ABC just reported .."WE the US taxpayers" are underwriting Merchant

[Gin]

salaries in Iraq. They showed a merchant selling 35 inch plazma TV's and business is booming. His salary is much better now,(he says) and... there is not tax in Iraq "now."

[JackSwift]

1. WTF are the idiots

up to now? We are underwriting an Iraqi welfare state while people here are unemployed? Are the neo-fascist idiots aware that this is contrary to everything they have ever supposedly held as principles?

[rfranklin]

2. It is essential that their "utopia" succeed in Iraq...

Their fantasy is a "free market" with no income or capital gains taxes a la Hong Kong. That's the Republicans wet dream. And they'll make it work even if we have to subsidize it with a trillion dollars in taxes.

[arcane1]

4. Iraq = the world's larget WalMart

[VolcanoJen]

3. Last night on SNL's "Weekend Update..."

They had a story about Iraq awarding national cell phone coverage to three different companies.

Jimmy Fallon then continued, "Now, Iraqis can soon be able to talk to anyone at anytime about how they have no security, electricity, water, or food."

[Snellius]

5. This is like trying to sell a car that's falling apart

Why are they trying to rebuild Iraq? Not to help Iraq but to avoid their own embarrassment.

It's like trying to sell a car that's falling apart. You put some money into a cheap paint job, a tune-up, cosmetic repairs just to get it running long enough to con someone into buying it. After the next election, Rove will just junk or leave it abandoned by the side of the road.