THE US, THE UN AND IRAQ, ELEVENTH THREAD

Senior US soldiers investigated over missing Iraq reconstruction billions



You know I just wonder how much money has been poured and wasted or lost or stolen down this drain. I don't see how all that money has helped either us or them but I bet it made the Iraq war creators and other corrupt Iraq leaders wealthy.

revel, This is actually very old news. I think this loss of billions came out after the first or second year of the war. Bush did nothing to get to the bottom of this cesspool, and nobody felt it important enough to follow through on. The incompetence of the conservatives highlights their politics when none of them voted for the stimulus bill that is supposed to help America and Americans. They'd rather lose billions they funded for "reconstruction" in Iraq. Spending billions for Americans is a transfer of wealth from the rich to the poor.

The far far greater incompetence of the Liberals is rapidly becoming apparent with the Obama's signing of the so-called stimulus bill.

Wasting billions of dollars is very bad, but wasting trillions of dollars is far far worse.

ican, How often do you use your crystal ball? Do you know something the experts who helped Obama plan this stimulus bill? What's your background in economics? Have you ever written any papers on economics? How about on the subject of an economy such as ours where we are losing some 600,000 jobs every month?

What are your grand plans for our economy?

How is wasting billions on the American people bad vs billions spent in Iraq?

I wrote: Wasting billions of dollars is very bad, but wasting trillions of dollars is far far worse. I'll add now: Now that president Obama has signed the stimulus bill into law, we will be wasting trillions on trying to recover the US economy the way the President and a majority of Congress say they want to recover it.

We have been losing thousands of jobs every month since the Democrats began to run the Congress in 2007. That rate has been rapidly asccelerating to our losing hundreds of thousands of jobs since the last quarter of 2008. Had the Democrats joined with the Republicans in 2006 to rein in Fanny&Freddy, we would still have had a recession, but nothing like we have now.

You asked what are my "grand plans for our economy?

I don't have any grand plans for our economy. I have only a simple practical recommendation for saving our economy. The longer we wait to adopt it or its equivalent the worse things will get.

MY RECOMMENDATION
If we must accumulate trillions more in federal government debt to get us out of our current economic mess, then instead of the government spending us into debt its way, let's do it ourselves our way by reducing federal taxes and by trusting the people to spend their own money more wisely, efficiently, and effectively than the government is capable of doing on their behalf.

When reducing taxes let’s replace the current tax system with a uniform tax, a single tax on each and every dollar of gross income. That way every American who earns income carries his own weight and pays his fair share of the cost of the benefits of our government securing our constitutional rights. Let’s eliminate all exemptions, deductions, paybacks, or refunds, except deductions for gifts to qualified charities not totaling more than 99% of gross income. A qualified charity shall be any individual or organization that does NOT pay back any amount of the received charity to the donor, and is NOT part of the donor’s family: that is, NOT the donor’s spouse, former spouse, offspring, sibling, parent, grandparent, great grandparent, uncle, aunt, or first cousin.

ican, You are just too stupid to have a discussion. 1) This crisis developed during the GOP president and congress, 2) they spent billions while cutting taxes by building up government, and 3) Bush and McCain both said as recently as six months ago "our economy is fundamentally strong."

Quit wasting our time with you BS.

I have no problem with the wealthier becoming more wealthy, because I know they cannot lawfully accomplish that without substantially raising the economic conditions of the poor and the rest of the less wealthy. If the only price to truly raise the poor is increasing the gap between rich and poor, so what!

There are too damn many pukin' wealth enviers in our midst. They are crippling our economy. These sick distructive fanatics are appeased only when they find a way to reduce the wealth of others, even if that costs them a lot of their own wealth.

These people are not merely insane or stupid. They are evil.

Yes, Bush et al severly damaged our economy by not reining in Fanny&Freddy early in the Bush first term, and again not reining Fanny&Freddy in early in Bush's second term. Hell, they went along with expanding Fanny&Freddy.

But Obama et al is not reining in Fanny&Freddy. Obama et al is expanding them and adding additional government agencies to emulate them.

Drag yourself out of the damnable corral and its piles of waste you appear to be desperately clinging to. Think for a change! There are better ways to make yourself feel better than suppressing others and dragging them into your corral.

ican, Do you understand the term "accountability?"

I've raised this before and you have failed to comment ci.



Mr Clinton signed the repeal into law on Nov 12 1999.

Account for that.

Glass had already been amended to the point that it was little more than a shell. In fact, Clinton signed a bill that had little or no effect.

What did he sign it for then?

Cice, do you understand the term accountability? I don't think you do! I think you need help! Here it is! Get someone competent to explain it to you!

I don't know. Ask him.

spendi, I cannot account for what any president does; it's beyond my control - believe it not! Even when Bush allowed the torture of prisoners, and authorized illegal wiretaps in conflict with our Constitution, it was beyond my control.

Isn't it amazing how governments in democratic republics works?

In the US, we're supposed to have a sharing of power between the three branches of government, but when they fail to do their jobs, it's still beyond my control. Are you shocked?

The British are not to be allowed to know why they went to war in Iraq

Why we went to war in Iraq remains a secret as Straw blocks the release of cabinet minutes

http://www.guardian.co.uk/politics/2009/feb/25/cabinet-minutes-iraq-war

I'm glad you looked it up in your dictionary; now, you should have some idea what the word means. *To which I very much doubt.

Cice, here it is March 6, 2009, and you have yet to say what you think the term "accountability" means! Your last post on the subject was February 25, 2009.

Obama with a tough problem:

This is the one area that I think Obama might be thinking somewhat straight on, but perhaps he is repeating what his military commanders are saying, very likely, and I think they have a pretty good handle on what we are up against. I think Afghanistan could be much tougher than Iraq, for several reasons.

http://www.foxnews.com/politics/first100days/2009/03/07/obama-hopeful-efforts-taliban/

"WASHINGTON -- President Obama says he hopes U.S. troops can identify moderate elements of the Taliban and move them toward reconciliation.

Asked in an interview with The New York Times if the United States is winning in Afghanistan, Obama said "no," while adding "our troops are doing an extraordinary job in a very difficult situation."

"But you've seen conditions deteriorate over the last couple of years. The Taliban is bolder than it was. I think ... in the southern regions of the country, you're seeing them attack in ways that we have not seen previously," Obama said in the interview, which was posted Saturday on the Times' Web site.

"The national government still has not gained the confidence of the Afghan people," he said. "And so it's going to be critical for us to not only, get through these national elections to stabilize the security situation, but we've got to recast our policy so that our military, diplomatic and development goals are all aligned to ensure that al-Qaida and extremists that would do us harm don't have the kinds of safe havens that allow them to operate."

There may be opportunities to reach out to moderates in the Taliban, but the situation in Afghanistan is more complicated than the challenges the American military faced in Iraq, Obama said."

.....

Well then, it is good that Obama does listen to his commanders. We do need to cultivate the moderates in the Taliban in Afghanistan in order to counter AQ.

I do disagree with the implication that Iraq has in some way been easy and is now solved. It is not solved and never will be solved. There is still ongoing violence even today and there probably will be fifty years from now.





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Despite the ongoing violence, it is up to Iraqis to stop the violence and learn to come together. We are not in danger from Iraq, but we are from AQ and it is in Afghanistan and Pakistan border where the real fight has always been.