I am a few chapters in to James Risen's, "Pay Any Price: Greed, Power, and Endless War." Ho, ho, ho, ho, ho. There's the story of Dennis Montgomery who conned DoD and the CIA with software that could detect and decode messages from Al Qaeda hidden in Al Jezeera's bottom-of-the-screen logo displayed during their broadcasts. Montgomery literally got rich by watching TV. All he needed was a big screen television, a computer, and a few credulous connections within Nevada and DC. No one could make this stuff up. Members of Team Montgomery included the aptly-named Congressman Jerry Lewis. Did all these clowns use Scott Joplin ring tones?
When the first set of deals soured, Montgomery found a new billionaire sugar-momma who made a connection to Jack Kemp and, through him, to the White House. Surprisingly, one of Cheney's aides was the only person in Washington who demanded source code for evaluation before diverting a palette of C-notes out of the river of money that flowed from the NJ Fed to Baghdad and into Montgomery's bank account. The software also failed the Israeli's sniff test.
For those of you under 50, Kemp was a quarterback for the Buffalo Bills, Republican Congressman, Housing Secretary, and failed VP candidate in 1996. He was a member of the fancy-schmancy, private, Wyoming ski resort owned by the billionaire sugar-momma and her soon-to-be ex-husband. Dennis Montgomery best skill was finding a mark within that exclusive realm, where money and connections far exceed intellect and facts.
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