How to Spot a Psychopath

I'm sorry about this Firepower Fest, but a Who Da Bitch Now? opportunity like this doesn't come along every day.

Remember, gentle reader, how Firepower got hundreds of thousands of dollars in grants from Austrade, the Australian Trade Commission?

(...and then hired as their new CEO one John Finnin, the Austrade guy who made the grants possible, among other even dodgier activities - and then fired him shortly afterward, when he was arrested as part of a child sex investigation, of all things...)

Well, now it turns out that the bright sparks at Austrade hired out consultants to Firepower at $190 an hour - one of whom also later joined the Firepower team... no, no conflicts of interest here, how dare you suggest such a thing!

But Austrade accidentally signed that consultancy deal with a Firepower "subsidiary" which didn't actually exist.

(This seems to be a common problem for Firepower-associated business entities. I noticed yesterday that Stephen Moss's "Global Fuel Technologies" does not seem to appear anywhere on the Australian Business Register.)

So now Austrade have joined the creditor chorus, as they try to get the $173,000 they're owed back from any part of Firepower that retains a shred of reality.

Mind you, the Austrade contract said that Firepower had lots of hugely lucrative deals in the pipeline, and also that Firepower's products had been "comprehensively tested by several world leading/independent testing institutes". Which they, of course, hadn't. So if you ask me, the whole contract was nothing but toilet paper from the moment it was printed and it serves Austrade right that they got completely screwed.

Since the money they were busy shovelling into Firepower's pockets came from the Australian taxpayer, though, I still think it'd be rather nice if they managed to screw some of it back out of Firepower.

Perhaps Firepower could sell that million-dollar Rolls-Royce which Stephen Moss so proudly insisted was absolutely 100% Firepower property?

Hey, the picture of Stephen and "his" Roller is back up on the front page of buyfirepowerpill.com!

I imagine that's a sight that really irritates the people who're trying to get what they're owed.