cheney got paid MILLIONS to start a war with iraq

[unblock]

he was bribed, plain and simple, and we should not shrink away from such language.

he received and kept options that would be worth many, many million with oil over $60/bbl., and not nearly so much with oil staying below $30/bbl.

his defenders will say no one told him to go to war, there can be no bribe without someone giving you instructions, "the money is yours if you do my bidding". but here's the thing:

no one had to "tell" him a damn thing. THE INSTRUCTIONS WERE ALREADY EMBEDDED IN THE OPTIONS. you're not supposed to dump the options just to avoid the "appearance of impropriety". you're supposed to avoid and ACTUAL impropriety. dumping the options would have eliminated not only the appearance of an ethical problem, but it would have eliminated any actual temptation to go to war for personal profit.

as it was, cheney was in a key position to determine the price of oil and chose the course of action that made him a massive personal profit.

if this isn't a public official acting on a bribe, i don't know what is.

[DemInDistress]

1. GOOD POST BTW.. I hear cheney owns about,450,000 shares

do the math?

[nuxvomica]

2. Here's a link for the numbers

A good breakdown of Cheney's "severed ties" with Halliburton: http://www.halliburtonwatch.org/about_hal/ethics.html

I calculate his 433,333 shares of stock options to be worth about $15 million right now and his other "post-employment" compensation is about $21 million. Now he did say he that when he exercised the options he would donate the swag to charity but I don't think anything he says is credible.

[unblock]

4. big deal. even if he WERE to donate to charity

it gets him prestige, tax deduction, influence over those charities, and excuses him from donating HIS money for years.

[salin]

5. who really takes him at his word

the dude doesn't flinch at lying. He may give a token million or two away - but the rest are likely to line his pockets.

[EC]

3. Don't forget a few things

he already had the maps drawn up of how the oil fields would be divied
and during Clinton years he tried to get santions lifted (French lawsuit on this)and kept trading illegally anyway...

[Peter Frank]

6. It's far worse than that...

Cheney (a PNAC leader) inserted himself into the role of VP & personally secured Haliburton's role in Iraq.

I'll supply links if wanted; but this is pretty much known.

[Virginia Dare]

7. Another lie he's repeated over and over

Is that he has no financial stake in Halliburton. Nothing could be further from the truth. In fact, there is a door that constantly revolves between the Defense Department and Defense Contracting. It is the biggest bastion of cronyism and corruption aside from the lobbying business.