It's time for another Truman commission

KENNETT, Mo. -- Sixty-two years ago this month, the junior U.S. senator from Missouri addressed his colleagues on an issue that had been troubling him for some time, namely the disturbing appearance of increasing graft and fraud by firms providing products and equipment designed to prepare America for its entry into World War II.

When the senator began speaking, there was a bare quorum, but by the time he had finished an outline of some of the industrial misdeeds he had been compiling, both the floor and the galleries were crowded with interested lawmakers and spectators. What the junior senator was proposing to overcome favoritism, inadequate quality supervision and price-gouging was a federal oversight commission that would monitor the progress of defense purchases and determine that American taxpayers were not being forced to underwrite special treatment for favored suppliers and manufacturers.

In the weeks that ensued, the junior senator's proposal was approved by both congressional chambers and the nation's news media were alerted to the increased need for official oversight of America's rush to arms. Because the proposal had been his suggestion, Sen. Harry Truman was named chairman of the panel and the job of defense-equipment oversight made headlines for weeks and months afterward. Indeed, as a result of our fellow Missourian's concern for strict accounting of taxpayer expenditures, several of the nation's best-known industrial corporations were cited for fraud and embezzlement, providing a climate that served to reinforce and enhance both public and official support for mobilization efforts.

As for the chairman from Missouri, who had earlier been viewed as a rather lackluster politician whose reputation was clouded by his association with one of the nation's least-regarded organizations, the notorious Pendergast machine of Kansas City, his reputation as an alert, invaluable member of Congress was enhanced a hundredfold. This made him an almost logical choice for the vice presidential nomination in the 1944 election. Within a few months, he was the president of the United States.

As the old saying goes, the rest is history.

Several events in recent weeks seem to mirror the climate Truman found so disturbing six decades ago, as witness recent multimillion-dollar contracts being awarded to U.S. corporations that have close ties to the White House, contracts that were not subjected to the legally mandated requirement of competitive bidding. These awards are accompanied by assurances that only a handful of companies can provide the services being required but the details of "rebuilding" Iraq and, earlier, Afghanistan are never accompanied with any detailed listing of services, with the implication being that millions of dollars of taxpayer money will be used for purposes that are never revealed nor even verifiable.

Strangely enough, some of largest of these contracts, including one that totals billions of dollars, have gone to corporations that have a long association with such administration officials as Vice President Dick Cheney, Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld and others. Huge corporations such as Bechtel and Halliburton are former employers of some of the nation's most influential officials, while some still retain their association if only through stock holdings. When announcing the awarding of a recent contract, negotiated behind closed doors to Bechtel, no one mentioned that the firm's investors include numerous members of the notorious bin Laden family, which stands to gain from just one contract that will exceed $680 million in taxpayer funds.

We are witnessing not only welfare for the wealthy but taxpayer largesses for families specializing in terrorizing countries of the free world, including our own. Indeed, according to HST's memoirs, Washington's business-as-usual awards for war contracts were the singular factor in his determination to investigate defense contracts more than six decades ago. The more things change, the more they stay the same.

An editorial in the New York Times recently referred to the awarding of several no-bid, no-competition contracts as the "Iraq money tree," which indeed is exactly what the administration's rebuilding program appears to have become. If one were overly suspicious, the present contract program by only U.S. firms may well be one of the reasons the White House has been so adamantly opposed to any part of reconstruction of Iraq being under the direction of the United Nations. Despite the billions of dollars planned or already proposed for this program, the federal government is facing a worrisome budget deficit that will affect not only the U.S. Treasury but existing programs designed to help less well-off Americans who depend on federal programs for their family's health, the welfare of their children and, indeed, their very lives.

A Truman-style oversight program of rebuilding efforts in Afghanistan, Iraq and elsewhere in the Middle East could prove to be more than Washington can handle, if indeed it can successfully manage existing programs under the proposed tax reduction measures so eagerly proposed and supported by the president and his cabinet. Bush becomes the first American president in anyone's memory to ask for huge wartime budget increases and at the same time support huge income tax reductions for the wealthy. How this is to be accomplished no one seems to be offering many new suggestions, except the often-tried and often-failed strategy to spend dollars Washington doesn't have to maintain national priorities.

We can almost hear HST chuckling.

Jack Stapleton is the editor of Missouri News & Editorial Service.