PLENTY OF CRIME, NOT SO MUCH PUNISHMENT-- ONE BUSH REGIME OPERATIVE WALKS FROM PRISON AND ANOTHER "RESIGNS"

Sen. Grassley greets Frank Calzone, head of GOP front group, Center For A Free Cuba

Few Republicans complicit in the most massive theft of public resources in the history of the world have even been indicted, let alone punished. And when one gets sentenced they know Bush is going to pardon them on his way out anyway. Apparently Brent Wilkes isn't even waiting that long. A pair of federal judges ordered him released from prison yesterday. He's out on bail pending his appeal. He had been sentenced to 12 years and has already served almost 5 whole weeks. According to the San Diego Union-Tribune prosecutors have been discussing appealing the case because they "were seeking a longer term of between 16 and 25 years."

He was convicted of bribing former San Diego Congressman Randy “Duke” Cunningham with gifts, trips, meals and cash in exchange for lucrative defense contracts. He also was found guilty of conspiracy, fraud and money laundering.

Even closer to the black heart of the White House a special assistant to the president for intergovernmental affairs, Felipe Sixto was forced to resign because of he was "misusing" grant money (taxpayer grant money) from the U.S. Agency for International Development when he worked for a shady right-wing Cuban-American destabilization outfit, Center for a Free Cuba. There's far more to this case than meets the eye, though. It's well known in Cuban-American circles that USAID's Cuba money was being funneled back into right wing politics in Miami, then into PACs and organizations that supported Republicans across the country.

I found out about this case from Joe Garcia's campaign. Joe, I hope you'll remember, is running against Debbie Wasserman Schultz's favorite fascist member of Congress, Mario Diaz-Balart in south Florida. To Joe, formerly Executive Director of the Cuban American National Foundation and Chairman of the Democratic Party of Miami-Dade County, this is just a symptom of what is so wrong with a Bush Regime policy specifically designed to win votes in Miami and patronize partisan supporters rather than to work seriously on helping achieve  social justice and freedom in Cuba.

As I have consistently stated in the past, millions of dollars intended to fuel a democratic change in Cuba are ending up in the hands of Bush/Diaz-Balart cronies and never makes it to the island. While some of the funds are being properly used, and the program should continue, it is shameful that Bush/Diaz-Balart sidekicks have used it to take advantage of the generosity of the American taxpayer in order to enrich their friends and political allies.

In 2006, the Bush administration was warned by the Government Accountability Office that federal funds to Cuba were being grossly mismanaged and they did nothing. The GAO uncovered that "USAID's internal controls over the awarding of Cuba program grants and the oversight of grantees do not provide adequate assurance that the grant funds are being used properly or that grantees are in compliance with applicable laws and regulations." The report further detailed instances where the review process for granting awards was never completed. The USAID also failed to follow-up with several award recipients to ensure proper use of the funds.

Presented with this compelling evidence, the Bush administration sat on their hands and allowed taxpayer dollars to be wasted. Accordingly, American policy should require that at least 80% of these funds make it to dissident groups on the island.  It's time to move beyond the Bush/Diaz-Balart do-nothing politics of cronyism and corruption."

In 2006 the Washington Post looked into the GAO report Joe refers to above. The report caused a small scandal for a few days and even a Republican hack like Arizona Congressman Jeff Flake was so astounded at the level of abuse that he denounced the Bush Regime:
"I think that this administration and to some extent the last wanted simply to curry favor with the Cuban American exile community."

Nearly all of the $74 million a federal agency has spent on contracts to promote democracy in Cuba over the past decade has been distributed without competitive bidding or oversight in a program that opened the door to waste and fraud, according to a report released yesterday by the Government Accountability Office.

In one of the more extreme cases of apparent abuse, the GAO said a Miami-based group used government money to purchase "a gas chainsaw, computer gaming equipment and software (including Nintendo Game Boys and Sony PlayStations), a mountain bike, leather coats, cashmere sweaters, crab meat, and Godiva chocolates."

Last year Sixto's boss before Bush, Frank Calzon, was in a TV debate with Joe about Cuba policy. When Joe mentioned all this stuff, Calzone went beserk and stormed off the show. (It's in Spanish but you'll get the picture even if you don't habla any espanol.) I wonder why Bush just asked this guy to resign instead of firing him? Don't they believe in accountability and responsibility over there? Or does he know too much to get him too pissed off?

According to this morning's Washington Post, which made no connection to its own reporting from 2006, "The matter has been referred to the Justice Department, and the inspector general at the U.S. Agency for International Development, the source of the grant funds, was investigating as well... Neither the White House nor the nonprofit would discuss specific allegations, how much was allegedly misused or how it was used."