FRANK RICH SMACKDOWN: The Road From K Street to Yusufiya

[kpete]

June 25, 2006
Op-Ed Columnist
The Road From K Street to Yusufiya
By FRANK RICH

AS the remains of two slaughtered American soldiers, Pfc. Thomas L. Tucker and Pfc. Kristian Menchaca, were discovered near Yusufiya, Iraq, on Tuesday, a former White House official named David Safavian was convicted in Washington on four charges of lying and obstruction of justice. The three men had something in common: all had enlisted in government service in a time of war. The similarities end there. The difference between Mr. Safavian's kind of public service and that of the soldiers says everything about the disconnect between the government that has sabotaged this war and the brave men and women who have volunteered in good faith to fight it.

Privates Tucker and Menchaca made the ultimate sacrifice. Their bodies were so mutilated that they could be identified only by DNA. Mr. Safavian, by contrast, can be readily identified by smell. His idea of wartime sacrifice overseas was to chew over government business with the Jack Abramoff gang while on a golfing junket in Scotland. But what's most indicative of Mr. Safavian's public service is not his felonies in the Abramoff-Tom DeLay axis of scandal, but his legal activities before his arrest. In his DNA you get a snapshot of the governmental philosophy that has guided the war effort both in Iraq and at home (that would be the Department of Homeland Security) and doomed it to failure.

.........................

If we had honored our grand promises to the people we were liberating, Dick Cheney's prediction that we would be viewed as liberators might have had a chance of coming true. Greater loyalty from the civilian population would have helped reduce the threat to American soldiers, who are prey to insurgents in places like Yusufiya. But what we've wrought instead is a variation on Arthur Miller's post-World War II drama, "All My Sons." Working from a true story, Miller told the tragedy of a shoddy contractor whose defectively manufactured aircraft parts led directly to the deaths of a score of Army pilots and implicitly to the death of his own son.

Back then such a scandal was a shocking anomaly. Franklin D. Roosevelt's administration, the very model of big government that the current administration vilifies, never would have trusted private contractors to run the show. Somehow that unwieldy, bloated government took less time to win World War II than George W. Bush's privatized government is taking to blow this one.


more at:
http://select.nytimes.com/2006/06/25/opinion/25rich.html?hp=&pagewanted=print
or:
http://www.dailykos.com/storyonly/2006/6/24/22349/6274

[jimshoes]

1. I'm beginning to believe that there was

never any intention of winning the Iraq war or the Afghanistan war for that matter. The feeling I get these days is that the whole Iraq war apparatus was set up to do nothing more than vacuum as much money out of the US Treasury and into the pockets of bushco cronies as humanly possible in 8 "short" years. Actually longer if you believe the next election is going to be compromised somehow to keep one of the cabal's insiders at the top spot for the next 8. (That is an eventuality that I cannot rule out at this time even as tin-foily as it seems)

[BrklynLiberal]

3. Makes perfect sense to me.

[DaveT]

4. I agree -- and the concept is not far-fetched

Tammany Hall provides one historical model for the Cheney/Halliburton approach to government. Another good comparison is provided by the railroad barons of the Gilded Age who bought politicians for the payoff of government contracts.

Cheney had never held down a regular profit-system job in his life when Halliburton hired him in 1993 to be its "Chief Executive Officer." If one were to believe that Halliburton was interested in Dick's business acumen, I suppose that one would also believe that the undermanned invasions of Afghanistan and Iraq were intended to achieve some sort of "victory" for the USA.

Here is the bottom line -- the uniformed military leadership in the Pentagon said that it would take at least double the troops on hand to win in Iraq. Do you really believe that Cheney and Rummy fancy themselves as military geniuses who know more about making war than professionals? Now that the facts are in, and they have proven to be military idiots, if objective reality played any role in their decision making, they would have made some adjustments in their policy by now.

Instead, the construction of the permanent bases in Iraq goes on while the military defeats on the ground in both Afghanistan and Iraq are painfully obvious.

Which explanation makes more sense? That they are morons or that they are crooks?

[glitch]

15. well we already know they are crooks, but they may be morons too

shouldn't crooks be better at not being discovered? Maybe in a system so corrupt it doesn't really matter...

[DaveT]

16. I'll buy that they aren't as smart as they think they are

but nobody is as dumb as they would have to be to screw up Afghanistan and Iraq so badly if they cared the slightest at all about "success."

It remains to be seen whether they will get away with it, but they have so far.

[glitch]

17. I guess we'll find out just how beyond repair our system is...nt

[grasswire]

5. chaos=profit

And more chaos=more profit for Bushco. They had only to break the egg, and then untold billions would flow to the coffers of the cronies.

Goddam ghouls, enriching themselves while the blood of young people spills into the sand and mothers cry their eyes out.

[spag68]

6. Can you spell CONTRACTOR WAR???????

[acmavm]

10. The two crimes that you mention are not mutually exclusive.

They intended to rape the Treasury and the Middle East.

[malaise]

19. And they're doing a

Heck of a Job

[leesa]

12. I believe you are correct and I believe most of our Congress, R and D

are in on the scam.

Who said, "The last official act of a (failed)government is to loot the treasury."

[Bozita]

2. That column is too good to only be seen by subscribers

I'm a subscriber. Trust me.

[slor]

8. Does Bugmenot still work?

I want to read it.

[REACTIVATED IN CT]

13. Sure does !

[slor]

18. Which did you use?

I cannot seem to get through.

[NI4NI]

7. No tinfoil about it!

At the beginning of the reconstruction of Iraq, an Iraqi owned company bid $100,000 to build a bridge......A subsidary of Haliburton bid nearly $1,000,000 on same job.......Quess who got the job?

[fooj]

9. Almost like it's the family business, eh?

:grr:

[dogday]

11. You can't trust anything they say

Always ask the questions and don't let others keep you from doing so!!!!

[seafan]

14. Frank Rich: The Road From K Street to Yusufiya

This column should be required reading for everyone.


While BushCo distracts us with trumped-up stories of the *Miami 7*, flag-burning amendments, anti-gay marriage amendments, and *staying the course*, whatever that is, Frank Rich yanks back the sleazy curtain on the biggest nest of criminals our country has ever witnessed.

Just as John Dean said on many occasions over the past 5 years, this is much worse than Watergate.

[Bozita]

20. Good find! ... It's all there.