"Contractors with conflicts of interest would be prohibited from conducting oversight or writing contract requirements they could bid on, as Halliburton did for its $7 billion no-bid Iraqi oil contract awarded in 2003."

Australian aside:..... and  the warship environmental  measures, and the nuclear dump safety consultancies, and South Australia's Major Works Development 

Adding to the statement in the introductory paragraph,  US Democrats believe what is needed is  “closing the revolving door between federal contract officials and private contractors.”

Australia, according to former Defence Minister Hill in 2004, is protected from contract troubles from such as Halliburton.  Hill told SBS Dateline's Sophie McNeill  that the "safeguard is the culture of the Australian beaureaucracy."  Ha Ha, Mr Hill... pull the other one!

 If it's believed that such measures are necessary in the United States, then the possibility of necessity to examine Halliburton's Australian operations, especially its gaining of local defence contracts on a no-bid business, should be considered by all Australian Governments.

The thing is that Halliburton's Australian defence involvement, up to the level of appointing the company's local leader Malcom  Kinnaird to solve the DoD's problems, is no longer Senator Hill's problem... he's just resigned the defence portfolio.  The Howard Government, as demonstrated by the change of minsterial portfolios after the "Children Overboard" fraud, is becoming adept at avoiding the code of conduct set down by the Westminster System, which Australia's parliament is supposedly based on.

However it is a major responsibility of South Australian Premier Mike Rann, who last year appointed HalliburtonKBR's former Global Vice President for Infrastructure to head SA's Major Works Development Board, on which he also gave a seat to Mr Kinnaird.   The possibility of KBR being able to exactly meet the project requirements set by Fletcher and Kinnaird is, even in hypothetical form, too nepotistic to be allowed to exist.  Mr Rann should stand down Fletcher and Kinnaird from public postings immediately, or before the State election in March, or explain why he has given South Australia to Halliburton and let voters decide.

Similarly, if Prime Minister Howard and Foreign Minister Alexander Downer,  now with full knowledge of the ethical breaches that the company has perpetrated internationally,  continue to grant the company international aid contracts on behalf of Australia, then these two should also be asked to depart from public life.

The granting of the construction ownership of the railway across Australia to Halliburton by Prime Minister Howard, Finance Minister Minchin, SA Premier Rann and Northern Territory Premier Clare Martin also needs to be re-examined.

Now that Newsweek has revealed that Australia deported Parkin using information that the US Military never should have had (should be up in the morining somewhere) all assumptions of credibility are on stand-by