Lockheed Martin faces setbacks
Mood:  chatty
Now Playing: WAR MACHINE AND PROFITS FOR LOCKHEED
Topic: BIG MONEY PLAYERS

 Hello Z3 Readers here is an article I copied from:

http://www.570news.com/news/business/article.jsp?content=b042123A

.

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Top U.S. defence contractor Lockheed Martin faces setbacks, but Wall Street seems unfazed

April 21, 2007 - 14:54

By: DAN CATERINICCHIA

WASHINGTON (AP) - Lockheed Martin is taking hits right and left - criticism of its newly designed presidential helicopter, the unusual Navy cancellation of a multimillion-dollar combat ship and losing its shared oversight role on a Coast Guard project worth billions.

 

Wall Street so far has shrugged at the missteps of the biggest U.S. defence contractor, since its bottom line won't be hurt in the near term. But Lockheed executives are worried, experts say, and not just about the negative headlines. The Democrat-led Congress is scrutinizing defence spending more closely and each time Lockheed stumbles it gives rivals an opportunity to horn in on its business.

 

"These are significant setbacks for Lockheed that occur against a backdrop of remarkable success over the last five years," said Loren Thompson, a defence analyst at the Lexington Institute in Arlington, Va. "The real question is if that trend is going to continue.

 

The company has had recent stumbles:

 

-The Coast Guard this week said it was taking over management of a troubled US$24 billion modernization program dubbed Deepwater that had been run by a joint venture of Lockheed Martin Corp. and Northrop Grumman Corp. since its 2002 inception.

 

-The U.S. Navy last week cancelled a shipbuilding contract with Lockheed after negotiations to control costs on the second of two Littoral Combat Ships failed.

 

-The Government Accountability Office last month criticized Lockheed's work on a new fleet of Marine One helicopters for exceeding program costs and for being about 600 kilograms overweight.

 

Despite these events, Lockheed's stock price has been relatively steady and Wall Street analysts have barely raised an eyebrow. In fact, many analysts praised Lockheed's financial discipline for walking away from the combat ship deal after weeks of fruitless negotiations. Analysts said the cancelled Navy deal would have little effect on the bottom line of the Bethesda, Md.-based company, which reported a 6.5 per cent jump in 2006 sales to US$39.6 billion.

 

Since the beginning of the month, Lockheed's stock has dipped about one per cent, while some of its rivals, including General Dynamics Corp., Boeing Co. and others, have seen modest gains.

 

But government and technology industry experts said Lockheed is concerned about the high-profile problems on government deals. Although continued contract wins in a variety of areas suggest Lockheed's reputation remains solid, any problems that arise bring unwanted attention from the media and lawmakers.

"If you're going to build a new technology, you're going to have to accept some failures," said James Lewis, director of the technology and public policy program at the Center for Strategic and International Studies, a Washington think tank.

 

And the company is not shy about branching out. While being known for making fighter jets and missiles, it also is expanding into government information technology and shipbuilding.

 

Lockheed Martin used to be considered an aerospace firm, but Lewis said a company executive recently corrected him by saying, "we're an IT company now." That official also told Lewis that the shipbuilding problems were a "huge headache."

 

But with hundreds of contracts in place serving dozens of customers worldwide, Lockheed spokesman Craig Quigley said "rarely are these programs easy." He described Lockheed as a "high-end engineering company" faced with difficult challenges that attempts to effectively apply its systems integration and program management expertise.

 

With 140,000 employees, many of whom are engineers, Quigley scoffed at the notion that Lockheed had spread itself too thin and said the company "moves skill sets around ... to address the challenges we're faced with."

The Navy combat ship deal was Lockheed's first and only one working as a prime shipbuilding vendor for the government and was bigger than the rest of its shipbuilding contracts combined, Quigley said, adding that company is pursuing other opportunities internationally.

 

Still, Lockheed CEO Bob Stevens said last week the company was "greatly disappointed by the cost growth" on the first Navy combat ship and frustrated that "we will not have the opportunity to apply lessons learned to a second ship."

 

"The first time you try a new military technology there are teething problems," Lewis said, adding that he did not expect the Navy and Coast Guard issues to have any long-term effect on Lockheed.

 

"Neither of these stories is good news for Lockheed, but it's not as though the company was fired," said Thompson, who does some government budget and acquisition consulting for Lockheed, but not for specific programs. "My impression is that they're departures from the norm rather than a new trend."

 

But senior U.S. Navy officials have recently stressed a need to revamp their acquisition strategy as various key ship programs continue to exceed initial contract estimates. The service has floated the idea of moving toward fixed-priced contracts for most ship programs, rather than cost-plus contracts where vendors can raise their price tags and reap extra revenue.

 

The most harshest criticism of Lockheed's work is expected Wednesday afternoon at a House Transportation and Infrastructure Committee hearing that will focus on the results of an investigation conducted by its oversight staff on the Deepwater patrol boat conversion.

 

The Coast Guard this week permanently decommissioned the eight cutters that had been removed from service late last year because of hull problems. Michael DeKort, a former Lockheed Martin employee who detailed electronics safety and security issues in the cutters beginning in 2003, and later chronicled his complaints in a YouTube video, is scheduled to testify about the company's alleged negligence and legislators already have called on the U.S. Justice Department to investigate.

 

Shares of Lockheed added 35 cents to $96.31 in Wednesday trading on the New York Stock Exchange.

 

http://www.570news.com/news/business/article.jsp?content=b042123A

 

More lessons of ethics with the Bushman crowd
Mood:  incredulous
Now Playing: Sleeping with a lobbiest
Topic: BIG MONEY PLAYERS

Now 3 Readers, please read over this recent AP news article and if you can keep track of who is who .....or who is sleeping with their favorite lobbyist then your soap opera skills are pretty sharp.

 Beside the very last line which is pretty much to the point, (( "Bush later appointed Wooldridge to head the Justice Department's environment division, representing virtually every federal agency, and she began working there in November 2005" )) this article does point out the unbelievable unethicalness this administration dabbles in and actually is awash in!  ..... It portrays more of the insider-good-ol-boy-bushman clan shenanigans, where one hand is helping the other if you know what I mean! < in very unethical profiteering way >

By JOHN HEILPRIN, Associated Press Writer Thu Feb 15, 9:01 PM ET

WASHINGTON - The House Judiciary Committee on Thursday asked Attorney General Alberto Gonzales to explain how the Justice Department's former top environmental prosecutor could sign consent decrees with the third-largest U.S. oil company after buying a $980,000 vacation home with its top lobbyist.  

_{An Associated Press report a day earlier disclosing the transactions "suggests potential unethical, if not illegal, conduct by a senior Justice Department official and, even more disturbing, apparent complicity in such behavior by the department," the committee's chairman, Rep. John Conyers (news, bio, voting record), D-Mich., said in a letter to Gonzales.}

_{Conyers also asked Gonzales when he and other department officials learned of then-Assistant Attorney General Sue Ellen Wooldridge's "close relationship with a target of a department public corruption investigation and what action, if any, was taken as a result?"}

_{A third buyer of the gated community home at Kiawah Island, S.C., was former Deputy Interior Secretary J. Steven Griles, who shares a condominium in northern Virginia with Wooldridge and was told last month he faces possible criminal charges of lying to Congress and fraud in the Jack Abramoff bribery and influence-peddling scandal.}

_{The Justice Department says ethics officials signed off on Wooldridge's purchase of the beach getaway with Griles, now an oil and gas lobbyist, and ConocoPhillips Vice President Donald R. Duncan, before the closing last April. The deed lists Duncan as half owner in the property, with Wooldridge and Griles each owning 25 percent.}

_{Nine months later, the Justice Department sent two proposed consent decrees signed by Wooldridge to a federal judge in Houston for approval. One, sent Jan. 11, would let the company delay the required installation of some of the $525 million in pollution controls at nine refineries; the other dealt with a Superfund toxic waste cleanup. Wooldridge resigned as assistant attorney general effective Jan. 19. ConocoPhillips said Duncan had no involvement in negotiating the consent agreements.}

_{Conyers' letter also was signed by Rep. Rahm Emanuel (news, bio, voting record), D-Ill., chairman of the House Democratic Caucus, as an expression of broader support for the inquiries within the House. Another House panel, the Oversight and Government Reform Committee chaired by Rep. Henry Waxman (news, bio, voting record), D-Calif., launched an inquiry a day earlier.}

_{The Justice Department said it would have no comment Thursday.}

_{Wooldridge two months ago amended her financial disclosure report for 2005 to include more than $10,000 in travel, jewelry, a watch and golf clubs she received from Griles between December 2003 and December 2005. Griles began dating Wooldridge in February 2003, when she was deputy staff chief and counselor to then Interior Secretary Gale Norton.}

_{Griles was the department's No. 2 official from July 2001 to January 2005. During that tenure he was almost constantly scrutinized by the department's internal watchdog over dealings with ex-clients and continuing payments from the sale of his old lobbying firm.}

_{Interior Inspector General Earl Devaney concluded in a 2004 that Griles' actions exposed a "wholesale failure of the ethics program" at the agency. They were, Devaney said, "a train wreck waiting to happen."}

_{While dating Griles, Wooldridge was officially counseling him on ethics matters and providing advice to Norton on how to respond to Devaney's report on him. Wooldridge did not tell Devaney about her relationship with Griles.}

_{In June 2004, Bush appointed Wooldridge as Interior's top lawyer. Sometime after she became Interior solicitor, Wooldridge told the department's ethics office she and Griles had begun dating, an Interior spokesman said. Devaney did not learn of Griles' and Wooldridge's romantic relationship until February 2005.}

_{Bush later appointed Wooldridge to head the Justice Department's environment division, representing virtually every federal agency, and she began working there in November 2005.} 

_{Original and Complete link: http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20070216/ap_on_go_ca_st_pe/prosecutor_lobbyist}

Looks Like our Democracy Crusade is Fruitful
Mood:  vegas lucky
Now Playing: $ Afgan Drug Trade $ = Police Commandeers Getting Rich
Topic: BIG MONEY PLAYERS
Let me start this by saying the following is the disclaimer from the Christian Monitor which was at the end of their article, I thought it should be read by you all first (please read The short Article on the Drug War Corruption in Afghanistan)
****************************************************

A note on how we (Christian Monitor) reported this story
The Monitor used a reporting device in this story that it normally avoids: The key interviews, all taped, were with sources who did not realize they were speaking to the press. This presents a risk to fairness and privacy, in that the interviewees might speak more casually and loosely than they would if they knew they were speaking to a reporter. We decided to go forward for several reasons. The subjects in these interviews are all public officials, not private citizens, discussing what should be public business. The issue of drug trafficking, illegal in Afghanistan as nearly everywhere else, is critically important to the future of that country and others. We could find no other safe way to collect direct evidence of this official corruption. But because we could not directly confront these police chiefs without endangering the lives of reporters or interpreters, we decided to withhold their names.- The editors of The Christian Monitor

Now here is the Link to the article:
Christian Monitor Undercover Article which is about the CORRUPT drug trade that is flourishing and out of control. And the key or should I say the only big players are the Police.
This article opens your eyes to how far out-of-control this has become. I wonder if this has any result in our "Spreading Democracy or Liberating?"

In a country where illegal business generates $2.7 billion a year, which is over half the value of the country's legal economy,and as one commandeer said "It's not the responsibilities that I like the most, it's the access to the drug trade, It is a good position," he says. "I pay $1,000 and get $20,000 in profit."

"Fellow Zebra 3 readers ...Welcome to Afghanistan!"

HURRY SEND A QUICK EMAIL TODAY TO CONGRESS
Mood:  loud
Now Playing: Please Support Chris Shays (CT) and Martin Meehan (MA)
Topic: BIG MONEY PLAYERS

Zebra 3 Readers, You have to fire off a very quick email to your State Representative by clicking
HERE

The following paragraphs I am quoting came from a email I received today....this first 2 paragraph sums up what pisses me off and I cant sit here and do nothing ....I clicked the link and sent my opinion in less than 2 minutes.

(quote)
The current corrupt system skews public policy decisions that adversely impact our daily lives. As the scandals came to light last year, gas prices peaked over $3 per gallon causing serious disruptions to family budgets. The response from Congress was to pass an energy bill that gave more than $12 billion dollars in tax breaks to an oil industry that now reports record profits with no significant impact on short-term prices or long term solutions. The new Medicare prescription drug plan benefits the pharmaceutical industry more than seniors. The same can said for the bankruptcy bill, which offers more protection to credit card companies than consumers. The list goes on.

In the last year the Department of Justice, the Securities and Exchange Commission, state ethics agencies, news outlets, and government watchdog groups have all launched investigations into the actions of members of Congress who appear to have crossed the line between public service and self-enrichment. About the only entity that hasn't been looking into the Congressional scandals is the one primarily responsible to do so, the House Ethics Committee. The committee is paralyzed by partisanship and the reluctance of members of Congress to blow the whistle on their colleagues. Despite months of front page headlines, the House Ethics Committee hasn't even met to discuss a scandal in the last year.
(end quote)

Hurry and pass on some encouragement to your Congressional Rep!
The email mentioned also how ...

(quote)
Former lobbyist Jack Abramoff and former Representative Duke Cunningham (CA) are going to jail. Former top congressional aides Michael Scanlon and Tony Rudy are headed for the same fate. Representatives Robert Ney (IN) and Alan Mollohan (WV) are among those who are operating under a cloud and Representative Tom DeLay (TX) felt it better to step down than explain his actions to voters.
Wealthy interests buy special access to Congress via free trips, gifts, and meals given to our legislators. This diverts our tax money toward pet projects and away from adequately funded schools, safe communities, and public health. It is time to rein in the special favors and force Congress to put the public interest ahead of self-enrichment.

This Thursday, Representatives Christopher Shays (CT) and Martin Meehan (MA) will try to offer amendments to significantly tighten and enforce the House ethics rules that lead to the costly backroom deals. I say "try" because the House leadership may prevent them from getting a vote on the amendments.
(end quote)

The suggested amendments detailed by Reps. Chris Shays (CT) and Martin Meehan (MA) that will need to get voted in would be... (quote)
Step one should be to establish an independent, professionally staffed ethics office like the one detailed in an amendment by Reps. Chris Shays (CT) and Martin Meehan (MA) with the power to launch nonpartisan investigations, audit disclosure reports, recommend sanctions, and hear complaints. An independent entity will have the credibility and authority to ensure members of Congress play by the rules.
(end quote)

So click This Here Handy Link and do your part to help end the corruption in lobbying and to help change laws that will hold accountable by ethics standards we all can be proud of
And help our leaders we elect to represent us, follow within the honorable boundaries that are just and set with no loophole or confusion. Click the link and help bring some Integrity to our Congress

The CEO's I am reading about, make enough cash to use Money for toilet paper
Mood:  irritated
Now Playing: Why do we allow CEO to make so damn much money anyway?
Topic: BIG MONEY PLAYERS
It happens everywhere, in every industry, in every government, in every
body. The greed & corruption ROT sets in.
The parasites worm their way in.
Eventually, we are
all doomed to -->
corruption, degeneration, and death.

Z3 readers I am talking about the corruption in Big Business CEO salaries.
Where CEO are pulling in hundreds of thousands of dollars while the rest of the company or even its customers head to the bankruptcy courts.

USA TODAY found in its annual analysis of CEO paychecks that median 2005 pay among CEO's running most of the nation's 100 largest companies soared 25% to $17.9 million, dwarfing the 3.1% average gain by typical American workers, . READ MORE in the --> USA TODAY Link

Take for example this character, which I copied from an email I got from the Daily Reconing Site
.... Mr. Ivan Seidenberg,
CEO of Verizon Communications.
In 2005, he was the top man at Verizon and got a raise of 48% - to $19.4 million. Wow...you would guess that Verizon had a very good year, right?

And, you would be wrong. Verizon's owners saw nothing but misery. Their stock went down 26%. Their bonds were downgraded. Earnings declined 5.5%. The other managers had to be clipped back; 50,000 managers had their pensions "frozen," according to the New York Times report.

How did Mr. Seidenberg do so well amidst so much financial suffering? He hired an independent consultant to help determine what his pay should be.
This consultant noted that the company had exceeded its "challenging" benchmarks and rolled over.
But it turns out the consultant was not so independent after all. Instead, he had been doing business with Verizon for years and had received about half a billion dollars from the company since 1997.
(HAHA WOW I see a connection here!)
Neither Verizon nor the consultant is talking, according to the Times.
(haha what can they say?)

And then there is the headlines in the USA Today newspaper that the Daily Reconing Wewbsite points out ....No CEO's pay soared more than the CEO of Capital One Financial.
Thanks to a generous package of options and perks, Mr. Fairbanks took home
almost $250 million last year - a sum greater than the profits of 550
Fortune 1000 companies, including Goodyear Tire, Reebok and Pier 1

Or how about these guys...
Broadcom's Scott McGregor, hired by the semiconductor maker in January 2005, received $7.7 million in pay and bonus, plus stock options with a potential value of $101.9 million.
...and...
3M's James McNerney, who replaced Boeing CEO Harry Stonecipher in June, received $25.3 million in Boeing stock to compensate him for losing potential payouts at 3M. His last six months at 3M proved lucrative, too. He got almost $41 million ? $8.4 million in compensation and $32.4 million exercising 3M stock options
....and...
John Mack, who replaced ousted Morgan Stanley chief Philip Purcell in June, pulled in more than $68 million, including $37.8 million in restricted stock and $30 million exercising stock options

Get the feeling we are being taken to the cleaners?
You should!
Think its fine to make that kind of money while Joe Anybody can barley eat.
I keep thinking back to the old battle cry of
...."EAT THE RICH"

Although it might give me heartburn or make me violently sick

Justice Slaps A Republican .....
Mood:  happy
Now Playing: Hit The Road Tom .....Damn Crook!
Topic: BIG MONEY PLAYERS


LATEST NEWS ON BAD ASS TOM HITTING THE ROAD
Makes Me Wanna Celebrate!
Read Here where he says he wont run again on MSNBC website.
Heck he might be in jail?
Didnt his buddy Jack get some time to think about it n all?

So where is all the Money?
Mood:  not sure
Now Playing: 37 millions in fines ? But where is that money at ?
Topic: BIG MONEY PLAYERS
In this Industry where so far, According to the Justice Department, there has been around $731 million dollars in fines which happens to be the second largest amount of ever collected by the department from a single price-fixing conspiracy.

So today, three Executives at South Korean chipmaker Samsung Electronics Co. who have just pled guilty and agreed to serve jail time and
each pay a 250,000 fines.
the results of a long investigation in the price fixing of computer chips.

The full article I read is here!

The sales executives admitted to a scheme to artificially set prices for DRAM (dynamic RAM) with other co-conspirators. The Justice Department has been investigating allegations of DRAM price-fixing since 2002. Earlier this year, Infineon pled guilty to corporate price-fixing charges and agreed to pay a $160 million fine.

The Court ordered Samsung to pay the $300 million fine in installments in the next five years,
with the first payment of
50 million dollars due within 15 days.
The PC customers affected by the price-fixing activities included Apple Computer, Compaq, Dell, Gateway, Hewlett-Packard, and IBM, according to the documents.

DRAM stands for "Dynamic Random Access Memory" which is used in computers, cell phones, game consoles, and other like products.

The Zebra 3 Report is just wondering where all that
300 million dollars the Justice Department is going to start collect within the next 15 days is going to?

HA....... gotta have deep pockets for 300 million
And I bet those Justice Department Brown Suits have just that pockets to hold all of that!

*check out the original link I posted at the top, and see the fines that have been collected already, 165 million from one, 84 million from another, 160 million from another ...WOW!

I wonder if those fines were in cash?

THIS LINK HERE IS AN INTERESTING INDEX TO a dozen articles ABOUT THE ROUGH ROAD THIS DRAM CHIP MARKET HAS BEEN GOING THROUGH WITH SUITS AND PATENT RIGHTS AND FTC APPEALS ..... GEEEEEE WHIZZZZ!

Oil
Mood:  irritated
Now Playing: 5 Kidnapped Workers ~ Milliants ~ Shell Oil ~
Topic: BIG MONEY PLAYERS
According to Reuters...
In response to attacks on communities in the Niger Delta by the Nigerian army, units of the Movement for the Emancipation of the Niger Delta moved into Delta State yesterday to commence an attack on installations, along with kidnapping and killing.

The rebels identified their 5 captives as three Americans, a Briton, two Egyptians, a Filipino and two Thais and warned that they planned to step up their war on the oil industry in retaliation for government air strikes, in regards to Saturday's attack followed a week in which the Nigerian military carried out two air strikes against barges used by the militants to smuggle stolen crude.
In a statement emailed from an address used by the militia, the group also claimed to have severely damaged the export terminal, a major pipeline manifold and a gas pipeline supplying energy to Lagos, and that is in besides the 5 military solider killed in the platform attack.

*** OIL ***

Last month, the same gang had kidnapped four foreign oil workers and held them for 19 days, demanding that two ethnic Ijaw leaders be released from jail and that Shell pay $1.5 billion to the tribe. They released the two, but didn't pay, the group and its allies also attacked a number of oil facilities, killing at least 22 soldiers and police in two assaults, and blew up a major pipeline.

Shell's production was already down by 106,000 barrels per day when the latest violence broke out and the company has closed four of its oil flow stations in the western delta because of security fears.

Wow... Blood For Oil is right!

Jack & Tom went up the hill to fetch a pail of ca$h
Mood:  not sure
Now Playing: Jack fell down ......& Tom came a-tumbling after !!
Topic: BIG MONEY PLAYERS
Sounds like a story huh reader?

Ya know every day we are hearing about the indictments.
It is becoming a common accepted notion that
"So what!"yahhhnnn! He was stealing money for the
Right Wing Neocon War Hawk Pro-Torture Spy GOP Party"

Well it looks like jack is gonna spill his pail
let’s just see who-all comes a-tumbling down the hill behind him?

I must add, It should be remembered, that when you drink from the
'Governments Swine-Trough of Greed & Lies' ....You might!
Pick up a disease or a jail term or something!


The fact that
Leaders Of Joe Anybody's Country
and the Ca$h Cow of these Lobbyist Pay-Olla still continues even if Jack & Tommy can't play for a while (unless its "time in the yard")
And the paymasters are still collecting for their Special Interests and its business as usual, as policy is favored-out and all that money pours into hands in exchange for favors in the old ....
"Remember Me Club"
Stop the flow of Big Dollar by some campaing Finance Reform and include lobbiest and maybe some Honest Government might have a shade of hope?

Speaking of Blogging on These Story-Book characters check this link I couldnt resist not clicking on ... The title got me interested--->


You want the truth?
You can't handle the truth


Z3 back issues on this crap --->HERE

Poorest Countries Get Debt Relief from IMF
Mood:  incredulous
Now Playing: Hard to Believe - Good News in the Z3 report
Topic: BIG MONEY PLAYERS


December 22, 2005 2:31 a.m. EST
London, England (AHN) - The International Monetary Fund (IMF) writes off the $3.3 billion owed by most of poorest countries in the world.
The multilateral debt relief initiative was agreed by leaders of the G8 industrialized states in July after the series of "Live 8" rock concerts drew attention to the issue, according to BBC News.

The debts owed by the 19 nations will finally be canceled once the IMF has the approval of all 43 rich countries that have contributed to an anti-poverty trust set up by the Fund.

"So far we have 37 consents. We're quite hopeful we'll get remaining the six in the next few weeks," says IMF spokesman Thomas Dawson.

Benin, Bolivia, Burkina Faso, Cambodia, Ethiopia, Ghana, Guyana, Honduras, Madagascar, Mali, Mozambique, Nicaragua, Niger, Rwanda, Senegal, Tajikistan, Tanzania, Uganda, and Zambia should receive IMF debt relief by early 2006.