from the Guardian

Billions wasted in Iraq, says US audit

· Projects behind schedule despite massive outlay
· Roadside bomb kills 3 contractors, wounds 2

Ewen MacAskill in Washington
Monday May 1, 2006
The Guardian

A US congressional inspection team set up to monitor reconstruction in Iraq today publishes a scathing report of failures by contractors, mainly from the US, to carry out projects worth hundreds of millions of dollars.
In one case, the inspection team found that three years after the invasion only six of 150 health centres proposed for Iraq had been completed by a US contractor, in spite of 75% of the $186m (£100m) allocated having been spent.

The report says: "Fourteen more will be completed by the contractor, and the remaining facilities, which are partially constructed, will have to be completed by other means." The inspectors blame the failure in this instance on management problems and security concerns.

read more at the Guardian... and gawk at the Bush cartoon heading this line of blog... He's just had a twin brother for a day, as a joke at the white house... as if the white house could be more of a joke than it is now...

From the Seattle Times

Strategy of dividing Iraq starting to make sense, some officers, analysts say
By Thomas E. Ricks
The Washington Post

WASHINGTON — As sectarian violence persists in Iraq, U.S. military officers and security experts find themselves in a vigorous debate over an idea largely dismissed months ago as a fringe thought: that the surest — and perhaps now the only — way to bring stability to Iraq is to divide the country into three pieces.

Those who see the partitioning of Iraq as increasingly attractive argue that separating the Shiites, Sunnis and Kurds may be the only solution to the violence that many experts believe verges on civil war. Others contend that it simply would lead to new, dangerous challenges for the United States, not least the possibility that al-Qaida would find it easier to build a new base of operations in a partitioned Iraq...

--------------------

Gus says three pieces of Iraq for the price of one?... Partition Baghdad like Jerusalem? Why not divide the US into two parts, or Australia? Like the Howard lovers on one side and the other ones living south of the north shore... That'd make Syderney a bit more interesting, with a toll way in between.. Hey?...

What a lot of rot these US army morons think of, when it is their president who ordered this big mistake of a war and then lost the plot with fanfaroneous "mission accomplished"... And these security midgets call themselves experts? More like a bunch of dangerous blind amateurs gangsters playing with the lives of real people...

The divides in Iraq are not as clear cut as the Sunnis, Shia and Kurds... Not only there are mixed marriages, there are fluxing divisions with essential interconnections through tribes, family history and religious dynamics... Ah yes... I remember now, that was also the US civil war...

Watching the Zargawi story on Four Corners (ABC-TV), one could see the fellow being a horrible and dangerous man, but also one could see, as mentioned here before, the US making this terrible series of political, legal, military and psychological blunders plus that bad decision to go to war and the condoning of torture — the lot delivered on a pack of lies...

And we're expected to swallow the experts' advice: because they are experts?: it's broke (we broke it), we don't fix it (we've lost the plan, we can't fix it)... So we just paint the pieces a different color each... and give them a different name each and we get a boot up our backside?... Eventually?

No wonder some people do not like what's being done to their country...

We need to open our yes... understand the situation from what it is rather than try to impose a corrupt "system" that compouds the problem...

Yes Gus,

Nothin' quite like that good ole' yankee arrogance ..... & who said that they don't want to run the world??

This brings us to little George.
How do you like this for a description? 

·                    

Frequent
temper tantrums

·                    

Excessive
arguing with adults

·                   Active
defiance and refusal to comply with adult requests and rules

·                    

Deliberate
attempts to annoy or upset people

·                    

Blaming
others for his or her mistakes or misbehaviour

·                    

Often
being touchy or easily annoyed by others

·                    

Frequent
anger and resentment

·                    

Mean
and hateful talking when upset

      ·                    

Seeking
revenge 

While I am not a personal friend
of little George, I do clearly remember the report by Karen Kwiatkowski that he
called the Constitution "just a god-damned piece of paper" (active
defiance and refusal to comply with adult requests and rules), and that Condi
Rice once cautioned the former British ambassador, "Don't make him
angry." 

Every dispatch out of the White
House indicates that temper tantrums are frequent, and we all know that blaming
others is his calling card. Seeking revenge is his life work. So, what is this?
This is "Oppositional Defiant Disorder," seen in lots of children,
along with ADD, ADHD and depression. For our purposes, we can also note that
ODD sometimes leads to another condition we are all familiar with called
"Conduct Disorder”. 

George W. Bush's Disorderly Conduct