Posted on 06/20/2008 5:56:43 PM PDT by Oshkalaboomboom
Didn't you just know this was coming?
A consortium of Western oil companies — the very definition of Big Oil — is on the verge of receiving no-bid contracts in Iraq, giving them access to one of the most sought-after prizes in the petroleum industry, according to The New York Times. Can it be mere coincidence that the leading companies in the deal — ExxonMobil, Shell, BP and Total — are the very same companies that Saddam Hussein threw out when he nationalized the Iraqi oil industry more than three decades ago?
The American public has been reassured, repeatedly, that petroleum had absolutely nothing to do with the Bush administration's decision to invade Iraq. President Bush, the oilman from Texas, has scoffed at the idea. So has Vice President Dick Cheney.
When I raised the specter of "petroleum wars" in a column dated Sept. 9, 2002, just as Bush was selling the idea that Saddam posed an imminent threat, I was assailed by critics, who called me "naive," among other choice descriptives. While I never believed that oil was the only reason for toppling Saddam, my critics weren't willing to concede petroleum played any role. ("The Bush administration is saturated with oil industry bigwigs. ... Their natural mindset is to assume that oil must be consumed ever more abundantly, even if that means going to war to preserve access to the supply," I wrote.)
Yet despite the vociferous denials, the four original partners of the Iraq Petroleum Co. (a misnomer, since all the companies are multinationals based in the U.S. or Western Europe) are about to receive contracts that allow them to service the fields in the country with the world's second-largest proven oil reserves. According to The New York Times, these are service contracts — paying the companies for their work — instead of the more lucrative licenses for oil deposits. But the contracts will give the global oil giants a leg up on more lucrative deals later on.
"It's been a long road, but the oil companies seem set to get much of what they have been seeking," said James Paul, executive director of the Global Policy Forum. "The Iraqi public is overwhelmingly opposed to this privatization of Iraqi oil, just like they are overwhelmingly opposed to the so-called security pact with the U.S."
Not that the opinions of Iraqis matter to everybody. There is a rather significant segment of Americans who believe that we have a God-given right to take what we want (though they'd never be so forthright in saying so). The United States is the world's remaining superpower; we have the biggest, baddest military. A belief in American exceptionalism leads some of us to think that we should stand astride the globe.
Writing in the London Review of Books in October 2007, American journalist Jim Holt observed that "the US may be 'stuck' exactly where Bush et al want it to be," in a country with as much as 300 billion barrels of undiscovered oil reserves.
"Among the winners: oil-services companies like Halliburton; the oil companies themselves (the profits will be unimaginable ...); US voters, who will be guaranteed price stability at the gas pump (which sometimes seems to be all they care about)," Holt wrote.
And even those Americans who recoil from the notion that "might makes right" would be hard-pressed to object to a deal that allows Big Oil to extract more petroleum from Iraq's rich fields. After all, gas is $4 a gallon. Aren't we salvaging some good out of a rotten war if access to Iraqi oil drives down the price?
Perhaps. But that's not the only cost. To protect those oil fields, the U.S. would have to station troops in Iraq indefinitely. That may explain why Bush has been so determined to work out a deal for more or less permanent military bases before he leaves office.
The war in Iraq has already lasted longer than U.S. involvement in World War II, and the projected cost is around a trillion dollars. That doesn't count the human toll — more than 4,000 U.S. troops dead and tens of thousands maimed and shattered, physically or mentally. Hundreds of thousands of Iraqis dead and millions displaced.
The U.S. government could have spent $500 billion on an Apollo mission-like search for alternative energy and still had about $500 billion to hand to Americans as gasoline subsidies. And we would have been well on the way toward freeing ourselves from the troubled Middle East.
What, another idiotic editorial by Cynthia Tucker? That's as reliable as the sun rising in the morning.
Rove!!!!!!! Now I see the plan!
I got as far as Cynthia Tucker. She was the one that proved that anyone, regardless of their intelligence level, can be a “journalist.”
From the Urinal and Constipation?
Oy.
Shut up Cynthia!!!!!
Cynthia Tucker has the brains of a two bit crack ho. How could anyone not understand that the oil industry would be denationalized once a democratically elected government was established.
That's an insult to non-tranditional cocaine derivate addicted sex workers everywhere.
If you think she’s stupid, just imagine the brain power of the people who would hire her...
And God forbid if America were to get paid in oil to mitigate the friggin shortage you Libs got us into.
BTW you dumb b1tch, people own corporations.
We better fix this and give all of the contracts to Russia and China and France. It’s only fair after all. (/extreme sarcasm)
Actually Lukoil (Russian) won the first round of oil contracts in Iraq.
Does this twit even know that "nationalizing" is just a euphemism for the GOVERNMENT STEALING private property?
Well, we did win. - Vae Victus.
And yet, we are not taking anything.
This is called doing business; an alien concept to communists and their liberal trash ilk.
Sounds to me that it is only fair that the oil companies are being given a chance to recoup their original investments that were lost when Hussein nationalized their assets in the first place. So what's the rub????
Naive she is not.
"The Iraqi public is overwhelmingly opposed to this privatization of Iraqi oil, just like they are overwhelmingly opposed to the so-called security pact with the U.S." [according to James Paul].
And he knows this ... how?
"... US voters, who will be guaranteed price stability at the gas pump ... ."
If only.
Presumably the PLA is the biggest, while ours just accomplishes its mission by dispiriting the thugs and ensuring fresh water supplies and setting up schools in villages.
a “nappy-headed two-bit crack ho”
But I'm sure she'd want "The People" to own the corporations, a la Marxine Waters and Maurice Hinchey.
True too. Good catch.
I thought the Left hated us as nation-builders. Is not telling the sovreign nation and elected government of Iraq that they CANNOT hire certain companies effectively nation-building?
Actually guys she is on the money! I have just now returned from working in Iraq for 32 months. I have seen the oil wells, pipe lines, drilling platforms, blow out preventer, drill colliers, you name it, in the oil industry. I have also seen a map of Iraq, and it had been high lighted with blocks, of parceled land, showing the big boys in the oil industry, there names clearly on it! The sad part, is we are there for one and one thing only, OIL! Our U.S. military are dieing not just for the Iraq people, but for the oil company’s, they just don’t no it yet! I spent alot of time in the northern areas of Iraq. And in Kurkuk right near the base is a huge oil facility there. There is more oil in Iraq than in Saudi Arabia! I know this from the fact, I met a gentleman that explained to me, the magnitude of the oil there!
I have to agree. What is wrong with the oil companies recouping their investments? And help the Iraq economy grow and send oil back to the US. Iraq will need to be competitive in some industry in order to thrive, why not the obvious one? And as stated in an earlier post..Russia has already obtained a contract. I read that China has..too.
You should use the tag when posting satire. If you agree with her, you should start posting at the DU.
You are trying to take a good situation and make a conspiracy out of it. It is a good thing that Iraq is developing its oil resources. They are wise to work with professionals provided by major oil companies. Major oil companies will only work in Iraq if they are confident about safety. Our brave men and women are in Iraq to stop the forces of terrorism from seizing the country. If the terrorists succeed in Iraq and turn it into a haven for terrorists, we will be in danger.
A really dumb clam.
And keep her for 25+ years.
And make her the editorial page editor.
Un-freaking-believable.
We are small fish in a shark tank.
We will have very few companies in the oil business if the congress critters nationalize the refineries.
You’re not fooling anybody.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.