The Bottomless Money Pit that is Iraq
The NY Times had an article this morning about the Iraq Rebuilding Project’s failure. “In a troubling sign for the American-financed rebuilding program in Iraq, inspectors for a federal oversight agency have found that in a sampling of eight projects that the United States had declared successes, seven were no longer operating as designed because of plumbing and electrical failures, lack of proper maintenance, apparent looting and expensive equipment that lay idle.”
As much of the blame for this is put on shoddy building materials used in construction as is put on lack of maintenance and lack of follow up training to teach Iraqis how to maintain facilities and equipment. “Curiously, most of the problems seemed unrelated to sabotage stemming from Iraq’s parlous security situation, but instead were the product of poor initial construction, petty looting, a lack of any maintenance and simple neglect.” (emphasis mine.)
It’s time for us to spend that dough at home, bringing our soldiers home where they belong, and using that money to give them the care and support they need to rebuild their torn up lives and families, and to upgrade our own creaky infrastructure of Vet care (and hopefully not using Fed Profiteering contractors like Blackwater and Bechtel to do it.)
Technorati Tags: Rebuilding Iraq, Profiteering, End the Iraq War
