September 18, 2006

Rebuild Iraq With The Best and Brightest Loyal Neoconservatives! A 24-year-old who had never worked in finance -- but had applied for a White House job -- was sent to reopen Baghdad's stock exchange. The daughter of a prominent neoconservative commentator and a recent graduate from an evangelical university for home-schooled children were tapped to manage Iraq's $13 billion budget, even though they didn't have a background in accounting. via

I hope to reopen Baghdad's stock exchange when I'm 24 Daddy! I'm very pro-Bush and I think abortion is bad! Yayy! *clap* *clap* Songs and Stories of Outrage Fatigue, part MCXVIII: "The decision to send the loyal and the willing instead of the best and the brightest is now regarded by many people involved in the 3 1/2 -year effort to stabilize and rebuild Iraq as one of the Bush administration's gravest errors. Many of those selected because of their political fidelity spent their time trying to impose a conservative agenda on the postwar occupation that sidetracked more important reconstruction efforts and squandered goodwill among the Iraqi people, according to many people who participated in the reconstruction effort."

posted by petebest 18 years ago
  • I liked to play "Find the Brownie" as much as anyone, but they're not even trying to hide them anymore.
  • according to many people who participated in the reconstruction effort. You mean it's finished already?
  • Yeah, they've made an effort.
  • Pretty fucking piss-poor effort, by all accounts. I almost there were a judgement seat in heaven.
  • "When President Bush announced in May 2003 that he was appointing L. Paul Bremer as the top U.S. civilian official in Iraq, I received an e-mail from one of his former business colleagues: 'I just heard that Jerry [Bremer's nickname] will be running Iraq. And the Iraqis thought that the worst we could do was to bomb them.' At the time, I just smiled and dismissed the message. Three years later, Rajiv Chandrasekaran's extraordinary book made me realize how tragically prescient that e-mail had been. Imperial Life in the Emerald City is full of jaw-dropping tales of the myriad large and small ways in which Bremer and his team poured fuel into the lethal cauldron that is today's Iraq. He was not alone and had many eager and powerful partners in Washington, Baghdad and elsewhere." --from Moisés Naím's review of 'Imperial Life in the Emerald City' via Mistakes Were Made linked via the blue place. Sounds like it went a bit beyond "Incompetent"
  • I think my Outrage-o-Meter® is broken.
  • "I'm not here for the Iraqis," one staffer noted to a reporter over lunch. "I'm here for George Bush." Hilarious! (but so so sad). This dude and all the other loyal dudettes ended up setting fire to Bush's pants. You can't make this stuff up. Jeezus. Also LOL on the Brownie comment, Captain.
  • The "best and brightest" don't get sent - they take profitable positions of responsibility and influence in the private sector. The loyal and willing (read: mediocre) get sent, because they are willing and able to be sent. Seriously: would ANYONE that could reasonably be considered best and brightest, or even second-best or half-brightest, want to be anywhere near Baghdad if they weren't legally obligated on penalty of lots of trouble to be there? Fat frggin chance. To paraphrase the inestimable Rummy, you go to war with the army you got, not the army you want. Loyal and willing they had; best and brightest they don't.
  • There are probably plenty of the B&B who'd like to go, despite the dangers, for several reasons. But why would you bother if you were going to be constantly second guessed by your President and Congress, have your decisions have to be approved and overridden because it doesn't benefit their political needs? Why bring your expertise and practical experience when all you'll wind up doing is banging your head against a brick wall? This seems to happen a lot in the neocon lands.
  • It just annoys me that this is what we'll be talking about for the next 20 years. Bush's fuckups will define our generation, just as Nixon's jaundiced mentality defined the political scene of the previous generation. It's just so banal. I was truly expecting something otherworldly for this era, but here we are, & this is just all so.. fecal. Truly, the sense-impression my brain is left with after considering the modern Republicans & the NeoConservative footprint on our world is the same sense I get after spending an afternoon cleaning up dog shit.
  • Okay, even if we don't undertake rebuilding Iraq with THE best and THE brightest, you'd think people with expereince or at least training in the fields they were placed in would be there. But if you read the article it spells out pretty grotesquely how even the "army we had" was usurped by GOP donors and GW Bush supporters. And not by accident or a misguided management group but by design. Which is par for the course for this incredibly out-of-control administration. Some recognized them as beyond dangerous before their actions proved it again and again and again. They don't come close to deserving even status-quo support. Just because we're all still driving SUVs and picking up little Jimmy from softball doesn't mean they haven't damaged America in countless ways we'll be "fixing" for decades at least. And this is just one very stupid way they did it. By not listening to opposing viewpoints to the detriment of everything else. By excluding expereinced people who may have differing political beliefs they've damaged this reconstruction effort - perhaps irreperably, spent us back to the stone age, wasted the goodwill of the Iraqis and the national unity of post-9/11, and for what? Best and the brightest maybe not, but I'd settle for "competent". Which they are not. In spades. Again. What else can explain this massive failure except for intentional misconduct? We already have many examples of outright theft - and not just by Clicky Dick's old company either, by many of the contractors chosen because of these same "loyalist" criteria. I'd take a Republican, hell, I'd take a frickin' Nazi cannibal as director of public works at this point if they could do the damn job.
  • Monkeyfilter: I'd take a frickin' Nazi cannibal as director of public works
  • Frankly, Chyren, I'd prefer an afternoon with the dog shit. At least that only stinks for me, and it's just for one day.
  • well, okay maybe not, but still.
  • Darnit that was in response to TUM, darn you Frogs! Happy Constitution Day too.
  • As another commentator on this story pointed out, the most tragic way in which these accounts reflect on the Bush administration is the fact that hearing of such incompetency does not engender any sort of surprise any more. The rank extent of the incompetence is somewhat shocking, but the fact that it happened just seems perfectly par for the course at this point, given the track record so far. would ANYONE that could reasonably be considered best and brightest...want to be anywhere near Baghdad Actually, if you read the article it appears that there were plenty of people, many many of them trained specifically for dealing with nations in crisis, who were interested in going. Why? Because that was exactly what they were trained for. Those people were turned down because they were not partisan. Or not partisan enough. Give thanks for living in such times. When talking to your grandkids you can say you got to see when the 'greatest nation' on earth was run by an oligarchy, a kleptocracy, a mob.
  • >>you got to see when the 'greatest nation' on earth was run by an oligarchy, a kleptocracy, a mob. I suspect they'll get to see it themselves. I fear that stuff like this rolls in easy and rolls back hard.
  • Riveting article, h-dogg.
  • Indeed. In the second article, also on the progress of the Iraqi Security Forces, the U.S. Army writers at the Al Faw palace put an even more positive spin on the country's prospects. "Unlike the terrorists, who offer nothing but pain and fear, the ISF bring the promise of a better Iraq. No foreign al-Qa'ida mercenary would ever consider bringing gifts to Iraqi children. The Iraqi Army, however, fights for a noble cause. ... Together with the Iraqi people, they will bring peace and prosperity to the nation."
  • Um, lots of terrorist organizations pass out candy to the children as they go about their destructive business. Falling back on "we give out candy" is scraping the bottom of the we're better than them because... barrel.
  • This is one of the more frightening and frustrating articles I have read.
  • MonkeyFilter: Frankly, I'd prefer an afternoon with the dog shit. At least that only stinks for me, and it's just for one day. Please, please, nobody post any more articles. Where the HELL are all the people that should be reading this and demanding accountability? This country wasted all that outrage and money on a damn stained DRESS? We have one fucked up buncha thieves in our gummint.
  • I haven't watched TV in years and don't watch online video. I've concluded non-textual presentations too easily serve to by-pass the thinking apparatus I optimistically want to believe most people still have tucked somewhere between their ears. But just reading about it, the Lewinski episode never made any sense to me.
  • the Lewinski episode never made any sense to me Irrespective of any viewpoint on Clinton's actions, keep in mind that the Lewinski scandal was largely driven by an extremely well-funded and fanatical right wing movement. The entire thing was one giant attack ad.
  • I wonder what Arthur Chrenkoff makes of all this.
  • I would recommend the movie Green Zone for possible answers.
  • The more I read about Iraq, the more enamel I wear off my teeth. Bush's lasting legacy