Anyways. Here is a Naomi Klein exerpt that details how a new law, pushed through Iraq's legislature by US hands, will rob the country blind and basically condemn the country and its inhabitants to a future of poverty and a failing economy.
Worse, this same move, this same charade, has been lauded by Bushcons and corporate interests (including many democrats)as a boon for the Iraqi economy. Lies as usual.
"The law that was finally adopted by Iraq's cabinet in February 2007 was even worse than anticipated: it placed no limits on the amount of profits that foreign companies can take from the country and placed no specific requirements about how much or little foreign investors would partner with Iraqi companies or hire Iraqis to work in the oil fields.
Most brazenly, it excluded Iraq's elected parliamentarians from having any say in the terms for future oil contracts. Instead, it created a new body, the Federal Oil and Gas Council, which, according to the New York Times, would be advised by "a panel of oil experts from inside and outside Iraq". This unelected body, advised by unspecified foreigners, would have ultimate decision-making power on all oil matters, with the full authority to decide which contracts Iraq did and did not sign. In effect, the law called for Iraq's publicly owned oil reserves, the country's main source of revenues, to be exempted from democratic control and run instead by a powerful, wealthy oil dictatorship, which would exist alongside Iraq's broken and ineffective government.
It is hard to overstate the disgrace of this attempted resource grab. Iraq's oil profits are the country's only hope of financing its own reconstruction when some semblance of peace returns. To lay claim to that future wealth in a moment of national disintegration was disaster capitalism at its most shameless."
I hate to seem too extreme, but America is drenched in the blood of Iraqis because of this war and now the excesses of the country's executive-branch-run-amock are seeking to suck the resources out of country as well. Seems like looting and pillaging to me.
If I could virtually scream with rage at the state of things I would. But I think I'll stick with just refusing to use the terminology "war" which implies a real enemy and battle, and stick with "occupation", "humanitarian disaster", "neo-imperial conquest", and the like. grrr.
Worse, this same move, this same charade, has been lauded by Bushcons and corporate interests (including many democrats)as a boon for the Iraqi economy. Lies as usual.
"The law that was finally adopted by Iraq's cabinet in February 2007 was even worse than anticipated: it placed no limits on the amount of profits that foreign companies can take from the country and placed no specific requirements about how much or little foreign investors would partner with Iraqi companies or hire Iraqis to work in the oil fields.
Most brazenly, it excluded Iraq's elected parliamentarians from having any say in the terms for future oil contracts. Instead, it created a new body, the Federal Oil and Gas Council, which, according to the New York Times, would be advised by "a panel of oil experts from inside and outside Iraq". This unelected body, advised by unspecified foreigners, would have ultimate decision-making power on all oil matters, with the full authority to decide which contracts Iraq did and did not sign. In effect, the law called for Iraq's publicly owned oil reserves, the country's main source of revenues, to be exempted from democratic control and run instead by a powerful, wealthy oil dictatorship, which would exist alongside Iraq's broken and ineffective government.
It is hard to overstate the disgrace of this attempted resource grab. Iraq's oil profits are the country's only hope of financing its own reconstruction when some semblance of peace returns. To lay claim to that future wealth in a moment of national disintegration was disaster capitalism at its most shameless."
I hate to seem too extreme, but America is drenched in the blood of Iraqis because of this war and now the excesses of the country's executive-branch-run-amock are seeking to suck the resources out of country as well. Seems like looting and pillaging to me.
If I could virtually scream with rage at the state of things I would. But I think I'll stick with just refusing to use the terminology "war" which implies a real enemy and battle, and stick with "occupation", "humanitarian disaster", "neo-imperial conquest", and the like. grrr.
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