Saturday 20th of April 2024

news from the trough .....

‘Recently, while watching Robert Greenwald's new film, "Iraq For Sale: The War Profiteers," I began to grasp the enormous scope and implications of the corporate takeover of the war in Iraq. I asked myself, Why isn't this a huge issue for Americans of all political stripe? After all, making money off war, while American soldiers are dying, strikes many people as just plain wrong.

It's all in Greenwald's film: American tax dollars paying for the enormous profits enjoyed by a gaggle of well-connected companies that have revolving doors with the military and the U.S. government. Wars waged in our name creating ballooning CEO salaries, gigantic waste, and the loss of control of the role of the military. But the viewer is unprepared for the really shocking realization; the lives of hardworking, patriotic Americans are sacrificed, stupidly and callously, and soldiers are put in unnecessary danger all to make a buck - many, many bucks.’

Iraq: American Deaths & Corporate Greed

‘The history of American war profiteering is rife with egregious examples of incompetence, fraud, tax evasion, embezzlement, bribery and misconduct. As war historian Stuart Brandes has suggested, each new war is infected with new forms of war profiteering. Iraq is no exception. From criminal mismanagement of Iraq's oil revenues to armed private security contractors operating with virtual impunity, this war has created opportunities for an appalling amount of corruption. What follows is a list of some of the worst Iraq war profiteers who have bilked American taxpayers and undermined the military's mission.’

The 10 Most Brazen War Profiteers

The war profiteers

It doesn't stop with Iraq of course. I wonder how much Israeli loot was skimmed off by the US munitions industry and I wonder how much depleted uranium is now spreading around the globe because of the obvious use of US bunker busters and mobile artillery shells to decimate Beirut and Lebanon? 

profiteering .....

Mark Fiore's new animation "Profiteering" has just been posted.