Andrew Sullivan gets it right

[Nederland]

http://time.blogs.com/daily_dish/2006/05/a_war_for_oil.html

<snip>

One thing that today's high gas prices strongly suggest is that, whatever else it was, the Iraq war was surely not about oil. If you care about cheap oil above everything else, you'd have found some deal with Saddam, kept the oil fields pumping, and maintained the same realist policy toward Arab and Muslim autocracies we had for decades. Or you could have just seized the Southern oil fields. Instead, we risked losing all of Iraq's oil fields at the beginning of the war, and now face a crippled supply just as India and China are booming and the U.S. is growing fast. (Instability in Iran, Nigeria and Venezuala don't help either.) I have unmixed feelings about this. The high price of gas is the best thing to have happened to the U.S. in a very long time. It alone, given the paralysis of the government, will force a market-driven push into new energy technologies, deter SUVs, and provoke the kind of technological research which will benefit us in the future. A smart overview of the entire situation can be read on this blog. I'm longing for gas at $4 a gallon. Yes, I know it hurts people. But pain is the only medicine for America's oil addiction. And if you have an SUV, decisions have consequences. Live with them.

<snip>

[Guy Whitey Corngood]

1. Huh?????? Other than the SUV part it's a pretty stupid conclusion. n/t

[Nederland]

3. How so?

You think we invaded Iraq for Oil? How's that working out?

[Guy Whitey Corngood]

10. It was to control the flow of oil (ie China and India). How's your

support for this moronic invasion going?

PS Didn't Wolfowitz admit the difference between N Korea and Iraq was the oil?

[reichstag911]

For BIG Oil, yes.

Have you noticed the profits being racked up by Bush's Big Oil cronies? They've gotten away with it thus far by blaming it on the rise in crude prices, but since they pass on those increases -- and then some -- their profits have skyrocketed.

[XNASA]

2. Iran and Venezuela are unstable?

News to me.

[Nederland]

5. From an oil market perspective

...yes

[400Years]

20. I guess you have not looked at Exxon's profits lately

Not about oil my ass.

[Beelzebud]

4. Sullivan is such a moron... It WAS about oil, but these jokers

didn't think about he insurgancy that would sabotage the pipelines at every opportunity.

I'm so tired of the amount of chances liberals are willing to give this idiot. If he weren't gay, he'd just be another idiotic right-winger, which to me, he is.

[Bridget Burke]

6. The invasion of Iraq was not about CHEAP oil....

It was about grabbing control of oil that will be even more valuable in the future. Thus, the oilmen can make even bigger profits. They really don't care about the people who live in sprawling cities without good mass transit. If they go broke driving to work, tough beans.

Sullivan's "expensive oil is great" attitude is fine for someone who lives in a city with good mass transit. Does he live in NYC? Or DC--whose fine Metro was built with Federal tax dollars?

(Tom DeLay used his power in the House to withhold Federal funding for mass transit from Houston. Our first light rail line got built--eventually.)

[Little Star]

9. What you said!

[Nederland]

15. Ok

If you're right, do you expect the US to retain control of the Iraqi oil fields? Do you expect the oil from those fields to be sold to whomever the US wants it to be sold and the 'US' (whatever that means) to keep the profits. Describe the end picture to me, cause I don't see it happening.

[EstimatedProphet]

34. This is what the plan was

The Us invades Iraq, gets rid of Hussein since he wasn't a good puppet anymore, puts in another puppet instead (Chalabi) who lets US oil companies dictate Iraq's policies.

You don't see that?

[MADem]

41. And remember, those OIL REVENUES were supposed to PAY for the WAR

That didn't work out too well, either...

[EstimatedProphet]

44. They paid for Halliburton

And for some reason we paid for Halliburton at the same time.

[Nederland]

50. Question

If that's not what happens, will you admit you are wrong?

[EstimatedProphet]

57. Uh...

That's what already did happen-at least what they had intended.

You don't believe they invaded Iraq on false pretenses?

You don't believe they intended Chalabi as Iraq's leader? That the only reason he was dropped by this administration is because he was publically exposed as untrustworthy?

[Nederland]

63. What I am saying

...is that there is no evidence that the US is doing everything it can to control Iraqi oil. Certainly there are some actions that can be construed that way, but if control of the oil was the primary goal, there are many things that the US could have done but didn't, and should not have done but did.

[EstimatedProphet]

65. Alright

The question then becomes: did we invade Iraq for land control (PNAC) and blunder, or for oil control (Cheney) and blunder, or for 'democracy' (freeper backwash) and blunder...? If we did invade for any of those reasons it was done poorly-if we wanted to hold Iraq as a functioning society. Maybe the welfare of Iraq or anything it had was never a concern.

Maybe it was all of those three, or more likely, 2 of those 3-I'll leave it up to the reader which 2.

[Nederland]

70. It was a blunder

...no doubt about that. It could have been done right, if Bush/Cheney/Rumsfeld had listened to their own generals about how many troops were needed. And it certainly could have been done without smearing the image of the US by torturing people. To answer your question, however, I believe that Bush wanted to see a democractic Iraq that was inclined favorably (politically and economically) toward the US. Did oil measure into this calculation? Of course, but it was not the sole or even primary reason for going in.

[EstimatedProphet]

72. OK

I can understand that. although lately I lean towards believing that BushCheney wanted chaos as a plan, because of what they wiould be able to do later-like inventing excuses to go into other countries.

[Bridget Burke]

35. This article from CommonDreams draws a good picture...

Published on Saturday, December 3, 2005 by CommonDreams.org
Mission Accomplished: Big Oil's Occupation of Iraq
by Heather Wokusch

The Bush administration's covert plan to help energy companies steal Iraq's oil could be just weeks away from fruition, and the implications are staggering: continued price-gouging by Big Oil, increased subjugation of the Iraqi people, more US troops in Iraq, and a greater likelihood for a US invasion of Iran. That's just for starters.

The administration's challenge has been how to transfer Iraq's oil assets to private companies under the cloak of legitimacy, yet simultaneously keep prices inflated. But Bush & Co. and their Big Oil cronies might have found a simple yet devious solution: production sharing agreements (PSAs).

Here's how PSAs work. In return for investment in areas where fields are small and results are uncertain, governments occasionally grant oil companies sweetheart deals guaranteeing high profit margins and protection from exploration risks. The country officially retains ownership of its oil resources, but the contractual agreements are often so rigid and severe that in practical terms, it can be the equivalent of giving away the deed to the farm....

According to Greg Muttitt, co-author and lead researcher of the "Crude Designs" report, "for all the US administration's talk of creating a democracy in Iraq, in fact, their heavy pushing of PSAs stands to deprive Iraq of democratic control of its most important natural resource. I would even go further: the USA, Britain and the oil companies seem to be taking advantage of the weakness of Iraq's new institutions of government, and of the terrible violence in the country, by pushing Iraq to sign deals in this weak state, whose terms would last for decades. The chances of Iraq getting a good deal for its people in these circumstances are minimal; the prospect of mega-profitable deals for multinational oil companies is fairly assured."

Of course, ongoing oil exploration in Iraq by administration-friendly companies would require permanent US bases, a massive ongoing troop presence and billions more in taxpayer-dollar subsidies to sleazy outfits like Halliburton.

www.commondreams.org/views05/1203-23.htm

[Nederland]

29. Question

If it was about oil, why seize the entire country? Why not just seize the Southern oil fields, an area dominated by the Shiites?

[Dunedain]

42. Because

That would totally negate the "Democracy" jingle.

[Nederland]

49. Yes

but the "democracy jingle" negates the benefits.

[Guy Whitey Corngood]

53. Benefits!? Have you been hanging out with Whitney Houston or some shit?n/t

[CJCRANE]

71. The "democracy jingle"

is meant to calm the natives (in both Iraq and America). It's just window-dressing.

Likewise if they'd just seized the oilfields the average American might just have wised up that the war wasn't really about WMD, Democracy etc.

[Kingshakabobo]

79. Where have you been?

Iraq was going to be a neo-con's wet dream flowing with un-taxed oil and no rules. Read this article: "Baghdad Year Zero". It's a couple years old but still makes sense. The article goes a long way to explain WHY the country wasn't secured...Why we turned over sovereignty early.......and why the insurgency is what it is today. It also talks about the 40 year contracts and business investment that never happened to to the neo-con's bungling of the situation.

http://www.harpers.org/BaghdadYearZero.html

>>>>>>>>Iraq was going to change all that. In one place on Earth, the theory would finally be put into practice in its most perfect and uncompromised form. A country of 25 million would not be rebuilt as it was before the war; it would be erased, disappeared. In its place would spring forth a gleaming showroom for laissez-faire economics, a utopia such as the world had never seen. Every policy that liberates multinational corporations to pursue their quest for profit would be put into place: a shrunken state, a flexible workforce, open borders, minimal taxes, no tariffs, no ownership restrictions. The people of Iraq would, of course, have to endure some short-term pain: assets, previously owned by the state, would have to be given up to create new opportunities for growth and investment. Jobs would have to be lost and, as foreign products flooded across the border, local businesses and family farms would, unfortunately, be unable to compete. But to the authors of this plan, these would be small prices to pay for the economic boom that would surely explode once the proper conditions were in place, a boom so powerful the country would practically rebuild itself.

The fact that the boom never came and Iraq continues to tremble under explosions of a very different sort should never be blamed on the absence of a plan. Rather, the blame rests with the plan itself, and the extraordinarily violent ideology upon which it is based.

* * *

Torturers believe that when electrical shocks are applied to various parts of the body simultaneously subjects are rendered so confused about where the pain is coming from that they become incapable of resistance. A declassified CIA “Counterintelligence Interrogation” manual from 1963 describes how a trauma inflicted on prisoners opens up “an interval—which may be extremely brief—of suspended animation, a kind of psychological shock or paralysis. . . . t this moment the source is far more open to suggestion, far likelier to comply.” A similar theory applies to economic shock therapy, or “shock treatment,” the ugly term used to describe the rapid implementation of free-market reforms imposed on Chile in the wake of General Augusto Pinochet’s coup. The theory is that if painful economic “adjustments” are brought in rapidly and in the aftermath of a seismic social disruption like a war, a coup, or a government collapse, the population will be so stunned, and so preoccupied with the daily pressures of survival, that it too will go into suspended animation, unable to resist. As Pinochet’s finance minister, Admiral Lorenzo Gotuzzo, declared, “The dog’s tail must be cut off in one chop.”

That, in essence, was the working thesis in Iraq, and in keeping with the belief that private companies are more suited than governments for virtually every task, the White House decided to privatize the task of privatizing Iraq’s state-dominated economy. Two months before the war began, USAID began drafting a work order, to be handed out to a private company, to oversee Iraq’s “transition to a sustainable market-driven economic system.” The document states that the winning company (which turned out to be the KPMG offshoot Bearing Point) will take “appropriate advantage of the unique opportunity for rapid progress in this area presented by the current configuration of political circumstances.” Which is precisely what happened<<<<<<<<<

[seaglass]

74. How could you say that you were looking for WMDs if you only

went looking in the South?

[SmokingJacket]

60. Bingo! nt

[sandnsea]

80. Government is to enable free commerce

Apparently Andrew Sullivan has forgotten that lesson from PoliSci 101. The purpose of government is to create an infrastructure and stable environment for commerce. That is the particular view of Republicans. It's just as you say, it's about gaining control of the oil because US economic superiority depends on it.

And the people pushing the government to invest in alternative energy is a far cry from the free market developing new products on their own.

What a twit.

[Spazito]

7. Sullivan is delusional.......must be the continuous loss of brain cells

due to alcohol abuse. Nobody is buying what he keeps trying to sell, that being the illegal invasion and occupation of Iraq was not about oil. Pathetic man, truly pathetic.

[Nederland]

11. I think

you are confusing Sullivan with Hitchens. Just a hunch...

[Spazito]

23. Oops, you are right, I guess I will have to figure out what is causing

Sullivan's delusions if, indeed, they are not alcohol related. He, Sullivan, is pathetic as is Hitchens as their delusions are the same albeit the cause of them might be different.

[Trajan]

8. Sorry ....

Just because Sully gets one minor element of the picture 'right' doesnt mean HE "Get's It Right" ....

The push for access to Middle East oil was NOT about making it 'cheaper' for us, but providing certain parties with the proceeds from their sales, which 'hopefully', for them, will be at as high a price as possible ....

Those "certain parties" were at certain energy task force meetings, where Iraq was carved up like a Thanksgiving turkey, with friends of the Bush Oil Cartel bellying up to the table ....

We already know that much ....

That meeting was a conspiracy to theft ..... Sully again tries to cover their tracks ...

And you mistakenly provide HIM cover ....

[Squeech]

12. Not really

Remember, BushCo really believed we'd be welcomed with flowers, and Cheney's old Halliburton chums assured him they could keep the pumps running on those brazillion-dollar contracts.

Sullivan's slowly getting over his own kool-aid addiction (or maybe he's beginning to realize that, as a gay man, he has too much to lose from Republican hegemony), but he still refuses to see how blitheringly incompetent the Chimpministration is.

“Always side with the truth. It’s much bigger than you are.” (Teresa Nielsen Hayden)

[EstimatedProphet]

37. I disagree

I know that the administration said the bit about being welcomed, but I think that was nothing more than propaganda for the American Idiots. I think the scenario was more likely that they knew there would be a lot of resistance, but that they just didn't care because they only want control of the oil, and anything else is unimportant to them.

[Squeech]

51. Depends

I think there were different factions within the WHIG that had different information and different goals, essentially cooperating only to get the war they all wanted. (I think nothing about BushCo's behavior is explicable without this assumption, actually.)

The corporate wing wanted the oil-- remember, one of the few things we know is they passed around a map of Iraq at Cheney's secret energy policy meetings. Cheney also wanted the no-bid contracts for Halliburton et al. It was probably at his insistence that our troops defended the Ministry of Oil in the initial occupation of Baghdad.

What the PNAC actually wanted is less clear, because either it was clearly delusional (e.g. a puppet government that would recognize Israel in the most nationalist secular Arab country) or it was all for show (American power projection and the madman theory of diplomacy). But it was their policy to ignore the expert analyses and scenarios from DOD and State and go with their war-on-the-cheap schemes and best-case pipe dreams. All of which were miserable failures.

Somebody posted in this thread that he didn't remember anyone saying that the Iraq invasion would bring us cheaper oil, but there are documented cases. I may not remember it right, but I think it was Stephen Hadley, who hails of course from the PNAC faction.

[EstimatedProphet]

58. True

[charlie]

62. It was Larry Lindsey

At least, he was one of them.

Washington Times 9/16/02:

"It's hard to say whether the net economic effects would be positive or negative. There are enormous uncertainties about what might happen. It depends on the prosecution of the war. But under every plausible scenario, the negative effect is quite small relative to the economic benefits that would come from a successful prosecution of the war," he said.

"The key issue is oil, and a regime change in Iraq would facilitate an increase in world oil," which would tend to lower oil prices, he said.

http://web.archive.org/web/20020918111623/http://www.washtimes.com/national/20020916-8081695.htm

[jedicord]

13. I only agree with the new technologies part.

For one, the oil fields being crippled does not mean the war was not about oil, in my opinion it just shows another one of Bush's failures. The idiot and his admin screwed that part up too.

Also, must be nice to be so rich that $4/gallon gas is no problem. Hurts people? That's an understatement. Many people are finding it difficult to get to work because of $3/gallon gas now. Many businesses are hurting (like my husband's plumbing company) because of $3/gallon gas now.

This is just another "let them eat cake" editorial, IMO.

[rsdsharp]

14. I don't recall anyone ever saying the war was about

CHEAP oil. Looks who is profiting. Cheney's salary as VP is $202,500, if I recall correctly. Yet he REPORTED 8 million in income, and got a refund of nearly 2 million. Where did that money come from? My guess is most of it came from Halliburton dividends resulting from soaring profits, which in turn are the result of billions in no bid contracts awarded by these thugs. No war, no contracts. No war, no market uncertainty, no $75 a barrel prices, and no half billion dollar golden parachutes for oil execs.

[Clark2008]

16. He's right about the market, but Iraq was about oil

The mark he misses is still minor, however.

He's correct that we risked losing all of Iraq's oil fields and have - but what he doesn't consider is how backward thinking this administration and their friends in the PNAC are. The PNAC honestly believed that they could take over everything in a "cakewalk" and, as a perk, give war profiteering contracts to the likes of Halliburton. They didn't bother to listen to their commanders on the ground and didn't bother to listen to the weapons inspectors because they thought they knew everything. They didn't.

They did want to take over the country and divide it up for the oil companies and the corporations - but they didn't figure on the fight they got.

[LiberalPartisan]

17. Sullivan gets it wrong

Sullivan errs in concluding that since oil is more expensive than before the occupation of Iraq then the occupation must not have been about oil. What he conveniently fails to consider, just as the Bush administation, is the complete dissolution of Iraq. Assumptions were made Iraq's oil exports would increase in the aftermath. Today Iraq exports less oil than before the US occupation.

It was always about oil. The reason oil is now more expensive is due to skiddish commodity exchanges. Demand for oil from China and India is an insignificant factor when compared to US demand.

[Nederland]

28. Answer this

If it was about oil, why seize the entire country? Why not just seize the Southern oil fields, an area dominated by the Shiites?

[Clark2008]

33. To build bases throughout the country as a means for

a strategic launching location in case we needed to steal oil from other oil-producing Middle Eastern countries, of course.

You don't really think the Saudi's would let us sit on their land forever, do you? They have to at least PRETEND to put up a fight against Americanism so their people don't overthrow the king.

[EstimatedProphet]

40. How?

How are we supposed to go into Iraq, take over part of the country, and still keep the pretwense in the world community that we are doing it in the name of 'democracy'?

[Nederland]

47. Of course

...because with the way we are doing it meets with the world's total approval. :eyes:

[EstimatedProphet]

61. Of course it doesn't

But do you honestly think that invading PART of Iraq and taking over their oil fields would be approved by anyone? The occupation is clearly about controlling Iraq and not about the safety of the US, but still some people have been fooled-look at the freeper backwash. There is NO WAY that invading part of a country and taking their resources could possibly be justified.

To say that we mush have invaded for some reason other than oil, just because the occupation isn't working, is ridiculous.

[TabulaRasa]

84. The question's been answered repeatedly

You just refuse to listen. But you like to pose pointed question, why don't you answer a few? If the war was about democracy, why not invade a myriad of undemocratic countries? Why continue to actively support and prop up undemocratic regimes? Similar questions, for WMDs. And as to your point that people who maintain that the war was about oil should admit that they are wrong if the U.S. doesn't end up with control of the oil fields, this is patently silly. Events on the ground, much more than the Busheviks anticipated, are dictating what they can or can't get away with. When Baghdad fell, you had administration officials on T.V. saying they weren't going to turn over the country to the U.N. because, "we fought the war, and we should get the spoils." They thought they could ultimately set up a pseudo-democracy transitioned from their hand-picked council. However, they were forced against their will by the powerful Shiite bloc, and its leaders, to hold elections against their will. Likewise, they may be forced out of the country. That doesn't in any way make our speculations about their intentions false. Does anybody with a functioning brain think that Iraq would have been invaded if it didn't have some of the largest stocks of oil in the world? Seriously? The simple-mindedness of your ideas about "cheap gas prices" are probably the main problem. Nobody has maintained the war was about cheap gas prices. That's just mind-blowingly stupid. And other than that, you have yet to further a meaningful argument.

[Chimichurri]

18. the reason gas prices are high is because oil companies have

closed refineries in order to lower supply raising demand thus raising their bottom lines.
Crude oil is coming in just fine from Canada - since that's where we get the majority of our oil - not the middle east. It's the refining capacity which produces gas from the oil, that's being slowed down.

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/jamie-court/memos-show-oil-companies-_b_6980.html
http://www.citizen.org/cmep/energy_enviro_nuclear/electricity/Oil_and_Gas/articles.cfm?ID=11829

[Crankie Avalon]

19. He's a moron...

...the war was about controlling Iraq's oil and using it as leverage to put OPEC on notice. Not being able to secure Iraq and exposing the limits of US power for all to see has emboldened OPEC to set prices higher.

[Guy Whitey Corngood]

21. Greg Palast actually gets it.

http://gregpalast.com/detail.cfm?artid=483&row=0

[Ms. Clio]

31. Bingo n/t

[Cha]

39. Thanks!

"It's Economics 101. The oil industry is run by a cartel, OPEC, and what economists call an "oligopoly" -- a tiny handful of operators who make more money when there's less oil, not more of it. So, every time the "insurgents" blow up a pipeline in Basra, every time Mad Mahmoud in Tehran threatens to cut supply, the price of oil leaps. And Dick and George just love it.

Dick and George didn't want more oil from Iraq, they wanted less. I know some of you, no matter what I write, insist that our President and his Veep are on the hunt for more crude so you can cheaply fill your family Hummer; that somehow, these two oil-patch babies are concerned that the price of gas in the USA is bumping up to $3 a gallon."

[Lydia Leftcoast]

22. It was about controlling the supplies and preventing Saddam from

selling his oil in euros, which would cause incredible damage to the dollar.

[Guy Whitey Corngood]

25. I believe he decided to switch to Petro Euros sometime in 2000. n/t

[EstimatedProphet]

24. Andrew Sullivan gets it wrong

It wasn't about CHEAP oil, it was about EXPENSIVE oil.

[Ms. Clio]

26. No, it wasn't about cheap oil, or cheap gas for US, the people

Like duh.

[maxsolomon]

27. willfully delusional

the war was about ensuring AMERICAN access to iraq's reserves.

it doesn't matter if the oil started flowing immediately (though that was probably the hubristic plan) to our "addicted" consumers. what matters is that its OURS, not china's not india's not japan's & not europe's.

with saddam in place & his sociopath sons lined up to take over, there was no chance that sanctions could be lifted entirely unless we backed down & admitted we don't give 2 shits about democracy.

which we don't.

al gore would have tackled our energy security head on.

[kenny blankenship]

30. Just because a plan backfires doesn't mean it had a different aim

more in keeping with the result. One might as well say that Hitler's drive to the south of the USSR (ending up in Stalingrad) wasn't about oil. This offensive failed and destroyed his armies, but that doesn't mean Germany went there, driving towards Baku and the oilfields surrounding it, for some reason other than oil.

If it was not for control of the oil in Iraq and the region, then what ? Then America must have invaded Iraq on behalf of someone else.

[jayfish]

32. Not Even Close.

Just because they failed in their war for oil doesn't mean it wasn't about oil. It's like saying " I went bass fishing today and didn't catch anything, but whatever else it was, it was not about catching bass.

Jay

[Cha]

36. Huh? The war was about

OIL but the fuckers didn't count on the freedom fighters..it was all about flowers at their feet and toppling sadam's damn statue.

It must be chafing their butts good that they can't steal Iraq's oil!

[RedStateShame]

38. Oh, my bad!!

We went to war with Iraq for oil MONEY. Better?

[Guy Whitey Corngood]

43. so, should the signs read: "NO BLOOD FOR OIL MONEY"? N/T ;-)

[RedStateShame]

46. EXACTLY,

possibly shortened to "No Blood For Oil Money, Like I'd See A Single Penny From It, Anyway."

[Guy Whitey Corngood]

48. I can already see all these Hollywodd eltists with their NBFOMLISASPFIA.

You know, the same people who got it completely wrong on the runup to the invasion. :sarcasm:

[mondo joe]

45. When he says "decisions have consequences" I'd like him to

remember that about his OWN decisions.

[Vinnie From Indy]

52. Sullivan is a toady of the first order

The BushCo regime is making money for their supporters across the board and they have secured future resources for more exploitation. Sullivan is a lightweight and a shameless scandalmonger.

[Crowdance]

54. "Yes I know it hurts people..." is the position of the rich man

Expensive gas hurts most those who can least bear the burden--the working poor, the disabled, the elderly. Higher gas prices for them will mean no heat, less food, higher prices on medication and services, and fewer jobs. Is that as OK with you as it is with rich Andrew?

[leftofthedial]

55. except for the "consequences" line, totally 180 degrees wrong!

Part of the point of seizing Iraq was to allow the CHeney cabal to control Iraq's oil for the long run and to keep it OFF the market. These bastards repeatedly play the game of artificially constraining supply in order to jack up profits and increase profits. Later, when Saudi and other supplies begin to diminish, Iraq will be brought back online, thus extending the period of maximum profit from declining oil supplies.

Cheney's energy task force planned this.

[justicewanted]

56. Sullivan and Nederland are still being conned into believing that

we are all in this together and the government somehow cares about our welfare.

When you get past that fantasy and realize every decision made is about making money for some special interest group then everything they do makes sense.

The invasion of Iraq has made billions for Halliburton, and other friends of this administration, but the american people are further in debt and the soldiers in the war are chewed up and spit out by the republicans while they pretend to support them. Just one big con after another.

Keep believing that they are looking out for us if you want, but the Enron style corruption of this administration is about to catch up with America. We will be left holding the bag while George and Dick are living it up in Dubai.

[AllieB]

59. Great Post.

Welcome to DU! :hi:

[Nederland]

64. I have no illusions

...that we are all in this together.

I am well aware that there are numerous people in this country that are rooting for the US to fail in Iraq.

[Bridget Burke]

68. I am rooting for the USA to get out of Iraq ASAP.

To save human lives. To let Iraq decide its own fate.

The ones who want to control Iraq's oil want a continuing failure. A country in turmoil & long-term occupation is their goal. With more death & destruction. And less budget money available for those wimpy causes like health care, education, the environment & our infrastructure.

[Nederland]

69. Question

When you say that you would like the US to get out so Iraq can decide its own fate, what do you mean? Do you honestly think that if the US pulled out right now the fate of Iraq would be in the hands of average Iraqis? Please, the only thing that prevents the fate of Iraq to be put in the hands of terrorists or wanna-be dictators is the US military.

[Guy Whitey Corngood]

73. Sure, that's why they rely on quality people like Allawi, Chalabi, etc.

I refuse to believe there is anybody this fucking blind about this situation at this point in time. Since when is our government opposed to dictators?

Question: Why didn't you sign up to go fight this noble cause in the first place? Or am I wrong and you're typing this nonsense from somewhere in Ramadi?

[Bridget Burke]

83. Yeah, we invaded to "spread democracy"....

Don't worry, the US has NO plan to get out of Iraq. Keeping the country in chaos is the excuse needed for a continuing military occupation. And continuing access to the oil.

I'd say Iraq is in the hands of a wanna-be dictator right now.

[newspeak]

81. well, it's hard to swallow

that some people are not above STEALING and MURDERING to further their agenda. Hey, how about that energy meeting with all of Cheney's friends???? Now, I wonder what they were up to? Hmmmmm.

[Bitter Cup]

66. Sullivan isn't being conned.

He is perpetuating the con. He knows damn well what he's demagaguing and why. We didn't need more oil, we needed to stop India and China from controlling large supplies of it. This isn't about OUR oil supply, this is about Big Oil's control of all supplies.

The Profits do tell the whole story.

[Ms. Clio]

67. welcome to DU!

great post!

[Guy Whitey Corngood]

75. Can you please explain to us once and for all,

what this bullshit was about then?

[walldude]

76. Sullivan's brain doesn't quite work right...

I mean really, a gay Republican? That's like being a black member of the KKK. I only have 2 questions, if the war wasn't for oil, then why was the first order of business after "shock and awe" to secure the oil fields? You'd think if we were there to help the Iraqi's we'd have secured the major cities and stopped the looting. Watch the interview with the soldier in Fahrenheit 9/11, he was there as they secured the oil fields first. Also, and I apologize because I lost the link to this but the British just gave a medal to an American General for his role in "securing the Iraqi oil fields". At least the Brits admit why they are there.

[warrens]

82. That's why Cheney's Energy Task Force is still top secret

They were divvying up the Iraqi oil holdings. Pity it didn't quite work out for them, eh?

[newspeak]

77. Andrew must have a short memory

because I distinctly remember when we invaded Iraq that the oil ministry was to be protected at all cost, while a nuclear facility, museums and apparently dangerous explosives were left unprotected. If anyone believed that gas for the US was going to go down from this debacle, I have a bridge I'd like to sell them. For the oil companies, it was so they could CONTROL the flow and make huge profits at our expense and at the expense of the Iraqis people.

[Blue_Tires]

78. uh....

one look at the record profits the oil companies have been getting since the invasion (the previous record for profits was smashed in '03, '04, '05 and soon to be '06) should tell you all you need to know