The RNC hearts Blackwater

By GottaLaff

Ben Smith reveals that the RNC has Xe hots for Blackwater. They're about to cohabitate at a fundraiser:

Spokesmen for the Republican National Committee and for Xe Services, the embattled military contractor formerly known as Blackwater, denied to me last month that the party had any plans to host a donor retreat at Xe's U.S. Training Center in North Carolina.

Today, however, spokesmen for both said the event -- which appeared in a calendar in the leaked RNC fundraising presentation -- is on.

Here is a snippet of Ben's original post:

The Republican National Committee is planning to raise $60,000 at a fundraiser next month at the North Carolina compound owned by the company formerly known as Blackwater.

The event is going to be held by the under-40somethings called the "Young Eagles".

If you still aren't familiar with who and what Blackwater really is, please take a look at the primer I compiled called "Blackwater for Dummeez".

Here are a few screen grabs of the leaked presentation. And remember, they put the FUN back in FUNdraising!

(click on image to enlarge)

Nothing more reassuring than teaming up with a bunch of thugs. That should lend as much credibility to the party as their RNC chair spending nearly two grand at a kinky bondage-themed club.

H/t: Gr8RDH

Xe-ing the light: Carl Levin asks for DoJ investigation into Blackwater contract

By GottaLaff

Carl Levin is Xe-ing the light:

The Senate’s top Democrat on military matters is pressing the Department of Justice to investigate whether the company formerly known as Blackwater and Raytheon Co. made false or misleading statements when bidding for an Army contract in Afghanistan.

A Senate Armed Services Committee investigation, spurred by chairman Carl Levin (D-Mich.), recently found that Xe Services’ (formerly Blackwater) contractors had no regard for policies and rules in Afghanistan. The panel found multiple irresponsible acts by the contractors and troubling gaps in government oversight.

The State Department needs to cut them off completely. They are currently contracted to be in Afghanistan.

Then DoJ has to nail Blackwater to the wall. Finally.

All the details are here.

BREAKING: Blackwater employees ordered out of Iraq

By GottaLaff

MSNBC just reported that Blackwater aka Xe aka Murderers aka Thugs have been kicked out of Iraq. More details to come.

UPDATE via e-mail alert:

BAGHDAD (AP) Iraq orders hundreds of former and current Blackwater employees to leave country within 7 days.

UPDATE:

Iraq has ordered hundreds of former and current Blackwater employees to leave country within 7 days. Iraqis seeking justice for 17 people shot dead at a Baghdad intersection in January responded with bitterness and outrage at a U.S. judge's decision to throw out a case against a Blackwater security team accused in the killings.

Once and for all, this bunch of criminals, who our government still employs, needs to get what they deserve.

Iraqis want Blackwater deal voided

By GottaLaff

The other day, I posted about Blackwater cutting a deal with Iraqis, a deal that didn't go over too well with many of them. They're not too fond of their family members and friends being murdered by mercenaries, followed by hearing that their lives were worth a few lousy bucks, that poor wittle Blackwater was about to become penniless, and finally, being told to just go away.

In fact, now we discover that they were forced into a deal:

Several victims of a 2007 shooting involving American private security guards employed by the firm formerly known as Blackwater alleged Sunday that they were coerced into reaching settlements, and they demanded that the Iraqi government intervene to have the agreements nullified.

The Iraqis said they were pressured by their own attorneys into accepting what they now believe are inadequate settlements because they were told the company was about to file for bankruptcy, that its chairman was going to be arrested and that the U.S. government was about to confiscate all of the firm's assets. This would be their last chance to get any compensation, the victims said they were told.

When criminal charges against the guards were dismissed by a U.S. federal judge on Dec. 31, the Iraqis concluded that they had been duped and that Blackwater, now called Xe, was not in the kind of legal and financial trouble they had been led to believe. [...]

The settlements were reached last fall in meetings at Baghdad's Rasheed Hotel, where the claimants say they were required to sign a paper, written in English, and make videotaped testimony in Arabic, relinquishing all future claims against the company.

Short version: We get to kill your loved ones indiscriminately, shove a few dollars at you, lie to you, and tell you to shut up and get lost.

Xe worst.

Blackwater to Iraqis: Your lives are worth $100K, take it or leave it

By GottaLaff

It's nice to know Blackwater values life so highly. And here I thought a human being's life was worth only a couple of hundred dollars. What was I thinking?

The security firm formerly known as Blackwater has reached a settlement in seven civil lawsuits filed against it by families of Iraqis killed during what the suits called "senseless slaughter" by company guards. [...]

In Baghdad on Thursday, a shooting victim who has not settled said he still wanted the guards prosecuted in criminal court.

"Iraqi blood is not that cheap," said Mehdi Abu Zaman, 45, who said he lost his sight after being shot. "The civil suit is not enough. There is no justification for this. If they gave me all the money in the world, my vision will not come back."

Another wounded man, Sami Hawas Hamoud Abu Iz, told the Associated Press that the company had offered $100,000 to each family of a person who died and $30,000 to those wounded. He said plaintiffs' lawyers told victims they might not receive anything if they did not agree to a settlement.

Brown lives are on special, apparently. As for wounded brown people? They're worth less than a Ford Taurus.

That Xe, er, Blackwater, er, Xe... they just ooze generosity and love of their fellow man:

The civil suits alleged that Blackwater "fostered a culture of lawlessness amongst its employees, encouraging them to act in the company's financial interests at the expense of innocent human life."

The suits alleged that some of the "shooters," as the plaintiffs said the guards were known, were "chemically influenced by steroids and other judgment-altering substances."

The suits accused Prince of making "a series of verbal and written statements that evidenced his support of the wanton killing of those of the Islamic faith."

Their consistent high regard for human life is illustrated here, too, via Jeremy Scahill.

Go here for more.

Iraq regrets Blackwater case dismissal, may sue

By GottaLaff

Giving Blackwater thugs immunity, great idea. That worked out well, didn't it?

BAGHDAD (Reuters) - Iraq expressed its disappointment on Friday with a U.S. federal court ruling that threw out all charges against five Blackwater Worldwide security guards accused of gunning down Iraqi civilians in 2007.

Government spokesman Ali al-Dabbagh said the five men had committed a "serious crime" in the September 2007 shooting in Baghdad, which strained U.S.-Iraqi relations and became a symbol for many Iraqis of foreign disregard for local life.

Dabbagh said Iraq may sue the private security company, now known as Xe Services.

New Years resolution: Cut Blackwater off. Xe ya later.

Talk about indoctrination: Blackwater accepting civilians

By GottaLaff

Xe plot xickens:

The massive Blackwater training center in Moyock, Va., is opening its doors to civilians, the company's ads indicate.

Oh boy, kids! New job ops! Who wants to learn to kill innocent civilians? Hands?

And check this out. Yet another name change:

An advertisement in The (Norfolk, Va.) Virginian-Pilot indicated the Blackwater facility, owned by Xe Services LLC of McLean, Va., has changed its name to the U.S. Training Center and is offering gun training courses to civilians as well as to military personnel and police officers, the newspaper reported Sunday.

I keep telling my friends that if there's one thing we need, it's more armed civilians. We don't have enough of those.

They even have women-only classes! Nothing says "equality" like a crash course in murder.

The company claims the Moyock facility is the world's largest private weapons training center, with 40,000 trainees per year, mostly from U.S. and other militaries.

Then why don't I feel safer

Beck/O'Reilly/Limbaugh and Drudge rule our world

The House just voted to completely defund any federal money from Acorn while Blackwater/Xe is still under a recently updated contract to the United States Government.

**Pic via NewsCorpse.

Blackwater Offers Training to 'Faith Based Organizations'

By GottaLaff

Via Jeremy Scahill:

Meet the “Personal Security Awareness” program, which appears to be an off-shoot of Erik Prince’s Greystone, Ltd., a classic mercenary operation registered offshore in Barbados. [...] [T]he “program” is described as “a multi-phase course which is designed to assist Non-Government Organizations, Faith Based Organizations and Commercial Businesses by providing individual personal awareness and driver training for their personnel when deployed to unfamiliar environments.” It adds: “Greystone recognizes the importance of “preparation by doing” and looks forward to you joining us for this exciting training!”

Oh boy! Exciting faith based training! And from Blackwater!

Are they serious? I’m sure there are just scores of Islamic aid groups just lining up to take courses from Blackwater, Xe, US Training Center, Greystone, Personal Security Awareness.

Xe ya later.

Moreover, any legitimate “faith based organization” that wants harmony with other faiths would be insane to work with this company.

That would be cra-Xe, alright.

One of the courses offered is described as teaching “persons traveling to foreign environments how to remain safe during their travels in a vehicle.” This truly is surreal. [...] Remember how those unarmed Iraqi civilians were blown up in their car by Blackwater operatives at Nisour Square? Or the Afghan civilians allegedly killed in their car by Blackwater operatives in Afghanistan in May?

Yeah, somehow that whole Blackwater/car thing wasn't a good match. This can't end well.

Also, lets remember that Blackwater—headed by a man described in a sworn statement by a former employee as “view[ing] himself as a Christian crusader tasked with eliminating Muslims and the Islamic faith from the globe”— is itself a twisted faith-based organization—and a very violent one at that.

I hope the ObamAdministration finally Xe's the light and breaks the contract they have with this bunch of thugs. I still need a good talking down from that one.

For a hard look at who these people are, see my Blackwater for Dummeez primer.

Read the rest of Jeremy's piece here.