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W stands for Wackenhut, and vice versa. Steven Baum at Ethel points us to a 1992 article from the sorely missed Spy Magazine. The story reports on a Wackenhut employee and former Marine named David Ramirez who was sent on a mission in the winter of 1990 to accompany a truck from Texas to Chicago:

A little before 5:00 on the morning of the third day [of the mission], they delivered the trailer to a practically empty warehouse outside Chicago. A burly man who had been waiting for them on the loading dock told them to take off the locks and go home, and that was that. They were on a plane back to Miami that afternoon. Later Ramirez's superiors told him — as they told other SID agents about similar midnight runs — that the trucks contained $40 million worth of food stamps. After considering the secrecy, the way the team was assembled and the orders not to stop or open the truck, Ramirez decided he didn't believe that explanation.

Neither do we. One reason is simple: A Department of Agriculture official simply denies that food stamps are shipped that way. "Someone is blowing smoke," he says. Another reason is that after a six-month investigation, in the course of which we spoke to more than 300 people, we believe we know what the truck did contain — equipment necessary for the manufacture of chemical weapons — and where it was headed: to Saddam Hussein's Iraq. And the Wackenhut Corporation — a publicly traded company with strong ties to the CIA and federal contracts worth $200 million a year — was making sure Saddam would be getting his equipment intact.

The eight-page article is well worth reading if you're curious how Saddam procured all his evil WMD.

And as if this isn't enough, here's another article about Wackenhut's involvement in W's prison privatization and profit scheme back in the good ol' days when Dubya was just a guvna....

George and Richard Wackenhut, owners of Wackenhut Corporation, operate 13 prisons in the Lone Star State. They are so enthusiastic about fellow Republican George "Dubya" Bush and his race for the presidency that they have contributed considerable sums to his election campaigns.

Bush's ties to the prison-industrial complex raise troubling questions about his posturing as a "compassionate conservative". It sheds light on his "lock-em-up-and-throw-away-the-key" policy on the incarceration of drug users — even though Bush does not deny reports that he snorted cocaine in his youth.

It also reveals much about his hard-line support for the death penalty which he has imposed 137 times since taking office, more than any other governor.

Bush sent Shaka Sankofa (Gary Graham) to his death despite widespread doubt about his guilt. He also executed Karla Faye Tucker, the first women in 100 years executed in Texas, despite worldwide calls for clemency.

The death penalty is a centerpiece of the GOP's [Republicans'] policy of criminalising youth and people of colour.

That policy has resulted in the incarceration of 1.8 million people in US prisons, rivalling the number of youth attending college.

At least US$35 billion is spent each year on prison incarceration and the "privatisers" of the GOP see this industry as a lush pasture for super-profits.

No wonder the Repubs are better at catching bong dealers than terrorists. They're much easier to catch, and much more lucrative to imprison, as Wackenhut Corrections Corporation boasts in its "Fast Facts" (excerpts):

• WCC was one of the first companies ever to capitalize on the trend toward government outsourcing of correctional and detention services.
  
• Today, we are one of the world's largest public companies managing privatized correctional and detention facilities - and we're the second largest provider of correctional services to the United States Federal Government.
  
• We estimate the United States private correctional and detention industry at $40 billion. We have a 21 percent share of the United States market and 55 percent share of the international market for a combined global market share of 27 percent.
  
• We have 57 correctional and hospital facilities under contract and/or award, which comprise approximately 42,500 beds for males, females, adults, juveniles, pre-trial and sentenced offenders and special needs.

That works out to about $8 billion for their share of the US market, and probably lots more for the rest of the world.

With 42,500 beds (sounds so cozy, doesn't it?), Wackenhut approaches the achievement of the hotel and resort company Westin and its 52,000 beds. As another global leader in the temporary human storage industry, perhaps Wackenhut should recycle some of Westin's ad campaign headlines: 1) "Good business people go to Heaven." 2) "Work like the devil. Sleep like an angel." 3) "He's the best in sales. He's the best in golf. He deserves the best in bed. Who is he sleeping with?"

Peek behind the drapes and you'll see that Wackenhut and elected officials are sleeping with each other.

{ 5:40 PM }

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