BULLY BOY
PRESS & CEDRIC'S BIG MIX -- THE KOOL-AID
TABLE
CELEBRITY IN CHIEF BARRY O CAN'T HOLD A PRESS CONFERENCE BUT HE LOVES TO WASTE EVERYONE'S TIME GOING ON BASIC CABLE DUDS LIKE "THE DAILY SHOW" WHERE HE AND VILLAGE IDIOT JON STEWART CAN DISH ON HOW JOE BIDEN WOULD LOOK IN A SWIMSUIT.
KEEP IT IN YOUR PANTS, GIRLY BARRY AND JON, JOE'S MARRIED.
IT ALLOWS BARRY O TO AVOID THE LIBYA ISSUE AND ISN'T THAT THE POINT?
SADLY FOR BARRY O, PEOPLE WON'T STOP TALKING ABOUT LIBYA -- NO MATTER HOW MANY BASIC CABLES SHOWS HE GOES ON, NO MATTER HOW STUPID HE ACTS, NO MATTER HOW MUCH HE CLOWNS.
Let’s review: After a brief statement deploring the loss of life on Sept. 12, Obama and his flunkies (Press Secretary Jay Carney, UN Ambassador Susan Rice) put on a prolonged full-court press to convince the American people that an obscure You Tube video, “Innocence of Muslims” — which had been out for months — was the cause of a wave of violence that swept the Islamic world on the 11th anniversary of 9/11, including the Benghazi attack.
Obama himself even went on the David Letterman show to retell the same falsehood, then doubled down with a speech at the United Nations in which he intoned: “The future must not belong to those who slander the prophet of Islam.”
But the video had nothing to do with the Benghazi attack, and everybody knew it, including the intelligence community and Hillary Clinton’s State Department.
REACHED FOR COMMENT BY THESE REPORTERS, BARRY O ASKED, "WOULD YOU LIKE TO SEE ME TAKE OFF MY SHIRT?"
FROM THE TCI WIRE:
So I'm at a daily paper visiting a friend who's an editor when a
name reporter decides he's going to make small talk while the editor's
on the phone and hijacks the computer to show me "something you won't
believe. It's so sad." Wrongly, I assumed I was about to see the
children of Falluja. Wrong. I saw a dog from Australia that people
around the world are donating to because it lost its snout saving a
child. And the dog's coming to -- or now in -- the United States with a
friend and will have surgery at one of the UCLAs (Davis?) and, turns
out, the dog's also got tumors and a sexually transmitted disease and --
On and on, it went. Now I love dogs. And if someone wants to send a
terminal dog across the globe for reconstructive surgery of a snout,
that's their decision. But I do think it's very sad that people want to
pull up a picture of this dog and oh-and-ah over it and these same
people will not even look at the children of Falluja.
Monday, we noted a new study by the Bulletin of Environmental Contamination and Toxicology.
The study documented the miscarriages and the birth defects and the
huge increase in both. The linked study even has photos of the
children. But that didn't become an internet sensation. What does that
say about us that we can feel for an injured dog but ignore suffering
children? If you're a citizen of the United States, especially what
does that say about us? These birth defects are a result of weapons the
US used.
Fred Mazelis (WSWS) noted the study yesterday and explained:
A study published in the Bulletin of Environmental Contamination and Toxicology
focuses on an extraordinary epidemic of congenital birth defects in
Iraqi cities over the past decade, particularly in Fallujah and in the
southern city of Basra, assaulted by British troops in 2003.
This
study has been released only one month before a broader survey is due
to be released by the World Health Organization (WHO). The WHO report
has looked at nine areas in Iraq and is also expected to show increases
in birth defects.
As summarized in the British newspaper The Independent,
the first study, entitled "Metal Contamination and the Epidemic of
Congenital Birth Defects in Iraqi Cities" and published online on
September 16, pinpoints statistics for Fallujah and Basra that add up to
a public health crisis that is as serious as any other around the
world.
More than 50 percent of all births
surveyed in Fallujah were born with a birth defect between 2007 and
2010, the newspaper explains. In the 1990s, Falllujah had a birth defect
rate of 2 percent. This rose to about 10 percent in the early years of
the twenty-first century, and then exploded in the years following the
siege of Fallujah in 2004.
The data on
miscarriages was also significant. Before the 2004 attacks on Fallujah,
both in April and in November-December of that year, about 10 percent of
pregnancies ended in miscarriage. This rose to a rate of 45 percent in
the two years after the bombings. It fell as the most drastic attacks
subsided, but the rate still remained high, at one in six pregnancies.
If
today's conversation had taken place anywhere but a newsroom and
involved people other than journalists, I wouldn't be writing about it.
But in the supposed information industry, not only did the reporter not
know about the above, when I pulled up the study to show the photos,
his response was "Eww, gross." No, not "gross," tragic. Those poor
children who never hurt anyone and who suffer now because of an illegal
war. I think, my opinion -- I could be wrong, I often am -- that we've
soaked up enough entertainment, gossip and cute animals online. I think
it's really past time we learned to actually care -- especially when
the harmed are harmed because the actions of our government.
Early this morning, Laura Rozen (The Back Channel) reported,
"Oil giant Exxon Mobil is expected to soon announce that it is pulling
out of non-Kurdish Iraq, an energy expert source told Al-Monitor
Wednesday on condition of anonymity. The decision would not apply to
Exxon's contracts in Kurdish Iraq, which has been a source of on-going
tension with Baghdad authorities for the company, the source said." Ahmed Rasheed and Patricky Markey (Reuters) state
the corporation didn't inform "Iraq of its interest in quitting the
country's West Qurna oilfield project" according to unnamed sources.
Sometimes unnamed sources lie. This may be one of those times. This
is very embarrassing for Nouri and his government and feigning surprise
may be their effort to play it off. 'How could we have stopped it? We
didn't even know it was coming!' That would explain why the 'big
surprise' that isn't is being played like it is. Derek Brower (Petroleum Economist) has been covering this story
for over 48 hours (including a source that stated ExxonMobil had
informed the Iraqi government) and he notes that ExxonMobil will be
focusing all their "efforts on upstream projects in Kurdistan instead."
In addition to the claim in Rasheed and Markey's piece about Iraq
having had no meeting on this, Brower notes that a meeting took place
today at the Ministry of Oil. It would appear Nouri's spinning like
crazy in an effort to save his faltering image. (Nouri can certainly
spend billions -- as he proved last week on his mad shopping spree for
weapons, he just doesn't seem able to maintain releations with those who
help Iraq generate large revenues.)
This Reuters story notes
that unnamed US officials stated Iraq was informed and it adds the
Iraq's Deputy Prime Minister for Energy, Hussain al-Shahristani, "told
Reuters in an e-mail that Baghdad was sticking to its line that all
contract signed with the Kurdistan Regional Government (KRG) without the
approval of Baghdad were illegal." ExxonMobil has long had problems
with their deal with Baghdad. In March, Emily Knapp (Wall St Cheat Sheet) explained,
"Foreign oil companies involved in Iraq's oil expansion generally
prefer to be compensated for capital expenditure and service fees in oil
because cash payments are more complicated to arrange. Now the parties
have reached an agreement in which they will be paid in crude. Exxon
and Shell spent $910 million on West Qurna-1 last year, and were repaid
$470 million in cash." Hassan Hafidh (Wall St. Journal) adds
today, "Exxon's 2010 deal with the Iraqi central government to improve
production in the West Qurna-1 field was never expected to be lucrative
under the best circumstances, the person said. The government had
agreed to pay Exxon Mobil and its partners $1.90 for each additional
barrel of oil they pumped after refurbishing the already producing
field. The fees would barely be enough to cover the companies' costs."
And
there is the issue of the nature of the contracts. The KRG is offering
production sharing ones while Baghdad sticks with the less
return-friendly technical service contracts. Dropping back to the November 11, 2011 snapshot:
In Iraq, things are heating up over an oil deal. Hassan Hafidh and James Herron (Wall St. Journal) report,
"ExxonMobil Corp. could lose its current contract to develop the West
Qurna oil field in Iraq if it proceeds with an agreement to explore for
oil in the Kurdistan region of the country, an Iraqi official said. The
spat highlights the political challenges for foreign companies operating
in Iraq" as Nouri's Baghdad-based 'national' government attempts to
rewrite the oil law over the objection of the Kurdistan Regional
Government. Tom Bergin and Ahmed Rasheed (Reuters) offer,
"Exxon declined to comment, and experts speculated the move could
indicate Baghdad and the Kurdish leaders are nearing agreement on new
rules for oil companies seeking to tap into Iraq's vast oil reserves." UPI declares,
"The breakaway move into Kurdistan, the first by any of the oil majors
operating in Iraq under 20-year production contract signed in 2009,
could cost Exxon Mobil its stake in the giant West Qurna Phase One
mega-oil field in southern Iraq." Salam Faraj (AFP) speaks
with Abdelmahdi al-Amidi (in Iraq's Ministry of Oil) declares that the
Exxon contract means that Exxon would lose a contract it had
previously signed with Baghdad for the West Qurna-1 field. Faraj
sketches out the deal with the KRG beginning last month with Exxon being
notified that they had "48 hours to make a decision on investing in an
oil field in the region." Exxon was interested but sought an okay from
the Baghdad government only to be denied.
November
11th, things heated up and they never cooled down. For months, Nouri's
people sent angry letters to ExxonMobil. The multi-national
corporation chose not to respond leaving Nouri looking like an angry,
spurned lover. Or a stalker. Nouri's people continued to send those
letters with no response. And we pointed out how ridiculous Nouri was
looking and making Iraq look throughout that period. There were threats
of lawsuits, there was barring ExxonMobil from auctions, it was
ridiculous. First of all, it didn't build confidence among the
international business sector that Iraq had its act together. Second of
all, those remaining acutions? In the February 22nd snapshot
we noted what was being offered by Baghdad in the March acution was "a
dingo dog with fleas." Were we wrong? The auction was a bust. They
had no takers. Instead of grasping that Nouri had created a serious
image problem for Iraq, they decided they just needed to have the same
auction all over again. So they scheduled it for two days at the end of
May. From the May 31st snapshot:
Iraq's two day energy auction ended today. Yesterday brought one successful bid. W.G. Dunlop and Salam Faraj (AFP) explain,
"Iraq on Thursday closed a landmark auction of energy exploration
blocks with just three contracts awarded out of a potential 12,
dampening hopes the sale would cement its role as a key global
supplier." The offerings weren't seen as desirable and the deals offered
even less so. But big business began sending signals this auction would
not go well over two months ago. (And we've noted that at least three
times in previous months.) That's due to the instability in Iraq caused
by Nouri -- and it is seen as caused by Nouri in the oil sector because
he is the prime minister, he did pick a fight with Deputy Prime
Minister Saleh al-Mutlaq, he did order Vice President Tareq al-Hashemi
arrested. All the instability in recent months have not helped. His
attacks on ExxonMobil and their deal with the KRG has not helped. Nouri
al-Maliki is bad for business. If Iraq had the arrangement they did
under Saddam Hussein, Nouri could get away with that. But he's going to
have to grasp real soon that state oil isn't what it was under Hussein.
The economic model (imposed by the US) is mixed. And if Iraqis hadn't
fought back, it would be strictly privatized. Nouri's not yet learned
that his actions impact Iraq's business. (And, in fairness to Nouri,
this is a new thing for Iraq. Saddam Hussein could do anything and it
wasn't an issue unless the super powers decided it was. But, again, it's
a mixed model now. Nouri might need to bring in some economic advisors
from out of the country.) W.G. Dunlop and Salam Faraj (AFP) report Iraq's response to the poor showing at the auction is to declare that they will hold another one.
Well
one is greater than zero. But not worth the cost of putting together
one auction, let alone two. Following the twin embarrassments of March
and May, Nouri had a new 'brilliant idea:'
get the White House to tell Exxon "no." So he made noises and made public letters to the White House. Then, on July 19th,
Nouri al-Maliki insisted that the White House had conveyed, in a
letter, their support for his attempts to cancel the October contract
the Kurdistan Regional Government signed with ExxonMobil. No such thing
happened. But damned if some in the press reported differently. The
US does not have state-control over oil companies -- certainly not over
multi-national ones like ExxonMobil -- "multi-national" meaning more
than one nation. Like so many of Nouri's brilliant plans, that one fell
apart. Derek Brower explains,
"Pressure has been building on the central government to punish
ExxonMobil for its investment in Kurdistan, he said. The government
knows it could not win a court case if it stripped the US firm of its
contract, he said, but could make operations intolerably difficult." It
couldn't win a court case. What the KRG and ExxonMobil did, for all of
Nouri's pouting and foot stomping, ws legal. Thomas W. Donovan (The National) explains:
The
most urgent need is for a comprehensive federal law to regulate the
hydrocarbons industry. At present, petroleum operations are governed by a
collection of laws from previous regimes and by the 2005 constitution.
This legal hodgepodge gives no guidance on the interplay between the
federal government and the Kurdistan Regional Government (KRG), nor does
it set out any rules for oil-revenue sharing between the central
administration and the regional governorates.
A
draft law to govern oil and gas production was tentatively agreed upon
as far back as 2007. However, disputes between Baghdad and the KRG
blocked enactment of a law, and today there are three draft versions,
none of them likely to win approval anytime soon.
2007
is a key date. Not just because Nouri was prime minister (but he was --
the US government installed him in April 2006). In the lead up to the
US 2006 mid-terms, Nancy Pelosi and other members of Congress lied to
the American people, swearing, "Give us back one House of Congress and
we'll end the Iraq War." The American people trusted that they were
being told the truth and did something pretty amazing -- turned both
house of Congress over to the Democratic Party. That was so surprising
that even Pelosi and company hadn't been pushing it as a possibility.
Afraid the Democrats might be telling the truth and might pull the
funding on the illegal war, Bully Boy Bush quickly devised a series of
benchmarks in 2007. He signed off on them, Nouri al-Maliki signed off
on them. This was the tool by which, the White House insisted, progress
could be measured in Iraq.
Because the US
press is as stupid as the US Congress (well, the Congress didn't want to
end the Iraq War, let's be honest, so they weren't stupid so much as
they were pretending to be), no progess was always somehow turned into
success. In April of 2007, Mike Peska (NPR's Day By Day -- link is text and audio) decided
to grade the progress on the benchmarks. He should have just stuck to
putting happy face stickers on each one. Needing people to help him
deceive, he enlisted the master of deception Philip Zelikow (adviser to
Condi Rice, betrayer of 9-11 Jersey Widows and others who thought they'd
get a real investigation into the events of 9-11) and the Brookings
Institution's Carlos Pascual. Here's how the 'brain trust' graded the
'progress' on the oil law:
Pres. BUSH: Iraq will pass legislation to share oil revenues among all Iraqis.
PESCA:
Both Pascual and Zelikow said this is happening as we speak. Details
are still to be worked out, but sharing oil revenue is something the
Iraqis can point to as an area of real progress, much more so than the
third plank that the president touch on.
They
needed to pass legislation. And Pesca 'reported' that his hand-picked
brain trust said "this is happening as we speak." Seriously?
It
was a lie then, it's a lie over five years later. Happening as we
speak? It never happened. The press sold the Iraq War. Not just the
start of it but all of it. There has never been accountability for any
of these actions. No one's ever done their update of, "Remember when we
said . . . Well, turns out . . ." And let's remember that Mike Pesca was just on Weekend Editon Sunday ridiculing the New York Daily News'
Filip Bondy for being creative with languge in his description of a
home run. That home run mattered to baseball fans. Those benchmarks?
All the press whores that lied -- that includes Pesca -- provided cover
for Nouri and Iraqis suffer because of Pesca and his ilk. Filip Bondy's
descriptive powers didn't have a fly. Pesca might need to remember
that before he takes to NPR next to slam another journalist. And Rachel
Martin might want to think about who she goes on air with to mock other
journalists.
Having agreed, in
writing, to pass an oil and gas law and never having accomplished it,
over five years later, Nouri's got no standing to whine about what the
KRG is doing. If he doesn't like it, he should have kept his word and
passed an oil and gas law. Didn't do it, so the current law(s) allow
the KRG to make the deals they're making. Considering the money
involved, you'd think even a semi-functioning government would have
taken this seriously. The Ministry of Oil notes
on their website, "The ministry of oil of Iraq declared that the daily
oil exports for September 2012 rose to 2.6 million barrels with 8.4
billion dollars outcome [. . .]"
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