How many $billions are we talking about in the oil for food scandal?

[BurtWorm]

I ask because I could have sworn I heard a Republican say on CSPAN recently that it was the largest scandal in the history of political scandal. A Google search turned up this from a January 19 CNN story about Samir Vincent's guilty plea:

"Various U.S. estimates allege that Saddam, who was able to choose the vendors, exploited the program to seize an estimated $2 billion to $4 billion in illegal surcharges on its oil sales and kickbacks on the humanitarian goods purchases." <bold added>

Granted, $2-4 billion is a large amount. But in LBN there's a story about Halliburton's overcharging the Pentagon $4 billion, and over the weekend, a scandal over the Bremer's occupation government losing track of $9 billion broke.

Once upon a time, boys and girls, when a person was shown that the amount they were touting as "the largest in all history" was suddenly shown to be dwarfed by other amounts, they would drop their claims and shut up, hoping to make their lie go away from public memory as fast as possible. But in this day and age, we can expect the Bushists to continue touting oil-for-food as "the greatest scandal ever" while much greater scandals in their own government go ignored.

[FatEmbolism]

1. CNN said

28 billion

[BurtWorm]

2. Where did they say that?

Not in the article I just cited.

[Bridget Burke]

3. What's your source for that information?

Do you have a link?

[FatEmbolism]

5. CNN about

two days after the guilty plea. It was Anderson cooper saying that since there was a guilty plea, it was possible the defendant would turn states evidence and disclose some more information.

[Bridget Burke]

6. Can you provide a link?

That would really be helpful.

[bvar22]

4. I've read $23 Billion over 10 years.

This is chicken feed compared to the Corporate and private looting going on in Iraq.

The $23 Billion was Iraqi oil money.


The Republican (Reagan) sponsored Savings& Loan Deregulation Scam weighs in at $55 Billion (lowball ), and that is US Taxpayer's money.

[Justitia]

7. largest financial theft in history - Savings & Loan Scandal - 1.4 TRILLION

Stolen from the Federal Treasury, to be paid back in by American taxpayers. $ 1.4 TRILLION includes accrued interest, and it comprises a full one-third of our national debt.

No other financial scandal even comes close.

Regan & the entire Bush clan (and Sen McCain) are at the epicenter.

[bvar22]

8. This needs to be kicked.

:kick:

Important for perspective and to debunk more NeoCon lies!