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Was The Iraq War Merely A Smokescreen For "The Largest Theft Of [Taxpayer] Funds In National History"?
Back in 2004, following the disastrous Iraq war, started on false Weapons of Mass Destruction pretenses, and which was nothing but a backdoor subsidy to various energy contractors close to the Bush administration, the US government decided to impose a mini Marshall Plan and literally flood the country with billions in crisp $100 bills. The LA Times reports: "Pentagon officials determined that one giant C-130 Hercules cargo plane could carry $2.4 billion in shrink-wrapped bricks of $100 bills. They sent an initial full planeload of cash, followed by 20 other flights to Iraq by May 2004 in a $12-billion haul that U.S. officials believe to be the biggest international cash airlift of all time." And here we are making fun of the Chairsatan and his puny helicopter. Yet where the story gets very disturbing is that it now seems that more than half of this "reconstruction" funding was blatantly stolen! "Despite years of audits and investigations, U.S. Defense officials still cannot say what happened to $6.6 billion in cash — enough to run the Los Angeles Unified School District or the Chicago Public Schools for a year, among many other things. For the first time, federal auditors are suggesting that some or all of the cash may have been stolen, not just mislaid in an accounting error. Stuart Bowen, special inspector general for Iraq reconstruction, an office created by Congress, said the missing $6.6 billion may be "the largest theft of funds in national history."" Is another huge political embarrassment in store for the current US administration (even if on this occasion it can legitimately be blamed on the predecessor?): it appears so: "The mystery is a growing embarrassment to the Pentagon, and an irritant to Washington's relations with Baghdad. Iraqi officials are threatening to go to court to reclaim the money, which came from Iraqi oil sales, seized Iraqi assets and surplus funds from the United Nations' oil-for-food program." Prepare for many more hearings involving Halliburton et al. As for where the money is - why, it has long been spent.
From LA Times:
Theft of such a staggering sum might seem unlikely, but U.S. officials aren't ruling it out. Some U.S. contractors were accused of siphoning off tens of millions in kickbacks and graft during the post-invasion period, especially in its chaotic early days. But Iraqi officials were viewed as prime offenders.
The U.S. cash airlift was a desperation measure, organized when the Bush administration was eager to restore government services and a shattered economy to give Iraqis confidence that the new order would be a drastic improvement on Saddam Hussein's Iraq.
The White House decided to use the money in the so-called Development Fund for Iraq, which was created by the Federal Reserve Bank of New York to hold money amassed during the years when Hussein's regime was under crippling economic and trade sanctions.
Where did the cash come from? Take a wild guess:
The cash was carried by tractor-trailer trucks from the fortress-like Federal Reserve currency repository in East Rutherford, N.J., to Andrews Air Force Base in Maryland, then flown to Baghdad. U.S. officials there stored the hoard in a basement vault at one of Hussein's former palaces, and at U.S. military bases, and eventually distributed the money to Iraqi ministries and contractors.
A truly "Swiss Watch" operation:
House Government Reform Committee investigators charged in 2005 that U.S. officials "used virtually no financial controls to account for these enormous cash withdrawals once they arrived in Iraq, and there is evidence of substantial waste, fraud and abuse in the actual spending and disbursement of the Iraqi funds."
Pentagon officials have contended for the last six years that they could account for the money if given enough time to track down the records. But repeated attempts to find the documentation, or better yet the cash, were fruitless.
Iraq is obviously pissed.
Iraqi officials argue that the U.S. government was supposed to safeguard the stash under a 2004 legal agreement it signed with Iraq. That makes Washington responsible, they say.
Abdul Basit Turki Saeed, Iraq's chief auditor and president of the Iraqi Board of Supreme Audit, has warned U.S. officials that his government will go to court if necessary to recoup the missing money.
"Clearly Iraq has an interest in looking after its assets and protecting them," said Samir Sumaidaie, Iraq's ambassador to the United States.
Iraq also happens to be the marginal producer of crude as was highlighted in yesteryday's JPM report.
Ah, the good old USofA: making international friends with every single ever more unbelievable theft from its own taxpayers.
h/t Manal
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Yes
$6.6 Billion is nothing. Let them keep it, for our stupidity, well our Govt worker stupidity.
The Highest Ranking Fools in the US GOVT are nothing more than a chud-recepticle gaggle of Losers and Thieves.
The representation of the citizens of the USA is so pathetic so embarrassing that we're doomed unless we kick out EVERY DEMOCRAT AND REPUBLICAN IN OFFICE. The vast majority are working against the best interests of the USA. They're pandering fools, pawns, puppets.
Wake up America,,,,, pull your heads out of your greedy asses and use the brain-stem you've been given!
Toss them ALL Out!!!!!!!
hey sparky - RE: "Toss them ALL Out!!!!!!!"
How about BOMB WALL STREET?
Just saw this graphic on ICYMI.
And, don't forget this announcement from the day before 9/11.
The tables turned on 2-11-2011 when bombing for change went through the wormhole of time and was replaced by people sitting in square without guns and gold.
Yes we can or yes we are in hell's kitchen?...
Recent american history, both military and financial, gets more and more bizarre. As if there is a weird sinister pattern that feeds a trend that knows no end and will bend backwards to defend its privileges pertaining to elitist rights ordained in some secret circle of skull and bone community that flies an unknown flag whose outward manifestation is ole glory but whose inner core spirit is more represented by the jolly roger...Are we still in Jefferson's land nourished by the blood of fallen sons of honest toil or in the lugubrious fantasy world of cauldron bubble, toil and trouble NWO-Unpatriot's riot act-GS zombie land?
I need a straight drink with no gut-twister...like a straight political line with no spin tongue twister.
Rhetorical question indeed.
The US has not changed one bit since its inception. And today US citizens are as much in living off honest toil as Jefferson and his peers were.
The US citizens nature is eternal. Once a thief...
((( ...there go all my illusions...like hot air balloons up in the air!
And certain parties criticise Australia as being founded by convicts?
;=))
Ha ha ha, your thieves got caught.
Not after they got there.
lol...reminded me of a guy i was working with in London back in '94, he had just hooked up with a hot aussie sheila(girl) and went to Australia House on the Strand to inquire about emigrating, they asked him if he had a criminal record, his reply...I didn't think you still needed one...
See TARP, ZIRP, AIG bailout, QE1, QE lite, QE2, QE reinvestment, etc...
Wealth transfer is ongoing.
Ergo
I think those pallets were superbills.
http://www.nytimes.com/1996/02/27/world/super-counterfeit-100-s-baffle-u...
Super-Counterfeit $100's Baffle U.S. By CHRISTOPHER DREW and STEPHEN ENGELBERGPublished: February 27, 1996
During the last six years, counterfeiters in the Middle East have turned out millions of dollars in exceptionally high-quality $100 bills, defying intense American efforts to find and halt their operation, senior American officials say.
Aided by the Central Intelligence Agency, teams of Secret Service agents have crisscrossed the Middle East, recruiting informants and collecting samples of the fake currency, said to be the most realistic counterfeit ever made.
Several Administration officials said the inquiry had turned up hints of sponsorship by foreign governments, including suspicions that Iran might be printing the bills and Syria sanctioning their distribution. There also are signs that some of the bills have been used by people with ties to terrorist organizations, the officials said.
But senior officials acknowledged in interviews that it remained unclear precisely where the currency, known as the Superdollar or Supernote, was being produced, or by whom.
http://www.dvorak.org/blog/2005/01/21/gao-counterfeit-us-currency-abroad...
Weird stories on this black-ops British website supposedly in the know. Great fun for the paranoid nutballs. I always assume there is some truth here and there in these sorts of rants. Deciding what the truths are is the challenge. You need a map.
Here’s an odd post claiming the bills come from West Africa, which would explain why they have not been eradicated: http://kevincameron.tripod.com/2003/071903.html (cut and paste in seperate window as Tripod sites are disabling the “return” arrow on some browsers for some reason)
Meanwhile this fellow sees the bill matter-of-factly coming from Lebanon. You start to get different leads when you change the investigation word from Superbill to Supernote.
It gets more dodgy when we read this assertion that North Korea is the supplier of the “Superdollar.” This would explain our sudden interest there too.
Can it get weirder? Yes, this website asserts that the bills cam from Ireland and were going to be funneled through China in some clandestine manner. That “accidental” bombing of the Chinese Embassy in Belgrade was a warning not to do it.
The one interesting thread in all this is that anyone who seems to be messing with the stability of the US greenback seems to suffer from the attempt. If this what all this military action is really all about then you gain a whole new perspective. Of course keeping the public in the dark isn’t helping anything is it?
are you the only person in the world that does not know Iran has our printing press and can duplicate our bills and has been doing so since the fucking 1970's when we sent the press to them for free! as a gift???
How about when the US was declared a bankrupt corporation in 1933 in the Emergency Banking Act? Its all been a total sham for over 100 years.
My suspicion has been that the $100 bills sent to Iraq were excess bills that were printed with a slight "defect" and were in storage for destruction at a later date. Instead of destroying them they had the idea to use them in Iraq. Unfortunately the $6.6 billion missing may have ended up in some of our underpaid GI's pockets and brought home. I have seen photos of U.S. soldiers tossing shrink-wrapped bundles around like footballs. If security was that loose what's to stop them ? I'm sure most of it ended up in the likes of Halliburton's purses too.
I seem to remember soldiers "stumbling" upon warehouses with huge amounts of cash in them. It really stuck in my head because it seemed so outlandish.
http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2005/04/25/60II/main690763.shtml
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/middle_east/2967029.stm
i once read a report that substantial amounts of gold were stored in the cellars of the world trade center. anybody knows the remains of it?
mmmm, yes, apparently "vaporised". . . like the pentagon's record of rumsfeld's lost trillions, *nods*
No, again.
The gold belonged to the Bank of Nova Scotia and was housed in vaults beneath WTC Four. A couple of days later, the gold was moved out and back to Canada.
you mean the molten gold? There were very high temperatures on the ground for weeks.
Any conformation on that?
That is always the reason for wars - has been for hundreds of years.
Blood and treasure. Nothing is new under the sun.
+1 "Blood and treasure".
+ 2 for "Nothing is new under the sun."
Now the valley cried with anger; mount your horses, draw your sword,
and they killed the mountain people, so they won their just reward.
Now they stood beside the treasure on the mountain, dark and red,
turned the stone and looked beneath it. "Peace on earth" was all it said.
Go ahead and hate your neighbor, go ahead and cheat a friend.
Do it in the name of heaven, justify it in the end.
There won't be any trumpets blowin' come the judgment day
on the bloody morning after one tin soldier rides away.
REPUBLICANS
REPUBLICANS
REPUBLICANS
Were in charge of 100% of US GOV.
BUSH/CHENY.
CONGRESS.
SENATE.
The same guys who removed many financial regulations / repealed Glass-Steagal that allowed sub prime mortgages to be rated AAA.
Wrong. It was the Clinton Administration that pushed that legislation through with plenty of Democrats voting for it.
And the difference between Republicans and Democrats is....... exactly what?
+ All the "missing" money.
Absolutely nothing. No difference at all. That is why I corrected his error and yet I get junked for pointing that fact out.
If you think they are any different from the Democrats, you're an idiot.
I have said for a long time now that most presidential administrations should leave office at the end of a rope. Fed board members and chairpersons included.
I think they all agree with you...only in their case, the rope is attached not to their necks but to the government safe deposit...which leaves with them.
Are you saying that Obama is NOT!?! any different than Bush? Say it aint so Joe! say it aint so?!
I would typing that I am LOLing but I really am laughing with a tear coming out of my eye!
God Love Ya! "T" hang in there man! You are doing Great!
No... Ken, they weren't. They didn't have control of both houses and the financial industry lobbiests were the one's paying off politicians to loosen the restrictions on lending and bundling of financial instruments that led to this whole economic fiasco. C'mon... only Liberals believe everyone has a RIGHT to own a home, etc. - these new proposals from the financial industry just sounded peachy to them so they voted it through. Sure, Bushey and Chaney did nothing to stop them... so the real problem is, politicians only worry about getting re-elected, never about actually doing the right thing - the core of the problem is embedded within human greed.
They are not "leaders" - they are elected representatives and they have not been doing a very good job. I say we fire all of them.
Drastic political campaign finance reform is actually the key to solving most of our Country's problems. It's got to start with the core of the motivations for our politicians. The amount of money paid to politicians to their "election funds" is unreal - it's flat out bribery. Combine this will all the deals via lobbiests, etc. has made the political career one of the easiest paths to becoming a multi-millionaire. This has to be eliminated first before anything will ever be done "right" by the U.S. taxpayer.
No there havent been any demicans or republicrats in charge of anything for decades, just ask JFK who really controls it.
Largest theft of *currency,* sure, but not "funds." $6.6 billion compared to TARP? I think it's safe to say extortion is theft.
and then there's the missing $2 trillion rumsfeld announced on 9-10-01: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xU4GdHLUHwU
Hes said that they were unable to properly track the money; not that it was missing.
Years of bureaucracy and differing computer systems made it next to impossible to tell where the money was. That's all.
It would help our cause if this misinformation were allowed to die a proper death.
of course, these are not the droids you are looking for, just simple confusion in record keeping. the lost trillions is just an tin foil hat nonsensical story.
The conspiracy theorists- myself included firmly in that camp- have to pick their battles carefully.
JFK, 9/11 was an inside job and on and on about the Bush's malfeasance...sure. But to espouse an easily disprovable claim and calling it in the same realm as the other "real" conspiracies does no one a service except the CIA trolls who would like nothing more than to have the idea that the Pentagon somehow lost $2.3T cast in the same light that Eisenhower was visited by aliens.
We have to be more careful than that. Unless your job is to see this myth perpetuated, John...
:?
Well money never gets lost. It gets devaluated, it gets white washed, it gets spent, it gets stashed in secret places, it gets converted to assets like arms n bullets. Take your pick...getting lost is only for little girls named Susan. Until they grow up as Madonna!
Truly found after being temporarily lost!
Orly : how about a recipe for tarte aux myrtilles...Blue berry tart for "blueberry hill" blues.
"I found my thrill..."
Any marinating recipes for chicken to be fired over the grill, Turkish-style?
Orly can I come over and eat.. I hate to ivite myself, its brash but given your inability to not describe your cooking skills.. well you will just have to get ove my brashness!
Good News Bad News..
Good News I will bring whatever food you will cook.
Bad News.. I have a feeling that I am not the only looking to bribe Tyler for you IP address so that we can track you down! Sorry!!
yes if you like tandoori or tikka...that is very hot here these days. If you have an Indian community in neighborhood just buy tandoor powder sauce add yoghurt and lemon to taste and let it marinate overnight...hot grill, b-bq or oven and presto...prost!
I like them baked as empanadas.
One pint of blueberries, juice from one lemon with half the zest, one-half cup of water, one-quarter cup white sugar, one-eighth cup of brown sugar. (You can use this simple recipe for any fruit, by the way. It was stolen from the Barefoot Contessa, Ina Garten...)
Melt the sugars and lemon in the water until glistening, then pour the sugar mix over the blueberries. Refrigerate for one hour, then drain the blueberries in a strainer over a small bowl for about twenty minutes, to make sure the blueberries are not too wet. Reserve the syrup to pour over the baked empanadas.
Wrap the blueberries in the empanada skins- do not overstuff them!- and bake at 425 degrees F for about twenty minutes.
:D
you are cordon bleu...I am chief supervisor ...I just watch my other half do it...it's called "exorbitant privilege"...except of course for grills! and steak au poivre!
My favorite spuds dish with grills : gratin dauphinois!
on Tue, 06/14/2011 - 11:44
#1367809
"He said that they were unable to properly track the money; not that it was missing.
Years of bureaucracy and differing computer systems made it next to impossible to tell where the money was. That's all.
It would help our cause if this misinformation were allowed to die a proper death."
isn't there something a bit odd about continuing to provide massive funding to a federal agency with such a rat's nest of computer systems that can't provide simple accounting information.
perhaps their budget allocation should be put on hold until they can turn out accurate info......
That's like stopping the Wells Fargo coach for repairs at Dodge city when the Cole Younger gang hits town... All they'll leave is the wood work. The show must move on!
So, I don't remember ANYONE coming out later and saying that they'd found it, or any part of ... TWO TRILLION DOLLARS -- Do you? 'Accounting errors'? 'Incompatible computer systems'? PUHLEEZE!!
And the very next day '9/11' happens, and everyone (almost) promptly forgets about it? Not even the U.S. Dept. of Defence could be THAT incompetent!
I'm surprised you fell for that. Not able to track is for petty cash, not trillions. That is like saying we can't find Alaska.
Bismark said [something like]: "Prussia is not rich enough to fight a war without getting something [material] out of it." The leaders of the US are such fools - especially any one of them named Bush - that they think they can throw away money and screw taxpayers. Going down.
'Bush' has been president for the last 3 years? Wow.
4 junks with no reply why thats such a bad comment, fuking cowardly punks.
for all practical (not stylistic) purposes g.w. bush is still president. obama is a sham, a potemkin village liberal president.
OH I see, Bush was a 'real president' but Obama is just an extension puppet...when will clowns realize that there has been no real US president for over 100 years?
disagree, Kennedy was a real president. He even started the treasury printing treasury notes again. I have two $5 bills that say US Treasury Note across the top, dated 1963. You can find them at most coin stores.
obama following bush puts to shame the timid ones that feared (and rightly so) the coming civil war in the 1850's, often cited as the worst run of presidents.
george w. bush is arguably the worst and most influential president since fdr.
Every president will be worse than the one before them, because our debt is rising exponentially requiring exponentially worse decisionmaking to keep the ponzi rolling.
Bush had no influence, he followed orders from his banker controllers as he was told. There are no presidents, only world bank puppet masters, just ask JFK.
bingo.
Yes.
I could go on and fucking on and curse / cuss and fuss.. but why.. the answer is Yes.. well maybe Bush on steriods is more accurate? but Yes is close enough for Canada.
'Bush' HAS been president for the last 3 years!!!
Nope, there have been no presidents since at least the Emergency Banking Act, which declared the US a bankrupt corporation. That was in 1933. I dont know what it will take to wake people up to reality, apparently a lot.
You and bezzle over at TF would get along just swell.
What smokescreen? We all know about the greatest transfer of wealth in history for ages now. So who is this supposedly fooling, the avg Joe 6 pack unemployed doofus? Hey as long as they can ignore anyone with half a brain, I guess they can do whatever they feel like.
please. I'm trying to maintain the suspension of disbelief carryover from that so-called debate.
Standard Operating Procedure
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LJmS_92Oo9I
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Aupqwx6vaCs
hole in your pocket - money falls out
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BJoft7gMvTs
Also,
How the US sent $12bn in cash to Iraq. And watched it vanish - Guardian - February 2007
Is this $6.6 billion really new news?
neh.. but it's something..
Yep, hit 'em with daisy cutters and palettes of cash. Makes sense. No one should question the Federal Government's use of funds. Nope. Just sit still and let every last entity of government, supported by the counterfeiter in chief, and go download a streaming movie as consolation for your lost job.
Makes perfect sense. I cannot imagine how this would make anyone angry. No reason to be upset about the coming tax increases to maintain these people currently in charge of the decline of America.
Baaaaaaaaa.
Now...on with the shopping stories, and how Chinese tourists are the key to job growth in America. Uh huh.
Must....drive.....to mall....must buy.....retail Gap T-shirts.....must buy.....$6 hot dog....must buy...
Baaaaaaaaaaa.
I thought Rumsfeld admitted that 1 trillion was missing just before 9/11?
$2.3 Trillion. But who's counting?
Obviously not the regulators and congressional oversight committees.
Watch out for the next puppet govt official who says there are trillions missing, last time we got 9-11 the next day.
$4 ice cream cones, $5 coffees, etc, etc.
How else were we supposed to win the hearts and minds?
Go ahead. If you win the Fed will just credit your account with the digits 6.6 followed by a bunch of zeros. It's a process similar to making Lay's potato chips but without the salt.
I'd disagree with that statement. Potato chips are a tangible item. A FED creation is mere illusion, sleight of hand. I'll take the 6.6 billion in tater chips please.
Bet you can't eat just one. :>)
and it's true it only costs five bucks to pull one out of the bag?
They've come a long way. Stealing billions looks like a purse snatching nowadays, how many trillions have the international banks stolen since 08?
Since we paid that much for Iraq, we should own it... right?
Is it a huge conspiracy or are they REALLY that incompetent? Its funny how people just can't accept the fact that loose government guns and policies yield complete and total incompetence, even in unjustified government intervention.
The people who write and argue this stuff seem to not have spent a day in the shoes of government.
What do you think? Standard Operating Procedure
and if someone opens their mouth, there's some kiddie porn on their office (Pentagon) PC
http://www.networkworld.com/news/2005/011705dodcybercrime.html
Whats your point?
I answered your question. It's not a bug, it's a feature.
you're welcome :-D
Please note this was NOT taxpayer money but Iraqui oil revenues.
Really? How much oil has been pumped in Iraq since the US invasion? Particularly by US companies. The Iraqi government incompetence is about as bad as it gets. You think Iraq really has oil flowing free? They can't even come up with any sort of coherent policy for oil.
If Bush went to war for oil, he failed on so many massive levels.
If Bush went to war for oil, he failed on so many massive levels.
No shit, thats why I'm paying $4 a gallon.
At least you don't live in a country that pays by the liter. $4? I realize its expensive for you....but make no mistake. Its only $4 BECAUSE we've gone to war.
ah yes, puts me in mind of that ole bumper sticker:
How Many Soldiers Per Gallon Does YOUR Truck / SUV Get?
They were funds frozen while the sanctions were in place, before the U.S invasion. Technically they belonged to Iraq. I'm sure the U.S. taxpayer will be forced to repay these funds.
He went to war for oil profits.
Except there haven't been any.
Um, hello? Exxon had its most successful years in history during the aughts.
Are you trying to imply that Exxon received their oil from Iraq during the aughts?
I said: Dubya invaded Iraq for oil profits.
Oil profits skyrocketed after he did so.
Mission accomplished.
What he said.
Is this in addition to the $2 trillion Rumsfelt lost on Spetember 10th?
http://911research.wtc7.net/sept11/trillions.html
Oops dang,...now where did I leave that $2 trillion dollars? Hmmm.
Blown up with WTC Building 7, Sir!
That was just a public warning to the folks who uncovered the story. The Pentagon's own ONI. You'll never guess where they were relocated to just a few weeks prior....
Largest theft. More like rounding error.
In this case, the nation being referenced in the claim is Iraq, not the US.
it must be hidden in Blackwater or Halliburton's account ...
More like in SHTF ranchs and fine fincas is Paraguay.
yabyum and everyone,
Was there ever more news out of Paraguay (after the reports in 2009 or so) about the Bush and Moonie ranches being bought in Paraguay?
I've looked and found NADA since.
the land purchase is less about the "cowboy" dubya having a "ranch" than having access to the pristine Guarani Aquifer, no doubt emulating that other "cowboy" T. Boone Pickens:
sociopaths.
Yes, they do charge for air, or at least really want to. The carbon credit tax scheme would have been a tax on air. And it is taxed in England.
I used to see tiny news articles about these curious incidents back when the USSR was imploding. Not on this scale however. Still there would be a one or two paragraph story in the Washington Post or NYTs about $10-50 million in fresh US $100 bills being stolen from an airport in London, Moscow etc.
Actually, adjusted for inflation, it was the second or third largest theft in history. The top two are the Gold Confiscation Act of 1933 and the creation of the Federal Reserve in 1913.
The U.S. military, like all government entities, is completely corrupt. Only pseudo-patriots support it's continued existence in it's present form.
Pseudo-patriots'? I just call em fukin morons.
Whom exactly? Those who "support the governments current existence" or those who are in the military (lets go ahead and group them all together like blacks, whites, gays, liberals or conservatives)?
How about liberals and conservatives?
Goose-stepping assbags.
The only welfare program the neo-cons love.
Not true. Look at public education.
You're so excited to be contrary you're forgetting to think. The neo-cons don't love public education. Get real.
++
bd and Chapelle: keeping it real.
Buying all of Paraguay costs money?
Some higher level officials didn't have an "adequate" retirement plan prior to 2004?
Look under sofas in that palace?
Please... $6B? Hardly ONE DAY'S POMO, bitchez.
This is not new news. Except to those who have their head up their ass and believe everything they heard on Fox.
It is just a historical Fact of reality. CNBC had Michelle showing the Iragi Stock market with a buzzer on a wall as being the start of their markets. Where CNBC blew it was when they showed a trader with a WAD of U.S 100 and 50 dollar bills in crisp condition. Is that what they used for currency to trade on U.S. private contractors. You Bet.
Great Article for those who still have their head in the sand on this. Otherwise, it is old news.
Yeah... Funny that the title is phrased as a question, the obvious answer to which has been a resounding "YES" for many years.
$50 billion? That's rounding error around these parts. Ask the ONI what happens to you when you start investingating the theft of trillions of dollars.
Oh leave me alone
I actually feel bad for these inspector generals. What a shitty job: you spend all your time finding problems and you have no power to fix anything.
How do we know it's all been spent?
Who was watching it, who were the top people involved? A lot is probably sitting in UBS accounts right now. UBS has only divulged 5k of the 50k high-value evader accounts --- and Obama's golf buddy at Martha's Vineyard was none other than the UBS CEO.
The first 5k were sacrificed as examples --- other 45k accounts are now owned by the banks and politicians and no doubt blackmailed into service! Perhaps there are now American Generals on the list.
The whole war is at about $3 Trillion.... what is $9 billion, thanks for that Bush
The palettes of cash will prove tiny to compared to the no-bid largesse of Cheney's posse and the most lucrative contractor's war(s) since Rome hired Goths.
Hun, Visi and Ostro...three types of barbarians to give hair cuts...they must all work for the same bank these days!
The whole war is at about $3 Trillion.... what is $9 billion? Thanks for that Bush
A conspiracy on top of a fuck-up within a conspiracy.
Awesome.
How much of it came back to the market? MIC QE?
How do we know it's all been spent?
Who was watching it, who were the top people involved? A lot is probably sitting in UBS accounts right now. UBS has only divulged 5k of the 50k high-value evader accounts --- and Obama's golf buddy at Martha's Vineyard was none other than the UBS CEO.
The first 5k were sacrificed as examples --- the other 45k accounts are now owned by the banks and politicians and no doubt blackmailed into service! Perhaps there are now American Generals on the list.
I actually feel bad for these inspector generals. What a shitty job: you spend all your time finding problems and you have no power to fix anything.
Since 2004, look at how often this theft has come up (a few times) and look at how much outrage it has received (hardly a blip), and look at who doesn't care (not even those who were against the war), and look at how few care.
I take this as just one more sign that fiat money makes money too easy to come by especially to people in government who live by handing it out.
We wouldn't have the same attitude about $6 billion in gold bullion. (well, maybe we do. Look at how many people yawn at Ron Paul's demand that we have a fully compliant audit of the gold in Ft. Knox and look at how little stir was caused by the belated news (1934-2011) that the Federal Reserve Corporation turned all its gold in to the UST in exchange for notational "gold certificates", that it still carries on its books just as a record of the exchange)
$6.6 billion? the largest theft? No. The largest theft is ongoing.....to the tune of 1.5 trillion a year. Anybody remember 'taxation without representation'? Well, what representatives of ours are determining where the money, that the fed is currently printing, is going? That is money that we (and our children, etc.) will have to pay back in the form of taxes and other who knows what.
No you won't.
It can't be repaid.
There will be a default.
100 % guaranteed.
Or default by hyperinflation, the "easy way" for short-term politicians.
whichever way it ends up.....We pay.
Only if you consider misery, hunger, collapsing standard of living, and a horrible life for your children, paying.
No. That picks one event, albeit ongoing in other venues, and tries to blame it for a ripoff.
What's really the case is that at every moment of every day of our entire lives, awake and asleep our government is in a constant state of ripping us off, one way or another, whether it's butter, or guns.
As the air we breathe is all around us----and only on rare occasion do you find yourself without air and not for very long----so it is with our government that on occasion, for a millisecond here and there, it does not rip us off.
You have to restate the question.
Maybe helicopter Ben had it sprinkled it all over the Iraqi people from black hawk and apache helicopters.
Fraud, Incomptence, Corruption......oh my.
But see....there were accounting standards. These guys are clearly dividing up the loot......er......counting the money before safe storage procedures are followed.
One for you, one for me.
One for you, two for me.
One half for you, five for me.
Isn't that how it's done at the big accounting firms?
Only difference is that the big accounting firms are NOT liable for their inability to count or do math.
Audited statements are sooooo vaulable.
Wow I didn't know they had so much toilet paper in Iraq.