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07/03/2004 Archived Entry: "Political post"

In Iraq, Halliburton labour supervisors are paid $80,000 to not supervise any labourers as they are told "just log 12 hours a day and walk around and look busy", while company officials say "We can be as dumb and stupid as we want in the first year of a war, nobody’s going to care". This according to a former company auditor. Costs like $45 cases of soda and $100/15lb. are rampant. This happens while soldiers are forced to buy their own gear. Even the Army reports say "American soldiers who defeated the Iraqi regime 15 months ago received virtually none of the critical spare parts they needed to keep their tanks and Bradley fighting vehicles running. They ran chronically short of food, water and ammunition. Their radios often failed them. Their medics had to forage for medical supplies; artillery gunners had to cannibalize parts from captured Iraqi guns, and intelligence units provided little useful information about the enemy."

Back at home, recent poll numbers show the possibility that Bush could be soundly defeated. Maybe Bush trying to get church member lists will make a difference. But it's certainly annoy a number of people.

Heck, that may be enough to get Cheney to use the F-word again.

All of this criticism of Bush seems to be rising, as journalists start to do their damned jobs. Unfortunately, up until this point, there's been pressure not to. Wassamata, George? Can't handle the hard questions? Specific to that last link, the White House gave the reporter questions about about what Irish PM Ahern was wearing that day to ask. Because that's oh-so-much-more-important than the ongoing war in Iraq, or the forgotten Afghanistan, where elections have been postponed until October since democracy is failing badly under U.S rule. But then again, can the U.S. be blamed if even the troops barely know where it is?