or Powell's or me• • •
"Mike and Jon, Jon and Mike—I've known them both for years, and, clearly, one of them is very funny. As for the other: truly one of the great hangers-on of our time."—Steve Bodow, head writer, The Daily Show
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"Who can really judge what's funny? If humor is a subjective medium, then can there be something that is really and truly hilarious? Me. This book."—Daniel Handler, author, Adverbs, and personal representative of Lemony Snicket
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"The good news: I thought Our Kampf was consistently hilarious. The bad news: I’m the guy who wrote Monkeybone."—Sam Hamm, screenwriter, Batman, Batman Returns, and Homecoming
August 27, 2007
Don't Owe! Won't Pay!
So China loans the US government money, which it gives to Iraqi contractors, which they give partially to insurgent groups, which they use to attack Americans:
Iraq's deadly insurgent groups have financed their war against U.S. troops in part with hundreds of thousands of dollars in U.S. rebuilding funds that they've extorted from Iraqi contractors in Anbar province.The payments, in return for the insurgents' allowing supplies to move and construction work to begin, have taken place since the earliest projects in 2003, Iraqi contractors, politicians and interpreters involved with reconstruction efforts said.
So in the end, American taxpayers end up with everything: the death, the crippling injuries, and the foreign debt!
All we need is for the Bush administration to borrow still more money to put down internal US rebellions, and Americans will truly come to understand the exciting third world experience of odious debt.
SEE ALSO: Matt Taibbi on "The Great Iraqi Swindle"
(McClatchy story via)
Posted at August 27, 2007 10:55 AM | TrackBackThe Iraqi contractor sets his price at up to four times the going rate because he'll be forced to give 50 percent or more to gun-toting insurgents who demand cash payments in exchange for the supply convoys' safe passage.
So the Sunni insurgency can now 1) kill people and 2) collect taxes at gunpoint.
Throw in "funnel tax money to cronies" and you've met all the requirements for the Bush administration's model of a fully-functioning government.
As Karl Rove said just recently, our work here is done.
Posted by: SteveB at August 27, 2007 11:14 AM"Waste, fraud and abuse" in our military and industrial complex! Why, by golly and by gum, if that's so, we must have a Congressional investigation! We must appoint a blue ribbon panel to propose reforms! We must initiate ethics programs within every contractor!
And as sure as every boy and girl in this great land can become president, that there "waste, fraud and abuse" will be gone by the time we grow up.
I too have a dream. Or, was that "scheme?" Hard to tell them apart, these days.
SteveB: is there any other way to collect taxes, besides at gunpoint?
Posted by: saurabh at August 27, 2007 12:45 PMAt the risk of sounding repetitive--STOP PAYING THESE PEOPLE. You might ask yourself "Why am I still paying these criminals"?
Posted by: Mike Meyer at August 27, 2007 03:05 PMhttp://www.newspress.com/Top/Article/article.jsp?Section=NATIONAL&ID=565074540867487317
This might explain things.
Posted by: saurabh at August 27, 2007 04:33 PMis there any other way to collect taxes, besides at gunpoint?
No, there isn't. Of course, over here in "civilized" America, the guns are usually kept out of sight.
And that's my point. We have, in the Sunni militia, an organization that can take your money under the threat of violence and use the money to benefit themselves, buy weapons, and kill people. And that meets Karl Rove's, Grover Norquist's and George Bush's definition of a government. Just as long as they don't use any of that extorted tax money to provide social services to anyone in the areas they control, that is.
Posted by: SteveB at August 27, 2007 04:56 PMSo China loans the US government money, which it gives to Iraqi contractors, which they give partially to insurgent groups, which they use to attack Americans:
By transitivity, that means that China is attacking America !
Time to invade Beijing! Faster please!!
OUR debt over Iraq IS NOT odious debt. WE all signed on for that through our duly elected officials, under almost NO COMPLAINT from the general population. (a population that PRIVATELY OWNS GUNS) Therefore WE OWE.
Posted by: Mike Meyer at August 27, 2007 05:57 PMStep right up! Everyone's a winner!
Posted by: Bob In Pacifica at August 28, 2007 09:18 AMregardless of us, the congress hasn't acted against it, which pretty much screws the argument that this was coerced, since they voted on all the emergency war funding, and non-state reactionary propaganda, however closely affiliated, isn't yet considered coercive.
it fails for us really bad because we had the choice to buy vengeance with tax money and opted to borrow it. being a vindictive doofus is not a get-out-free card.
now if there were aggressive action taken on stolen elections — that would be interesting. but i don't think people are arguing that the congressional elections were tampered with.
Posted by: hapa at August 29, 2007 12:46 AM
