Irag war

[H2O]

Hi All

I had recently received word from a soldier currently in Iraq; he had sent a letter to his family and I would like to share a tidbit from that letter;

He says that being over there has changed how sees the world profoundly. What bothers him the most is that unlike here in the US, there is no economy to speak of. You may see people selling a few things on the street, but there are no "real jobs" out there.

The Iraqi insurgents are paying people on the street money to go out and shoot the soldiers. The people on the street have nothing better to do and there is anger regarding the lack of any economy.

The phrase this soldier uses most when describing it is "its messed up"

I agree with him.

[madokie]

1. from my vantage point it looks like Iraq is a real screw up

but its what i expected it to be, after all we do have a couple war criminals running the show

[salin]

2. I think the first person put in charge of Iraq had a priority

of getting factories back up and running (to get folks back to work) - but that was counter to the Norquist agenda of fundamentalist freemarkets tied to crony connected contractors (non Iraqi). In a blink he was gone and Bremer was in. This was done by (stupid) design.

btw - check your title...

[KharmaTrain]

3. Lots Of IOUs To Pay Out

Hopefully Henry Waxman will get into all the contracts Bremmer and Rummy signed in those early days to major contributors that resulted in billions going down the rathole and now coming back to us in IEDs and sniper attacks. A classic case is the Nick Berg...who came to Iraq as part of a contract to rebuild radio facilities (and set up cellphone networks to be run by our corporations...cellphones later used to set off IEDs) and the contract given to Clear Channel to set up "commercial broadcasting" in Iraq that failed to win us many "hearts and minds". And this was just the start. Much of the "restoration" was to replace infrastructure destroyed in the wake of the invasion as our military was more interested in protecting the oil ministry and the rest of the country was pillaged. When we look back, this was when we "lost" the war.

Cheers...

[H2O]

6. Oops!

Thanx! Unfortunately I cant change it now; I tried. Apologies :blush:

[Me.]

4. What A Disgrace

I can't even imagine the karma this country is accumulating from the Iraq debacle.

[Toots]

5. No jobs..but we have over a hundred thousand contractors over there..

Oh that's right the oldest civilization on earth is too stupid to know how to fix things in their own country...That is why we hire foreigners from other third world countries who make four dollars an hour and it's the best pay they have ever received..