Remember those $600 toilet seats?

[MADem]

10. That's odd. When I was doing budgets, that piece wasn't "justified."

It was done behind closed doors and never became part of the public debate. There was no "skimming" or "padding" going on--there was just a Big Chunk Of Money that was allocated with the door locked and the cameras turned off to cryptic-sounding programs or projects--not something as simple as a part on a piece of equipment that was part of the "public" budget.

I think this is what it is--plain old graft and corruption, a "kickback" to a major campaign bundler/contributor-- not a "cover story" for black ops. If it were a cover story for black ops, they'd come up with a better one, surely.

This is ancient history, but it provides a "sense" of the matter: http://www.wired.com/wired/archive/3.11/patton_pr.html