ABSENT QUORUM & THE OIL LAW

Widely reported last week as another positive breakthrough in the ongoing Iraq debacle, the contested oil bill finally traversed its way from the al-Malicki cabinet to the Iraqi Parliament where the optimistic momentum, created by the less than ubiquitous true-believers still aboard the Neocon Iraq Express, immediately mired itself to the same reality-based morass that envelopes the entire country-- Lacking a complete quorum the Parliament cannot convene and therefore cannot even begin the debate-- This breakdown is not the result of blind chance or haphazard insignificance--

Mainstream media have never challenged the equitable tenets of this hastily and poorly conceived conundrum-- If equal distribution of less than moderate oil profits to the three disparate groups, the Sunni, the Shia and the Kurds, could accomplish its oft stated and supposedly only intention of enriching the Sunni group enough to encourage it to cease the sectarian mayhem and actually participate in the Iraqi Government as a full fledged partner to a common peaceable future, then the oil bill might already be a fait accompli--

But, as the bill has been written, nearly the entire oil industry of Iraq must be controlled and directed by US Oil companies to whom must go the lion's share of oil contracts and resultant profits-- Why are the Sunnis, the prime intended beneficiary of this wildly disproportionate bill, the most reluctant to even begin debate on it??-- Why are the Kurds so seemingly complacent for so long concerning the current state of affairs now grumbling their considerable discontent with a proposal promising less oil than they already claim for themselves in their own previously announced and then world-ignored independent Kurdistan??-- Even al-Sadr has given thumbs down to the oil draft--

Obviously something is amiss over the disparate expectations these groups once had and were once led to believe were etched in the stone of America's word and the extant proposals now being mandated by the same Coalition Authority that once patently denied oil was a raison detre for our occupation of Iraq in the first place-- All of which is congealing into serious resistance from the point of view of all involved participants--The Shites, the impoverished majority Shia, were oppressed by Sunnis empowered under Saddam and understandably, in terms of real politik, do not favor enforced enrichment of the Sunnis-- The Sunnis can't trust US proposals having experienced the duplicitous alliance of the US during the early years of Saddam's US-aided rule-- One example, the Sunnis have not forgotten US Ambassador April Glaspie's green light('The US takes no position on inter-Arab border disputes'--rough quote) Saddam then took to imply permission to invade Kuwait-- The Kurds remember Bush's Father endeavored them to overthrow Saddam, after the first Gulf War, promising overwhelming military support should they need it-- Well, need it they did and thousands of Kurd families lost love ones to Saddams' slaughter of the failed coup attempt while the elder Bush basking in the faux glow of short-lived victory lifted not a finger-- There are strong precedents for this glaring mistrust--Americans may have forgotten but the Kurds haven't and won't anytime soon-- Their 'Kurdistan', they believe, has tacit approval from an America that still owes them blood debt upon which America, the Kurds now fear, intends to renege-- There are consequences for not living up to your word--

Trouble belies the placid calm of Northern Iraq now as Turkey injected a couple of troop forays across the Iraq border ostensibly chasing Kurdish PKK rebels seeking sanctuary-- Turkey denied the incursions ever happened and the media chose to bury story but couldn't prevent Oil prices from catapulting into the $73/bl range-- Add to this jumbo-cluster of aggravation and false promises Australian Defense chief Brendon Nelson who publicly admitted 'resource security' otherwise known as oil supplies are defining component of Australian troop deployment in Iraq and was quickly downplayed by his Aussie boss PM John Howard-- Cat's, too late, out of the proverbial bag-- Ooooops!!!


The snarled oil bill reflects the internecine political complexities of everyday life and death in the Iraq killing zones as well as the particular life-pace of the people involved-- The US, without ever knowing much about the cultural habits and preferences of the Iraqi people except that, of course, narcissistic canard they absolutely craved liberation from such inherent restrictions-- Now the US wants its cake immediately and the tantrums, our self-serving politicians mouth-off in abject contagion across the full political spectrum, echo their sullen refusal to accept any responsibility for the rigors of both guerrilla stalemate and potential anarchic collapse alternatively struggling in the power vacuum region-wide--

Over 450 Baghdad corpses were found in various states of blindfolded bondage and lethal torture in June considerably outstripping pre-Surge number levels of last January-- One puzzling factoid to which the Media is so persistently reluctant to give much air is this: The Greed Zone receives incoming mortar fire every night and is now incapable of removing its own garbage from the zone-- Is this a self-induced siege or what??-- The bureaucratic denial of this lack of control cannot be maintained for a South Korean eternity of say 30 more years-- Each fictitious milepost of ever more complex success is almost immediately shot down by simple insurgent operations on ground they control only when they want to--

The Surge is having difficulty because it cannot win the people it once might have-- The US no longer has the wherewithal, even if debate-ably it ever did, to provide the necessary security to insure stability-- Too much precious time was lost flaccidly debating for over a year the existence of an extant insurgency that then and now never skips a beat-- Recouping trust lost by heavy-handed tactics designed by blind administrators far too distant from the the boots on the ground battlefield and hard facts they attend-- Lost time is not found again even by well intentioned and supremely intelligent generals and, less so even by electioneering politicians (Speaker Pelosi--'We(demies) have many arrows in our quiver and we are sharpening them') playing only for time and praying the voters don't hold them accountable for the entire mess--

Something must be rotten in the state of DC-- So, too, The Greed Zone-- Take a whiff!!!--

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