Conservatives are finally catching on to Bush

The American Conservative is about as far from my political point of view as a publication can be, but I agree with the October 24, 2005, issue.

In an article titled "Money for Nothing", Philip Giraldi takes the Bushies to task for the billions (with a B) of dollars that have just disappeared in Iraq. The money has "gone to bribe Iraqis," the article says, and to "line contractors’ pockets." Contractors such as the one that Dick Cheney used to work for? Giraldi, by the way, is a former CIA Officer. He is now a partner in Cannistraro Associates, an international security consultancy.

Key quotes from a conservative's conservative publication:

• "When the final page is written on America’s catastrophic imperial venture, one word will dominate the explanation of U.S. failure—corruption."


• "The American-dominated Coalition Provisional Authority could well prove to be the most corrupt administration in history, almost certainly surpassing the widespread fraud of the much-maligned UN Oil for Food Program."


• "Some of the corruption grew out of the misguided neoconservative agenda for Iraq, which meant that a serious reconstruction effort came second to doling out the spoils to the war’s most fervent supporters." I know this sounds like something Ed Schultz would say, but it's from the cover article in The American Conservative. Wow!


• "The 15-month proconsulship of the CPA [Coalition Provisional Authority] disbursed nearly $20 billion, two-thirds of it in cash, most of which came from the Development Fund for Iraq that had replaced the UN Oil for Food Program and from frozen and seized Iraqi assets. Most of the money was flown into Iraq on C-130s in huge plastic shrink-wrapped pallets holding 40 'cashpaks,' each cashpak having $1.6 million in $100 bills. Twelve billion dollars moved that way between May 2003 and June 2004, drawn from accounts administered by the New York Federal Reserve Bank. The $100 bills weighed an estimated 363 tons." I don't know about you, but this is corruption far beyond what I suspected. When it comes to thievery, these guys are professionals.


• "Once in Iraq, there was virtually no accountability over how the money was spent." This is a Republican administration and the Republicans are supposed to be the party of fiscal responsibility.


• "Money also disappeared in truckloads and by helicopter. The CPA reportedly distributed funds to contractors in bags off the back of a truck. In one notorious incident in April 2004, $1.5 billion in cash that had just been delivered by three Blackhawk helicopters was handed over to a courier in Erbil, in the Kurdish region, never to be seen again. Afterwards, no one was able to recall the courier’s name or provide a good description of him." Wait a minute! Earlier I said these guys are professionals when it comes to thievery. Maybe not. Maybe they're just astonishingly stupid.


• "Paul Bremer, meanwhile, had a slush fund in cash of more than $600 million in his office for which there was no paperwork."


• "Halliburton, Vice President Dick Cheney’s former company, has a no-bid monopoly contract with the Army Corps of Engineers that is now estimated to be worth $10 billion. In June 2005, Pentagon contracting officer Bunny Greenhouse told a congressional committee that the agreement was the 'most blatant and improper contracting abuse' that she had ever witnessed, a frank assessment that subsequently earned her a demotion." Where is the Congressional investigation? Where is the special prosecutor?


• "Another U.S. firm well connected to the Bush White House, Custer Battles, has provided security services to the coalition, receiving $11 million in Iraqi funds including $4 million in cash in a sole-source contract to supply security at Baghdad International Airport. The company had never provided airport security before receiving the contract."


• "Another American contractor, CACI International, which was involved in the Abu Ghraib interrogations, was accused by the GAO in April 2004 of having failed to keep records on hours of work that it was billing for and of routinely upgrading employee job descriptions so that more could be charged per employee per hour. Both are apparently common practices among contractors in Iraq, and audits routinely determine that there is little in the way of paperwork to support billings."

These are just small snippets from a huge (2800 words) article. If you can read this without being outraged, without feeling that everyone in the White House should be in prison, then you are stronger than I am.

And again I point out that is not from some goof-ball lefty publication. This article is from The American Conservative: Scott McConnell founded The American Conservative with Pat Buchanan and Taki Theodoracopulos in 2002. A Ph.D.in history from Columbia University, he was formerly the editorial page editor of the New York Post and has been a columnist for Antiwar.com and New York Press. His work has been published in Commentary, Fortune, National Review, The New Republic, and many other publications.