while the DC press corps looks the other way. Eisenhower was right. And my, my, my guess which state IAP is located in? It involves a governor with a familiar name. And I did all this in about 20 minutes. Gawd the press pisses me off.