Money runs out on U.S. projects in Iraq (major reconstruction halted)

[truthpusher]

http://seattletimes.nwsource.com/html/nationworld/2002479659_contracts08.html?syndication=rss&source=seattletimes.xml&items=146

Money runs out on U.S. projects in Iraq

By T. Christian Miller
Los Angeles Times

WASHINGTON — The United States will halt construction work on some water and power plants in Iraq because it is running out of money for projects, officials said yesterday.

Security costs have cut into the funds available to complete some major infrastructure projects that were started under the $18.4 billion U.S. plan to rebuild Iraq. As a result, the United States has had to pare back some projects to only those deemed essential by the Iraqi government.

While no overall figures are yet available, one contractor has stopped work on six of eight water-treatment plants it was assigned.

"We have scaled back our projects in many areas," James Jeffrey, a senior adviser on Iraq for the State Department, told lawmakers at a hearing of the House Appropriations Foreign Operations Subcommittee. "We do not have the money."

(snip)

complete story: http://seattletimes.nwsource.com/html/nationworld/2002479659_contracts08.html?syndication=rss&source=seattletimes.xml&items=146

[Teaser]

1. Fucktarded

nt

[saigon68]

2. IRAQ-NAM The bottomless money PIT

More Graft and Corruption than in Saigon

[NNN0LHI]

3. I thought the oil proceeds will pay for the reconstruction n/t

[Skwmom]

17. You and me both. n/t

[buddysmellgood]

55. Oh, they will, but not until you and I pay to steal it and then give tax

breaks to refine it, and then pay three times it's current value for the honor of using it. Now that, is an energy policy.

[Tight_rope]

73. Bingo!...You are so right...

[Lecky]

77. Exactly n/t

[yorkiemommie1]

24. they promised !

n/t

[Roland99]

26. That's what Wolfowitz said:

http://www.ips-dc.org/wolfowitz/tl_01-05.htm

February 27, 2003

Wolfowitz tells the U.S. House Budget Committee that oil exports would pay for the reconstruction of post-invasion Iraq. “It's got already, I believe, on the order of $15 billion to $20 billion a year in oil exports, which can finally -- might finally be turned to a good use instead of building Saddam's palaces,” he testifies. “It has one of the most valuable undeveloped sources of natural resources in the world. And let me emphasize, if we liberate Iraq those resources will belong to the Iraqi people, that they will be able to develop them and borrow against them.”

Wolfowitz continued his long-term tirade against European countries that are involved in Iraq’s oil industry. He denounced French and German opposition to NATO involvement. He said Eastern European countries, hopeful of joining NATO, “came out openly in opposition to the French and German position. Prime Minister Chirac of France told them they ought to shut up and behave themselves like good East Europeans, and that produced a wonderful reaction from those people. They are doing it because they believe in it. Believe me, we aren't offering them anything. If we want to talk about who is bought and paid for, it would be worth looking at who has big financial commercial interests in Saddam Hussein's regime, who were the big importers, who were the big oil developers. I get so tired of hearing chants of, ‘No war for oil.’”

[RUMMYisFROSTED]

76. It will.

For the time being all the pumps are clogged with rose petals.

[Tace]

4. Bush's Folly

[xray s]

5. translation

Halliburton is shifting its looting operation from Iraq to New Orleans, thereby saving thousands in airfare for the looters.

[UpInArms]

9. won't Blackwater be sad since we don't have the same

"security" problems here :crazy:

[xray s]

12. oh...but they are already supplying security in NOLA

http://www.blackwaterusa.com/

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

September 01, 2005
BLACKWATER JOINS HURRICANE KATRINA RELIEF EFFORT!

This morning (September 1, 2005), Blackwater USA joined the ongoing relief effort in the Gulf Region devastated by Hurricane Katrina by dispatching a SA-330J Puma helicopter to help assist in evacuating citizens from flooded areas.

Chairman and Chief Executive Officer Erik Prince stated, “At this time, all Americans should band together and assist our countrymen who have been struck by this natural disaster.”

The following services are available:
Airlift Services
Security Services
Communication Support
Crowd Control
Humanitarian Support Services
Logistics and Transportation Services

Anyone having a security or evacuation request may call
[phone]. All requests shall be prioritized and acted upon as quickly as possible.




We would also like to thank Iridium Satellite www.iridium.com for providing satellite phones for our relief efforts due to Hurricane Katrina.

[UpInArms]

22. Wow! September 1! Before FEMA even evacuated or dropped

food - putting a contract into the hands of the most nasty of the corporations - Hellaburnin, Blackwater, et al.

It would be funny if it weren't so pathetically tragic.

[ClayZ]

58. PNAC

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=132x2075498

[NYC]

31. Who is paying the Blackwater mercenaries?

I suspect they'll be collecting big money from the federal government.

[xray s]

34. The Rich Families Of New Orleans who dance on the corpses

http://www.post-gazette.com/pg/05251/567892.stm

The green expanse of Audubon Park, in the city's Uptown area, has doubled in recent days as a heliport for the city's rich -- and a terminus for the small armies of private security guards who have been dispatched to keep the homes there safe and habitable. Mr. O'Dwyer has cellphone service and ice cubes to cool off his highballs in the evening. By Wednesday, the city water service even sprang to life, making the daily trips to his neighbor's pool unnecessary. A pair of oil-company engineers, dispatched by his son-in-law, delivered four cases of water, a box of delicacies including herring with mustard sauce and 15 gallons of generator gasoline.

Despite the disaster that has overwhelmed New Orleans, the city's monied, mostly white elite is hanging on and maneuvering to play a role in the recovery when the floodwaters of Katrina are gone. "New Orleans is ready to be rebuilt. Let's start right here," says Mr. O'Dwyer, standing in his expansive kitchen, next to a counter covered with a jumble of weaponry and electric wires.

More than a few people in Uptown, the fashionable district surrounding St. Charles Ave., have ancestors who arrived here in the 1700s. High society is still dominated by these old-line families, represented today by prominent figures such as former New Orleans Board of Trade President Thomas Westfeldt; Richard Freeman, scion of the family that long owned the city's Coca-Cola bottling plant; and William Boatner Reily, owner of a Louisiana coffee company. Their social pecking order is dictated by the mysterious hierarchy of "krewes," groups with hereditary membership that participate in the annual carnival leading up to Mardi Gras. In recent years, the city's most powerful business circles have expanded to include some newcomers and non-whites, such as Mayor Ray Nagin, the former Cox Communications executive elected in 2002.

A few blocks from Mr. O'Dwyer, in an exclusive gated community known as Audubon Place, is the home of James Reiss, descendent of an old-line Uptown family. He fled Hurricane Katrina just before the storm and returned soon afterward by private helicopter. Mr. Reiss became wealthy as a supplier of electronic systems to shipbuilders, and he serves in Mayor Nagin's administration as chairman of the city's Regional Transit Authority. When New Orleans descended into a spiral of looting and anarchy, Mr. Reiss helicoptered in an Israeli security company to guard his Audubon Place house and those of his neighbors.

[bullimiami]

6. 250 billion gone up in smoke. almost none of it spent on the iraqi people.

[bpilgrim]

7. We Are Bankrupt - n/t

peace

[xray s]

15. Spiritually, morally and monetarily bankrupt

They will rebuild NOLA for the rich and powerful on the dead bodies of its poor (and yes, Ray Nagin has been shown the pot 'o gold and will play along)

http://www.post-gazette.com/pg/05251/567892.stm

[NNN0LHI]

35. It appears so n/t

[Massachusetts]

63. "We Are Bankrupt - n/t"

AND THE AMERICAN PUBLIC STILL SNOOZES. ARE THE MAJORITY OF AMERICANS THIS STUPID?

[CrispyQ]

64. They are ignorant & choose to remain so because

they are still too comfortable in their daily lives. When they get hungry & cold, they will wake up & wonder, "What happened to my country?" But it will be too late.


BTW, I heard we can expect a 45% increase in heating oil prices this winter (sorry, can't remember the source). That will affect many of those McMansion people living paycheck to paycheck. Maybe a few will wake up then?

[Mari333]

67. just wait til the heatin costs go up 70 percent this winter

and no one will be able to file bankruptcy after Oct...shit will hit the fan.

[UpInArms]

8. close to $300 billion shoved up a rathole and not a damn thing

to show for it but dead bodies and a destroyed country. Now add the destruction and devastation and death of New Orleans to that mix.

Our country is so F***ED up that I can't stand it.

The madness of this maladministration is beyond comprehension.

[FyurFly]

29. I apologize in advance...

If I offend anyone, but I don't care what happens to Iraq ( Power Vacuum/ Civil war), I just want our troops home. We can't even protect our fellow countrymen dieing on the goddamn steps of an NFL stadium, much less be prepared for a WMD attack from the terrorist!

Home Land Security does not EXIST!!

[UpInArms]

46. Welcome to DU FyurFly!

Glad you found your way to the one place of sanity (DU) -

So, was it Katrina that brought you to these realizations? (Not being anything but curious.)

No offense taken at your sentiments. There are many of us here that hold those exact same feelings and have had them - up to the Katrina-moment - for quite some time.

Having watched this junta dismantle everything good in this country whilst stuffing their and their cronies pockets full of every penny they could loot and dreaming of more ways to do just the same while our fellow citizens have supported it all has made us a bit cynical.

[FyurFly]

50. It was mostly...

The bullshit carrier landing (Mission Accomplished banner)and the SOTU address in 2004 where Bush prioritized Gay bigotry and steroids in baseball above the soldiers dieing FOR NOTHING IN IRAQ!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

[Lecky]

79. I care what happens in Iraq considering we are partly responsible

for all the death and destruction. As Americans we need to care how we affect the world, the apathy is part of the problem.

[shanti]

47. but halliburton got their money!

that was all that mattered.

[FyurFly]

48. I had heard...

That Haliburton will be recieving NOLA demo/rebuilding contracts, is that true?


--FyurFly

[barbaraann]

52. It's true.

And the news tonight is that Bush released them from the normal wage guidelines to workers. :-(

[shanti]

70. i read it HERE

and DU is the most reliable site for news, imo.

[northzax]

71. sort of. They have a contract to work on the Navy facilities at

the Port of New Orleans. KBR has a standing military maintenance contract. Haliburton and KBR do military and oil/gas construction, they don't have a civilian division to even bid on NoLa work.

don't believe everything you hear.

[cliss]

53. You and me both, UIA.

Here's an observation: we probably will never finish the reconstruction in Iraq.

There won't be enough money in the future. We've blown too much, already. This hurricane is going to suck out whatever we had left. Forget any other hurricanes that might blow our way.

It's unbelievable when you consider: NONE of these funds that you mention have been paid for. It's all borrowed from the future.

We're bankrupt.

[TheCowsCameHome]

10. What a dirty rotten waste of American taxpayer's money.

Absolutely unreal. George W. Bush will bankrupt this country and everyone in it.

[Old and In the Way]

11. Project for a New American Century is DOA , 95 years short.

And to think these idiots thought they'd "roll up" Iran, Syria, Lebanon, and Saudi Arabia to boot. Their hubris was only exceeded by their lack of intelligence.

[not fooled]

45. Oh oh...

...someone had better tell John Bolton that PNAC is over. Sure looks like that kook is plowing full speed ahead w/the next scheduled invasion on the PNAC itinerary , i.e. Iran.

Kinda reminds me of those Japanese soldiers on Pacific islands who didn't know WWII was over and kept trying to fight.

[ClayZ]

59. Iran hell, it will probably be SEATTLE!

ARGH!

:nuke:

:scared: :scared: :scared: :scared:

[marmar]

13. The boondoggle that bankrupted America...

When will this long national nightmare end?

:cry: :cry: :cry:

[TheCowsCameHome]

14. This should be the headline on every newspaper in the US tomorrow.

Dirty, rotten scum Republicans.

[BootinUp]

21. I agree. Hit em when they're up. Hit em when they're down.

"mercy."

I'm fresh out.

[Maggie_May]

16. Time to come home

the money is run out. Wait till they start on New Orleans.

[FyurFly]

28. What can I do..

Besides vote all dems to hopefully Impeach this bastard after the 2006 elections? I'm honestly scared about another 3 years of Bush.

[NYC]

32. You have every reason to be scared.

By the time Bush is gone (even if he leaves tomorrow) this country will be so impoverished it will be unrecognizable. His friends, however, will be extremely rich.

Welcome to DU.

[FyurFly]

49. I will do..

Whatever I can do for the Democratic party in Northern Virginia, I will do what I can!! Personally i'm an atheist that is starting to Study Buddhism and Eastern philosophy, but I feel end times coming. I hope it's GAS and not a gut feeling I got :)



--FyurFly

[TheCowsCameHome]

18. What do you say about this, you stinking Republican bastards??????????

You people should rot in hell for what you have done to this country.

[anotherdrew]

19. well, the money's spent, time to pull out... mission accomplished!

[htuttle]

20. How can we be out of money? We still have checks in our checkbook!?!

They probably spent the lion's share of it on mercenaries.

I'm also reminded of a story I read (may have been by Naomi Klein) back in late 2003/early 2004. There was a contract for a bridge to be rebuilt. An Iraqi building contractor put in a bid less than $100,000. An American contractor put in a bid for almost $10,000,000. The American contractor got the contract. It goes without saying that the American contractor was Bush campaign contributer.

No surprise they've run out of money.

[ClayZ]

60. And * signed some damn thing today to cut wages for

rebuilding NOLA! It was posted here on DU somewhere.


Here it is:

http://money.cnn.com/2005/09/08/news/economy/katrina_wages.reut/index.htm

[FightingIrish]

23. So much for the bright side the press never talks about.

Thanks to bankrupt leadership, bankrupt policy and morally bankrupt Bush supporters, we're not paying for what we broke. On with the slaughter.

[Roland99]

25. They make the Keystone Cops look like Scotland Yard.

So, corruption is rampant that rivals that under Saddam and these are hand-picked puppets and US contractors? Beautiful.

BTW, "exasperate both Democratic and Republican lawmakers" Really? What about the poor Iraqis suffering from the violence, unemployment, and lack of basic services?!

This entire administration needs to be impeached.

[Strelnikov_]

27. Sounds Like Time For Another Tax Cut For The Rich

What happens when the rich no longer have to pay taxes? How will we be able to stimulate the economy?

[ShockediSay]

39. Double or nothing

If the fat cat fat rat capitalists think that the Invasion of Iraq was a great idea, then they ought to not only give up their tax cuts, but pay double so we can "stay the course," and they can prove their patriotism, "until the job is done."

[CrispyQ]

66. Feudalism is where we're headed.

It will be a modern day version, more accurately called corporate feudalism, but still it will be 'government of, by & for the rich.' Thom Hartmann states in his book Unequal Protection:

"...the consensus is that when the wealthiest in a society take over government and then weaken it so that it no longer can represent the interests of the people, the transition has begun into a new era of feudalism."

and . . .

"The transition from a governmental society to a feudal one is marked by the rapid accumulation of power & wealth in a few hands, with a corresponding reduction in the power & responsibilities of government. Once the rich & powerful gain control of the government, they turn it upon itself, usually first eliminating its taxation process as it applies to themselves."


If they get the Paris Hilton tax relief plan & privatization of Social Security, our democracy will be toast. Hell, we may be toast already.

[turbo_satan]

30. Bushie, yer doin' a heck of a job. n/t

[CountAllVotes]

33. Halliburton = HELL IS BURNING

no shit!

:kick:

[mike_c]

36. what an unbelievable cluster fuck....

Epic. Absolutely history book material.

[tridim]

57. The BFEE will need their own volume

The human race won't survive without the hard lessons learned from this horrible chapter in American history.

[struggle4progress]

37. Where did all the money go? eom

[Erika]

38. What a freaking mess W has brought to our country &

the world.

[Roy]

40. Bush's blank check bounced?????

Guess they kicked off one too many duffel bags of money off the back of truck.

[Javaman]

41. Rebuilding a country requires "hard work" and money...

moron* lacks the ability of one and the reality of the other. What future we had left, kiss it goodbye.

colossal failure* sold us down the river.

[goforit]

42. Reconstruction????.......Try take the money n run highway robbery!!!!

[daleo]

43. They can't afford Iraq and New Orleans and a tax cut for the rich

The neo-cons can pretend to ignore reality all they like, but the facts are clear. Something will have to give.

[CrispyQ]

69. If there were a terrorist attack now

it would finish us. We are stretched too thin & are ineffective at everything we do. These assholes have looted our treasury & yet have the audacity to point fingers at the itty bitty looting done in NOLA. Their greed is on the scope of which I have never seen before.

[Roy]

44. Too bad patriotism is not a tax write-off

It it was, I'm sure these patriotic companies would keep working just to serve their country.

"While no overall figures are yet available, one contractor has stopped work on six of eight water-treatment plants it was assigned.

"We have scaled back our projects in many areas," James Jeffrey, a senior adviser on Iraq for the State Department, told lawmakers at a hearing of the House Appropriations Foreign Operations Subcommittee. "We do not have the money."

[Lindacooks]

51. Where in the goddamned fuck are the billions we have already

wasted on that sinkhole? I want all of Halliburton's execs up against the wall. They should have all their assets repossessed and be thrown into debtor's prison.

[Donailin]

54. It's two in the morning and I'm in outrage mode

this shit can't go on.

we're all gonna get a disease.

Dis-ease.

[Barrett808]

56. So this is what it has come to, the neocon / PNAC plan

So this is what it has come to, the neoconservative / PNAC plan to remake the Middle East in our image:

A failed state of our own creation;

A brutal secular regime replaced by a brutal Islamic Republic that is also a client state of Iran;

Whole cities handed over to Islamic militias and former Saddam henchmen;

Other cities annihilated by US bombing and terror campaigns;

Ongoing corruption so profound that billions of dollars are missing, silently transferred to hot-money centers abroad;

Looting on a scale so massive that entire buildings have disappeared from satellite images;

Radioactive materials and high explosives left unattended for contamination and looting;

Delusion, mendacity, and official malfeasance that continue unchecked to this day.

Now comes the whimper, as the entire criminal enterprise simply runs out of money. Estimates for Katrina are already in the hundreds of billions of dollars, and some estimates approach a trillion. After those first days of post-Katrina chaos, after the excruciating My Pet Goat stare displayed by Bush, he finally looked angry. My theory is that somebody finally worked up the courage to tell him that his splendid little war in Iraq is over, and this upset him more than seeing thousands of American citizens left by his administration to die of dehydration, starvation, disease, and exposure.

[not fooled]

75. Katrina = *'s Gotterdamerung

Up in Flames, ba-by!!!:rofl: :rofl:


(glee is over the exposure of the chimperor w/no clothes and the death of the PNACrackpot agenda, NOT the suffering inflicted by Katrina)

[Festivito]

61. 2.4 billion in cash doesn't go as far as it used to. nt.

[Solly Mack]

62. and Bush is still allowed to walk free...unreal

[KansDem]

65. Damn! It appears Bush is doing to the US, what he did to his companies

...his oil companies before he "answered the calling" to elected office. The only problem is there is no one or thing that will bail out the US like his Poppy and the Saudis (and others) did with his failed oil companies.

Welcome to the United States, the world's only super third-world power!

[Mari333]

68. Bushs friends are making money, thats all that matters

everyone else is screwed.

[Tight_rope]

72. Oh...NO SHIT!...

Well maybe it's time for Bushco and Haliburton to put back all of the money that have stolen!

[Zenaholic]

74. Yes. Where is that $9 Billion anyway? (n/t)

[aint_no_life_nowhere]

78. Maybe Bush can reassign Michael Brown to manage Iraq

It can't get any worse, can it?

[Triana]

80. YABF (Yet Another bu$h Fu*kup)

We have a new one every 10 minutes, don't we?

[turbo_satan]

81. Halliburton, Bechtel, et. al. are flush with cash...

Why not make them bootstrap their own operations instead of making all of us pay for them? If they do a good job, the magic of the free market will see to it that they profit.

[chieftain]

82. With apologies to those who are suffering from Katrina, this may

be the biggest story of the day. The moral bankruptcy of the Bush Gang is now manifesting itself in the biggest theft in world history. The amount of money that has been stolen, wasted, misappropriated , and/or lost in Iraq is staggering. As the great Woody Guthrie wrote "some folks rob you with a six gun, some use a fountain pen." It may well be that when the history of the Bush Regime is written, the outstanding theme may well be the unbelievable amount of money that found its way into the pockets of the Bush cronies, all under the sleep filled eyes of a compromised, complicit MSM.

[kestrel91316]

83. Well this is easy to fix - just give the rich another tax cut.............

Oh, wait.

Nevermind.