Brian McNicoll, Director of Communications, Committee on Oversight and Government Reform accuses Dan Catalano of making up facts on whether Tom Davis can "measure up" should he decide to run for the U.S. Senate ["The man who would be king," The Odd Dominion, May 1, 2007]. In his retort, McNicoll is certainly guilty of making up his own facts to save his boss's face. (Was this distortion written on government time?)
There are lots of factual errors in this letter and the Connection newspaper should not let them remain with the appearance of the approval of the Reform Committee.
This is a copy of the LtE I wrote to the Connection, cross posted on Beltway Progressive and MyDD.
To say that Tom Davis's name is on some bills during a time when lobbyists paid for the privilege to write them is no compliment. Davis, in fact, collected more money from lobbyists than 428 of the 435 members of Congress. After Tom Delay resigned in disgrace, he moved up from #8 to #7. He worked closely with Tom DeLay and Jack Abramoff at the Republican National Congressional Committee. Disgraced Mark Foley was a member of his $100,000 club that Davis called "The Business Leadership Trust." Foley said he was being pressured by "the White House and Rove gang," who insisted that Foley run. If he didn't, Foley was told, it might impact his lobbying career.
As to Davis's wife's job at ICG, it's true they weren't married when he got that job for her. At that time, he was her "mentor" and campaign manager and they were divorcing their spouses with children. She had lost three elections and Davis was setting her up with a position with no federal campaign limits so that after donating to him up to the limit, bidders on government contractors could substitute money for competence. ICG did register as a lobbyist after they got caught by the Post. Again McNicoll gets his facts wrong: Andrew Hurst brought it up on his website and in debates, calling for Davis's resignation, for example at here, here, and here.
As to the work he did on the Reform Committee, yes, he and Waxman didn't call each other names. But it didn't take a genius to conclude that the response to Katrina was "A Failure of Initiative." And the tragedy was foreseeable and in fact was foreseen and Davis did nothing to prevent it while agencies responsible for response were dismantled and sold to contractors under Davis's watch while he collected their campaign contributions. Tom Davis knew about Walter Reed conditions in 2004, but did not want to hold hearings because it would "embarrass" his Party or his President. See Congressional Quarterly March 7, 2007. Davis accepted campaign contributions from the Halliburton-connected contractor for Walter Reed during the decline of the staff and facility. Davis held a half-day hearing on Abu Gharib while Democrats had to meet in the basement.
At the recently-revealed GSA scandal, Tom Davis knew Lurita Doan was firing auditors, giving GSA contracts to friends. Davis had forced out previous GSA manager Angela Styles who had been pushing for audits of incompetent contractors, replaced her with David Safavian, a felon who sold access to contracts to Jack Abramoff. See more on Ms. Styles here. Tom Davis's name appears on the slides of Republicans that federal employees were supposed to help on taxpayer time.
This is just the tip of the iceberg. I appreciate that Mr. McNicoll's boss may have asked him to respond to the May 1 article, but the inaccuracies of a loyal Bushie should not go uncorrected.