Occupation Iraq; Computing the Costs of Corruption

You can't because no one really knows how many billions have been tossed away.

"Fate of US gift for students shows corruption in Iraq; 8,080 laptops are divided and delayed" by Steven Lee Myers, New York Times  |  September 26, 2010

BAGHDAD — The shipment of computer laptops that arrived in Iraq’s main seaport in February was a small but important part of the American military’s mission here to win hearts and minds.

Invading and killing thousands if not millions and shattering the place never wins people over.

Of course, IT NEVER WAS ABOUT THAT! 

This ENTIRE WAR CRIME from which NO GOOD -- no good! -- has come has been about REMOVING a FOE of ISRAEL and GETTING ON TOP of that OIL!

What happened afterward is a tale of good intentions mugged by Iraq’s reality.  

I'm sick of the s*** "journalism," folks.

The computers — 8,080 in all, worth $1.8 million — were bought for schoolchildren in Babil, modern-day Babylon, a gift of the American taxpayers.  

Yeah, YOUR TAX DOLLARS at WORK, Americans!

Hey, it is NOT LIKE YOU are HUNGRY, SUFFERING, or the country is BANKRUPT! 

Btw, WHERE is MY GOVERNMENT-FUNDED LAPTOP that I PAID for with MY TAXES?

 Only they became mired for months in customs at the port, Umm Qasr, stalled by bureaucracy or venality, or some combination of the two. And then they were gone.  

You would think this was the Israeli border crossing into Gaza!

Corruption is so rampant here — and American reconstruction efforts so replete with their own mismanagement — that the fate of the computers could have ended as an anecdote in a familiar, if disturbing trend.

Iraq, after all, ranks above only Sudan, Burma, Afghanistan, and Somalia on Transparency International’s annual corruption index. But the American military commander in southern Iraq, Major General Vincent K. Brooks, was clearly furious. Even if the culprits are not exactly known, the victims are: Iraqi children and American taxpayers.

He issued a rare and stinging public rebuke of a government that the United States hopes to treat as an equal, strategic partner — flawed, perhaps, but getting better....

The disclosure embarrassed the government of Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki, who, in the middle of a protracted political fight to win a second term, could hardly have welcomed the headlines.  

Yeah, HOW CONVENIENT!

“They are stealing the computers of students,’’ the newspaper Al Nasiriya declared, voicing a populist outrage at Iraq’s government that is becoming fairly common.

It also put the US Embassy in Baghdad in a bind. Diplomats here, like their counterparts in Afghanistan, have found themselves forced to address — delicately — the misdeeds a nominally democratic government that US military force brought to power.  

Yeah, whatever.

The embassy promptly took charge of making statements about the affair, and then stopped making any, preferring to handle the matter diplomatically — that is, with as little public fuss as possible....

And the newspapers willingly oblige!

The original statement disappeared from the website of the US military in Iraq — “in error,’’ according to a spokesman.

And if that doesn't work RESORT to CENSORSHIP!   

After inquiries, it was reposted yesterday....

--more--"