{"id":1184,"date":"2010-04-17T03:30:33","date_gmt":"2010-04-17T10:30:33","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.politicsplus.org\/blog\/?p=1184"},"modified":"2010-04-17T03:30:33","modified_gmt":"2010-04-17T10:30:33","slug":"blackwater-is-the-gop-ss-a-militia-now","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.politicsplus.org\/blog\/2010\/04\/17\/blackwater-is-the-gop-ss-a-militia-now\/","title":{"rendered":"Blackwater: Is the GOP SS a Militia Now?"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><font color=\"#0000ff\">Not too long ago, I remember reading that the Young Eagles, those 45 and under GOP stalwarts, who expressed their GOP family values at a lesbian bondage club at donor expense, were also slated for a field trip to Xe, the new name for Blackwater.&#160; Did Steele plan to have the schooled in the use of an AK-47?<\/font><\/p>\n<blockquote>\n<p><strong><a href=\"https:\/\/www.7thstep.org\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2010\/04\/Blackwater.jpg\" target=\"_blank\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" style=\"border-right-width: 0px; margin: 2px 10px 5px 0px; display: inline; border-top-width: 0px; border-bottom-width: 0px; border-left-width: 0px\" title=\"Blackwater\" border=\"0\" alt=\"Blackwater\" align=\"left\" src=\"https:\/\/www.7thstep.org\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2010\/04\/Blackwater_thumb.jpg\" width=\"304\" height=\"392\" \/><\/a> The former president of Blackwater Worldwide and four other former officials at the embattled security firm were indicted Friday on federal weapons charges<\/strong>, partially the result of a raid two years ago by agents that rounded up 22 weapons, including AK-47s.<\/p>\n<p>The indictment issued Friday charges Gary Jackson, who left the company last year in a management shakeup, along with four other former workers. The charges against Jackson include a <strong>conspiracy to violate firearms laws, false statements and possession of an unregistered firearm<\/strong>.<\/p>\n<p>Also indicted were former general counsel Andrew Howell, former executive vice president Bill Mathews, Ana Bundy, who at one point had oversight of the firm&#8217;s armory, and Ronald Slezak, who was hired to oversee documents related to the company&#8217;s status as a firearms dealer.<\/p>\n<p>The charges open a new front of the government&#8217;s oversight of the sullied security company. <strong>Several of the company&#8217;s contractors have previously been charged with federal crimes for their actions in war zones<\/strong>, but the company&#8217;s executives have so far weathered a range of investigations.<\/p>\n<p>Around the time that Jackson left the company, Blackwater changed its name to Xe Services.<\/p>\n<p>The company has been trying to rehabilitate its image since <strong>a 2007 shooting in Baghdad left 17 people dead, outraged the Iraqi government and led to a federal charges against several Blackwater guards \u2014 accusations later thrown out of court after a judge found prosecutors mishandled evidence<\/strong>.<\/p>\n<p>The latest case stems from a raid conducted by federal agents in 2008 that seized 22 weapons, <strong>including 17 AK-47s<\/strong>. [<em>emphasis added<\/em>]<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n<p>Inserted from &lt;<a href=\"http:\/\/news.yahoo.com\/s\/ap\/20100416\/ap_on_bi_ge\/us_blackwater_probe_2\" target=\"_blank\">AP\/Yahoo<\/a>&gt;<\/p>\n<p><font color=\"#0000ff\">These are the same thugs that the Bush\/GOP regime unleashed on the city of New Orleans.&#160; But the Obama administration also bears some accountability here.&#160; Why is this Republican private militia, with a track record of fraud, murder, and now, hoarding illegal weapons still employed at taxpayer expense?<\/font><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Not too long ago, I remember reading that the Young Eagles, those 45 and under GOP stalwarts, who expressed their GOP family values at a lesbian bondage club at donor expense, were also slated for a field trip to Xe, the new name for Blackwater.&#160; Did Steele plan to have the schooled in the use <a href='https:\/\/www.politicsplus.org\/blog\/2010\/04\/17\/blackwater-is-the-gop-ss-a-militia-now\/' class='excerpt-more'>[&#8230;]<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1184","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-politics","category-5-id","post-seq-1","post-parity-odd","meta-position-corners","fix"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.politicsplus.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1184","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.politicsplus.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.politicsplus.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.politicsplus.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.politicsplus.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1184"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.politicsplus.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1184\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.politicsplus.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1184"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.politicsplus.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1184"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.politicsplus.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1184"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}