(Continued...)

L. PAUL BREMER



Given a Medal of Freedom despite letting $9 billion in cash go missing in Iraq and steering the country into an anarchic civil war, he's now signed on at BlastGard, makers of pricey anti-ballistic bubble-wrap. In exchange for options on 100,000 shares of stock, Bremer has promised to "[get] this technology introduced to key decision makers."

PROGNOSIS: What with a nearly endless supply of master IED makers now plying their trade in his former fiefdom (heckuva job, Bremer!), the
market for "blast mitigation solutions" is certain to blow up worldwide.

TICKER: BLGA

---

RICHARD PERLE


The Prince of Darkness presided over the Pentagon's Defense Policy Board until a March 2003 article in the New Yorker exposed some truly stunning conflicts of interest. It seems that Perle had carefully positioned himself to get rich (well, richer) off the same war he was busily promoting. His most notable shenanigan was a secret lunch to shake loose $100 million from Saudi investors for Trimere Partners, his defense industry venture capital fund. But Perle also had—and has—a post at Autonomy Corp, which designs eavesdropping and data mining software. The company has boasted about having more than 30 U.S. "intelligence-related and classified organizations" as customers.

PROGNOSIS: Investment banks like Goldman Sachs and Citigroup have given the company a "buy" rating after its continued success in racking up new big-ticket government contracts.

TICKER: AU (London)