{"id":816,"date":"2007-11-01T10:39:56","date_gmt":"2007-11-01T10:39:56","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blog.beliefnet.com\/jwalking\/2007\/11\/blackwater-proving-john-edward.html"},"modified":"2007-11-01T10:39:56","modified_gmt":"2007-11-01T10:39:56","slug":"blackwater-proving-john-edward","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/jwalking\/2007\/11\/blackwater-proving-john-edward.html","title":{"rendered":"Blackwater proving John Edwards correct"},"content":{"rendered":"

Blackwater Worldwide, the self-described “military company” at the center of much criticism, scandal, and attack, is doing a wonderful job proving John Edwards’ point about Washington’s culture of corruption.
\nIn Edwards’ speech on Monday<\/a> in New Hampshire, he said:<\/p>\n

It\u2019s time to tell the truth. And the truth is the system in Washington is corrupt. It is rigged by the powerful special interests to benefit they very few at the expense of the many. And as a result, the American people have lost faith in our broken system in Washington, and believe it no longer works for ordinary Americans. They\u2019re right.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Is he right? Wrong? Nuts? Bold? Pandering? Prophetic? What?
\nCut to today’s story<\/a> in the New York Times on Blackwater.<\/p>\n

Blackwater Worldwide, its reputation in tatters and its lucrative government contracts in jeopardy, is mounting an aggressive legal, political and public relations counterstrike.
\nIt has hired a bipartisan stable of big-name Washington lawyers, lobbyists and press advisers, including the public relations powerhouse Burson-Marsteller, which was brought in briefly, but at a critical moment, to help Blackwater\u2019s chairman, Erik D. Prince, prepare for his first Congressional hearing.\n<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

The article then goes on to document how former officials from the Bush and Clinton administrations, some of Jack Abramoff’s former associates, former senior Hill aides, and others are all being paid very large sums of money by this very, very wealthy company.
\nWhile this is clearly legal and it is clearly within their rights to mount a vigorous defense, there is something tawdry about this as well. There is something that just reeks about this wealth-trading insider game.
\nI have no idea what can be done about it – if anything. But something has to change here because this is really, really gross.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Blackwater Worldwide, the self-described “military company” at the center of much criticism, scandal, and attack, is doing a wonderful job proving John Edwards’ point about Washington’s culture of corruption. In Edwards’ speech on Monday in New Hampshire, he said: It\u2019s time to tell the truth. And the truth is the system in Washington is corrupt.…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":22,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[7],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-816","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-politics"],"yoast_head":"\nBlackwater proving John Edwards correct - J Walking<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/jwalking\/2007\/11\/blackwater-proving-john-edward.html\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Blackwater proving John Edwards correct - J Walking\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"Blackwater Worldwide, the self-described “military company” at the center of much criticism, scandal, and attack, is doing a wonderful job proving John Edwards’ point about Washington’s culture of corruption. In Edwards’ speech on Monday in New Hampshire, he said: It\u2019s time to tell the truth. And the truth is the system in Washington is corrupt.…\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/jwalking\/2007\/11\/blackwater-proving-john-edward.html\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"J Walking\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:published_time\" content=\"2007-11-01T10:39:56+00:00\" \/>\n<meta name=\"author\" content=\"David Kuo\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary_large_image\" \/>\n<!-- \/ Yoast SEO plugin. -->","yoast_head_json":{"title":"Blackwater proving John Edwards correct - J Walking","robots":{"index":"index","follow":"follow","max-snippet":"max-snippet:-1","max-image-preview":"max-image-preview:large","max-video-preview":"max-video-preview:-1"},"canonical":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/jwalking\/2007\/11\/blackwater-proving-john-edward.html","og_locale":"en_US","og_type":"article","og_title":"Blackwater proving John Edwards correct - J Walking","og_description":"Blackwater Worldwide, the self-described “military company” at the center of much criticism, scandal, and attack, is doing a wonderful job proving John Edwards’ point about Washington’s culture of corruption. 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