Dealing: Even Ex-Federal Watchdogs Are Doing It
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At least Mr. Thibault did this near the end of his career, Mr. Sauber swung through the watchdog revolving door early in his career and I am sure that he is now a very rich man.
I know about this watchdog revolving door case because I knew Mr. Thibault personally. However, this is going on daily under the radar. The Security and Exchange Commission (SEC) oversight personnel have been also blatantly and boldly going through the revolving door to help out delinquent companies.
Michael Smallberg, an investigator for POGO, has been following the SEC watchdog revolving door and here is one of his most egregious findings:
Every SEC enforcement director from the last decade has left the agency to go through the revolving door: Linda Thomsen [17], Stephen Cutler [18] and Richard Walker [19]. Walker’s departure was particularly controversial, because he ended up at Deutsche just after the SEC mysteriously dropped [20] a case against the bank [21].
It is especially disheartening to me to see the government watchdogs, who have seen the contractor fraud up close and personal, leave the government to advise these wrongdoers on how to beat a government investigation. The government is handicapped enough by not having the money or personnel to do in-depth and thorough investigations, but now they will find some of their former colleagues across the table from them. And they know that these revolving door watchdogs have given away their investigative methods and are, at the least, misleading their former colleagues.
The Solution?
I have written about what to do about the revolving door in other columns, but there should be a special restriction on government watchdogs leaving to work with companies that they were investigating. These former government watchdogs are trained by the federal government and should be forbidden to go to work with any contractor, subcontractor or consulting firm that has any business with their former government agency.
There are many types of post-government jobs for former government watchdogs, including working with whistleblowers and the federal government on whistleblower suits to get money back for the federal government. They can also help alleviate fraud against the government by teaching what they know at universities, so that there will be future generations of government watchdogs who will, hopefully, not go to the dark side of the force and help companies get out of legitimate oversight. This is something that can’t be totally legislated; it is also a matter of character, but sometimes the lure of big money breaks through. So, the federal government needs to make stronger rules so the egregious behavior of Mr. Thibault and Mr. Sauber is not repeated over and over. (Click HERE for original article)
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Other Related Posts From Ms Sparky
- Neil Gordon: Two Former Watchdogs Ring in the New Year on the Other Side of the Revolving Door
- Pentagon Watchdogs Rarely Side With Military Whistleblowers
- A Tip for Dealing with TIPS
- F is for “Fraud or Federal Contracts”
- It’s Time To Debar KBR From Federal Contracts
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Thursday, January 12th 2012 at 2:36 pm |
The simple answer is to remove the Army and Air Force from Contracting and turn it over to an Agency with some integrity. Turn the Army and Air Force Contracting Officer into Administrators without a SF1402 ( Warrant ) and publicize all contracts. ALL.
Here is what USAF LtCol Blair has to say while defending Ali Al Salem single sole sourcing KMS.
“There is an exception to publicizing contract actions for supplies and services in FAR Part 5.202 for performance outside of the U.S.”