GAO Is 90 Years Old and Is Cranky As Ever

Congress established the Government Accountability Office (GAO) in 1921. GAO was formed because Congress was demanding more information and better control over expenditures of tax dollars that were soaring due to a wartime demand.  GAO was also designed to be Independent and a non partisan agency that President Harding signed into law.  Presidents still appoint the comptroller general s’ to lead the so called “non partisan and independent agency”. 
If the GAO is truly Independent and non partisan, then all federal agencies and the like who is part of the political process would be under the same credible non partisan and independent agency classification.  GAO’s Mantra is:  Accountability * Integrity * Reliability *. I thought all federal agencies had integrity, were reliable and accountable.  My point is this; GAO folks are no different than any other federal group of investigative and accounting workers. There can be dishonest workers in any agency.

 Why would William Solis  report me to the Police (FPS) over an email concerning accountability of their audit? Also, the GAO-IG will not even acknowledge with a simple yes or no (by email) whether or not they will investigate my claim over the volume of material omissions in the GAO audit and not answering Rep Hoyer’s two simple questions. My product and company have been damaged by the incomplete and inaccurate audit/report on MILITEC-1 that Allen Westheimer admitted to me twice that my company would be damaged more in the private sector than in the public sector. 

So what does the GAO-IG do about my complaint and a defective military specification? Nothing, as of yet. The GAO could be shuttered and others (federal or private) would be happy to pick up their meager work load. My other Blog on defense waste/threat deals with cutting unnecessary people and programs that can’t prove their worth, since many programs are redundant, or are make work programs with no end result to the warfighter or taxpayer.

There were maybe six (6) GAO members in the meeting while I reviewed the draft audit and they all appeared to have some knowledge on the audit. For these many folks working on a report that took 18 months that yielded no new information is waste at its finest. The redundancies in the 17 page audit are tremendous. Westheimer claims the redundancies in the Militec audit is how GAO does business by repeating the same thing over and over.  Westheimer cited lubricant additive (s) over 50 times in the report. So when you break down the report into actual substance, and remove the redundancies and the already known failed government lab tests, there is NOTHING of value, no new information and the audit does not answer the congressman’s mail at all.

The only thing this audit did was damaged my small company and its principal product, while at the same time supporting the army’s position 100% on this 149 degree F defective military specifications. When I challenged Westheimer on this defective specification  he sided with the  army’s position 100% and then  I said to Westheimer, you took the army’s position hook, line and sinker and Westheimer replied, I do only when they are right, meaning the army and their weapons lubricant program are perfect from GAO’s point of view, or his own. This misguided belief in the army’s facts on my dry lube product is how the army mistakes on MILITEC-1 appeared in the GAO draft audit and unnoticed by Westheimer until I pointed it out. I could not believe after waiting 17 months for this report, to see a 25 year old army mistake on dates concerning Militec and my business in the early 1980’s before I was even in DC and set up my business. This also proves GAO spent very little time on the report, and went on a fishing expedition since MILITEC-1 was not even invented and marketed to the military until spring 1988.

 This audit helped the folks in the army (my enemies) look relevant and a defective product that should be banned to appear as state-of-the-art. Why GAO is helping to perpetuate a Fraud is not a mystery anymore. I was just writing about Westheimer admitting during Solis’ presence that the Fraud used against Militec Inc to gain its NSN’s and retroactive emergency war orders were legitimate, since our NSN’s were never valid. WOW. However, Westheimer must have forgotten that he can’t find the rules on how NSN’s were granted.

 I use to wonder why the GAO would go out of its way to damage a company so recklessly even though they could not answer the congressman’s two simple questions. I have heard of shooting the messenger, but this is ridiculous for the U.S. Government to intentionally go out of its way to damage a private company with a solid reputation by cheating on an audit.

 Based on GAO’s outstanding reputation with Congress, the GAO-IG should not be that busy policing itself while weapons are malfunctioning in combat every day. I would think the IG would be concerned over a defective 30 year old military specification (CLP gun oil) that is applied to millions of military weapons that are vital to our National Security.  The big question on jammed weapons is this and is a fact: Is 20% of weapons malfunctioning at all times acceptable? One out of 5 weapons going down in a squad size gun fight is not acceptable.

The minimum flashpoint for this army mandated specification is 149 degree F, which proves it’s defective for world-wide military weapon usage for complete maintenance.  Allen Wertheimer (GAO SR Analyst) could not find evidence that weapons (M16, M4, M9) jam, (weapons have been jamming since Vietnam) even though, the stars and stripes newspaper (OSD Sanctioned) reports on thousands of jammed weapons that need to be fixed. The 507^th capture and  Massacre, Roberts Ridge, the two small outposts in the Stan, emails from soldiers and marines on the front lines claiming their weapons have jammed with the use of army developed and managed CLP-- the 3 in 1 lubricant. GAO also ignored military reports, military publications, military advisories that mentions, refers too and/or cites jammed weapons.  GAO even brushed aside the Center For Naval Analysis (CNA) report that the army paid over $900,000.00 for to prevent bias. GAO used one sentence out of the entire report to make MILITEC-1 look bad and that one sentence was taken out of context, since that sentence is contradicted in several areas in the same report that GAO also failed to account.

 I never thought anyone could be this reckless , until I connected the dots to the former CG of ATEC  who  proclaimed at a Pentagon news conference that Soldiers should clean their weapons up to eight (8) times per day, because the onetime you don’t  clean it may be the time it  jams. This was contained in an army news release that has been on our site and was provided to GAO. Not surprisingly, Allen Westheimer missed this one too even though he was suppose to meet with the General.   

According to The Washington Post, The GAO’s budget is 571.1 million and employs 3,350 personnel.  GAO puts out about one-thousand reports, including testimonies each year.  I am not a math and accounting experts t like the GAO is supposed to be, however, 3,350 folks goes into 571.1 million allot of times.  Ok, 1000 or so reports goes into 571.1 million how many times? 

It took GAO almost 18 months to answer my congressman’s letter.  And the belated answer contained a BIG LIE in the first paragraph of the cover letter and not only did not answer the two questions that pertain to millions of products with existing NSN’s, GAO unexpectedly decided to expand their audit to include automobile applications and testing of metals that were not on any actual working weapons, or in the real world, i.e. nothing outside of a “controlled laboratory environment”. GAO was forced to expand their investigation into other areas, since GAO could not explain how products were granted National Stock Numbers (NSN’s) during the nineties.  GAO would not admit that the rules back in the 1990’s were based on demand of a product over time and by a variety of federal agencies. I explained this known fact to GAO and have written on this subject more times than I care to count.

GAO’s excuse (for not answering the question) was that the responsible folks at DLA have left (retired) and too much time has passed (dog ate the homework) so the records are incomplete/lost. PLEASE.  So, GAO does not know (or would admit too) how NSN’s were issued during 1990’s. GAO then goes on a new path into other areas that are unrelated to Rep Hoyer’s specific request concerning the listing and de-listing of NSN’s and if the rules and regulations were followed. This was a very straight forward and easy to understand request that was based on Hoyer’s office receiving thousands of emails from Soldiers and Marines all requesting MILITEC-1 and many complaining about the problems with CLP causing weapons to jam and MILITEC-1 was the solution.

 If it was not for the volume of warfighters requests for help, Rep Hoyer’s request would not have been sent to the GAO asking about NSN procedures. And wouldn’t you know it, Allen Westheimer, did admit to a large number of emails sent to Militec, however, he said those emails were not relevant. WOW. If tens of thousands of warfighters emails (saying the same thing) are not relevant, then GAO, like Picatinny must then blame the soldiers for not keeping their weapons clean -- when they jam. Soldiers would be alive today, if one out of five weapons did not jam in gun fights.  

GAO must have had some quid pro quo arrangement with the army to rely on their MILITEC-1 public information and the errors I pointed out to Westheimer and Westheimer had the corrections made prior to the report’s release.  To further help GAO pull this injustice off they needed Capitol Hill help which they had from a newbie staffer who sold out my company and our troops to gain favor with HASC personnel.

 One of the many reasons I know the GAO audit  was proforma are;  when I was allowed 30 minutes to read their 17 page draft  report, the report had dates and information (pasted in) that was prior to the NSN assignment (SIC) in 1993. In other words, GAO pasted into their draft audit army mistakes (dates) that were years before MILITEC-1 even existed and was not relevant to boot. This is when I knew for sure I was set up.  I had 30 minutes to read the 17 page draft report and GAO wanted me to take notes on the draft, plus, I had to surrender my notes and the draft at the end of the 30 minute review. Allen Westheimer was raising his voice at me at the end of the meeting (Solis told him to stop) and I was crying in absolute disbelief at the rude and especially arrogant behavior exhibited by several members of the GAO group. I felt like I was in another country and was being tried for crimes that I did not commit.  Plus, there was a security guard (plain clothed) standing by in site (in case I got violent) and even took the trip down to the lobby with me. This encounter with the GAO group made me feel sick and could not believe I was in America.