Truth sneaks out in Iraq war corruption case, despite AWOL mainstream news media
The trial of a former Halliburton sub-contractor (from Chicago's Southwest suburbs) is plodding along, but it stumbled on a landmine Thursday when a witness acknowledged during the trial that he was given a bribe by one of President Bush and Dick Cheney's pals, Kuwait businessman Walid al-Absi, the owner of First Kuwaiti, which just this week (surprisingly) completed building the new, high-tech U.S. Embassy in Baghdad. A Halliburton sub-contractor, too, First Kuwaiti did a bit better than some American contractors involved in building Chicago's much publicized Millennium Park, which had spending excesses that were far above the original contract amount. First Kuwaiti was given the contract to build the country's largest American embassy ever for around $490 million. It slowly grew over the years and last reported, had surpassed $590 million. But in court, as people were catching their breaths at the charges of a new bribe -- they just don't stop apparently -- it was reported the embassy will not cost over $720 million.
Of course, the mainstream media is AWOL, spending most of their time asking questions on other issues like "Why isn't Barack Obama wearing an American Flag on his lapel?"
The case is being prosecuted in Rockford, Illinois, and it is getting a smattering of coverage. The news media leading the coverage, naturally, are the local newspapers, the very capable Quad City Times Newspaper and the equally capable Quad Cities Online Ledger/Argus newspapers. And, the reporting of the two newspapers there is driving the Associated Press, which occasionally picks up a headline or two from their work.
I even saw one AP story picked up by the Houston Chronicle. But that's it!
So why isn't it a bigger story? Although I understand the "reasoning" behind prosecuting the cases in Rockford, the fact is the U.S. Attorney has not hesitated to put the heat and spotlight on other Iraq related issues by holding press conferences in Washington D.C., or coming out to the suburban regions to prod the news media to take the cases seriously.
Well, Bush and Cheney clearly want to make sure that they address the public's growing concern over war related contract abuses -- after all, the victims are not just the government, but more importantly the soldiers who get lousy equipment that often does not work, or below grade military support at excessively high and often bribe-driven rates.
But Bush and Cheney don't want the cases to get out of hand and start the public thinking about the bigger role that Halliburton and its coterie of sub-contractors have enjoyed for years in terms of no-bid contracts that strated out as a few billion but that have grown to hundreds of billions of dollars, without even a whince or whimper from the public.
And goodness knows Cheney doesn't want anyone to wonder aloud why the controversy has put a harsher spotlight on Halliburton, which he ran and probably will return to run when his stint as Vice President ends in January. Al-Absi is an administration pal. First Kuwaiti sure had clout to land that contract. Imagine if all this had come up a few years sooner on the front pages of the New York Times, the Washington Post, the Los Angeles Times, the Chicago Tribune (I can hear them all smoring in concert) when all these suspicions were already known. First Kuwait probably would have been dumped as the contractor.
Who knows, maybe the public outrage would have also put a stop to Halliburton's contract empire in Iraq?
Well, the mainstream media is AWOL.
What else is new?
Ray Hanania
www.ArabWritersGroup.com