Wednesday, May 07, 2003

Oh I'm just so suprised, aren't you?

Lawmaker Says Halliburton's Role Expanded in Iraq

Halliburton, the oil giant once run by Vice President Dick Cheney, appears to have been given a bigger role in rebuilding Iraq's oil industry, according to letters between the U.S. military and Congress.

In a letter sent on Tuesday to the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, California Rep. Henry Waxman, a Democrat, raised questions about the contract awarded without competition to a Halliburton subsidiary, Kellogg Brown and Root.

Waxman said originally the contract had been described as one to extinguish oil well fires and do related repairs, but Halliburton now appeared to have a more lucrative and direct role in rebuilding Iraq's oil industry.

"It now appears however, that the contract with Halliburton -- a company with close ties to the Administration -- can now include 'operation' of Iraqi oil fields and 'distribution' of Iraqi oil," wrote Waxman to Lt. Gen. Robert Flowers of the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers.

Waxman was replying to a letter from Flowers sent last week which said the scope of work included extinguishing oil well fires and cleaning up related damage as well as the "operation of facilities and distribution of products."

The letter from Flowers did not indicate what was meant by the operation of facilities or the distribution of products but the White House has always said that Iraq's oil industry belongs to its people. Flowers' office was not immediately available for comment.

Asked on Wednesday about the issue, White House spokesman Ari Fleischer said: "It's not a White House issue ... the White House does not get involved in who gets contracts."


We knew it. We ALL knew it. This war was waged to make money and control the oil. Countless thousands have died so Americas' rich can get richer. No one's hands in the Whitehouse are clean, they all are covered in the blood of American soldiers and Iraqi civilians.

Mr. Bush has the blood of your young men and women on his hands. If any of you on the right can justify this, I'm all ears.

Kansas @ 12:48 PM