Dear Senator:

Taxpayers for Common Sense (TCS) urges you to support Sens. James Webb (D-VA) and Claire McCaskill’s (D-MO) Wartime Contract Commission, Study and Investigation amendment to the FY08 Defense Authorization bill to expand the Special Inspector General for Iraq Reconstruction (SIGIR) oversight to include Afghanistan and to establish a special commission to investigate and report on contracting practices, activities and failures in Iraq.

For several years, TCS has supported the creation of a “Truman Committee” for Iraq. During World War II, Sen. Harry Truman (D-MO) led a special committee investigating profiteering and contract irregularities. While not a senatorial committee, this amendment would establish a bi-partisan commission with subpoena powers to investigate contracting procedures and activities in the Iraq and Afghanistan Wars. The SIGIR reports that document individual contracting failures demand an overarching review, recommendations and “lessons learned” to inform ongoing and future reconstruction efforts whether overseas or here in the U.S. after a catastrophe like Hurricane Katrina. It is clear that our national involvement overseas will continue for the foreseeable future and the nation has billions of dollars in contracting lessons to be learned from failures in Iraq.

Further, the valuable SIGIR investigations in Iraq would be similarly valuable in Afghanistan and TCS strongly supports expansion of the IG’s purview.

Again TCS strongly urges the Senate to adopt the Webb-McCaskill contracting amendment as part of the FY08 Defense Authorization bill. Please contact me or Steve Ellis, 202-546-8500 ext. 126 or steve@taxpayer.net with questions.

Sincerely,

Ryan Alexander
President