Political Procurement

IBD Editorials ^ | May 12, 2011 | Staff

[Kaslin]

Government: Under the guise of rooting out Chicago-style political corruption from government contracting, President Obama seems intent on signing an executive order that would enshrine it.

Last month, the White House drafted an order that would require any company bidding on a federal contract to disclose not only its company donations to federal candidates going back two years, but those of its directors and officers as well.

It would also force these firms to disclose contributions to independent groups that might spend some of the money on campaign ads. And it would warehouse all this data in a searchable government database.

The executive order claims this is all in the interest of keeping the federal contracting process "free from undue influence."

But as numerous groups told lawmakers at a Thursday congressional hearing, this is a solution in search of a problem.

First, there's no evidence of corruption in government contracting, or even the taint of it in the public's mind. That's because the federal contracting process is already well insulated from politics, with contracts awarded by civil service bureaucrats, not politicians, who are specifically forbidden to take political donations into account when making their picks.

In addition, federal contractors are banned from spending company money to support federal candidates, party committees and political action committees, and federal law requires disclosure of these donations by everyone, companies and individuals, whether they're bidding for government work or not.

[politicianslie]

You shouldn’t need any more confirmation that Obama is a radical.

Obama is a threat to our Constitution and our way of life.
Any reasonably observant person knew that before he was elected but by now, you should know without any further information that Obama wants to dismantle our government as we know it.

Obama’s ideas of change is something that must be stopped. Few patriots doubt that is true but most are waiting for 2012.

The only question is “Can we wait that long?”

[Eric in the Ozarks]

Unconstitutional.

[Tzimisce]

Free Speech?

That’s just a fancy word for “racist”.

And if we cared what you thought, we’d be trying to push this through Congress instead of just regulating it.

Now you plebes stop crying and pay your taxes. We need the money....