Guardian: Same Old Racket in Iraq

[kskiska]

To the victors, the spoils: Bush's colonialism will only deepen resistance


Iraq remains a country of unbearable suffering, the sort that only soldiers and administrators acting on behalf of states and governments are capable of inflicting on their fellow humans. It is the first country where we can begin to study the impact of a 21st-century colonisation. This takes place in an international context of globalisation and neo-liberal hegemony. If the economy at home is determined by the primacy of consumption, speculation as the main hub of economic activity and no inviolate domains of public provision, only a crazed utopian could imagine that a colonised Iraq would be any different.

The state facilities that were so carefully targeted with bombs and shells have now to be reconstructed, but this time under the aegis of private firms, preferably American, though Blair and Berlusconi, and perhaps plucky Poland too, will not be forgotten at handouts time. Meanwhile, Dick Cheney's old firm, Halliburton, awarded a contract (without any competition) to rebuild Iraq's oil industry, is happily boosting profits by charging the US government $2.64 a gallon for the fuel it trucks into Iraq from Kuwait. The normal price per gallon in the region is 71 cents, but since the US taxpayer is footing the bill, nobody cares.

The secret plan to privatise the country by selling off its assets to western corporations was drafted in February this year and surfaced in the Wall Street Journal, which helpfully explained that "for many conservatives, Iraq is now the test case for whether the United States can engender American-style free-market capitalism within the Arab world". Worried by the leaks, Bush and Blair issued a user-friendly joint statement on April 8, stressing that Iraq's oil and other natural resources are "the patrimony of the people of Iraq, which should be used only for their benefit". But who decides on behalf of the Iraqi people - Bremer/Chalabi or Chalabi/Bremer?

more…
http://www.guardian.co.uk/Iraq/Story/0,2763,1106270,00.html

[burythehatchet]

1. There was scene in The Sapranos when Bobby turns to Tony

and says "to da victa go da spoils". At which point Tony tells him to "take your fuckin' quotation book and shove it up your ass".

That pretty much describes the attitude of the fascist government. They shove the conflicts of interest into our faces - they have no notion that they need to keep it secretive - and tell us to shove our quotationi book up our ass. Now, the really scary deals are the ones that we don't know about.