The Federal Reserve sent record payouts of more than $4 billion in cash to Baghdad on giant pallets aboard military planes shortly before the United States gave control back to Iraqis, lawmakers said Tuesday.
The money, which had been held by the United States, came from Iraqi oil exports, surplus dollars from the U.N.-run oil-for-food program and frozen assets belonging to the ousted Saddam Hussein regime.
Bills weighing a total of 363 tons were loaded onto military aircraft in the largest cash shipments ever made by the Federal Reserve, said Rep. Henry Waxman, chairman of the House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform.
Outraged yet?
"Who in their right mind would send 363 tons of cash into a war zone? But that's exactly what our government did," the California Democrat said during a hearing reviewing possible waste, fraud and abuse of funds in Iraq.
On December 12, 2003, $1.5 billion was shipped to Iraq, initially "the largest pay out of U.S. currency in Fed history," according to an e-mail cited by committee members.
It was followed by more than $2.4 billion on June 22, 2004, and $1.6 billion three days later. The CPA turned over sovereignty on June 30.
According to bushco's own detainee bill:
Bush & Co. has portrayed the bill as a tough way to deal with aliens to protect us against terrorism. Frightened they might lose their majority in Congress in the November elections, the Republicans rammed the bill through Congress with little substantive debate.
Anyone who donates money to a charity that turns up on Bush's list of "terrorist" organizations, or who speaks out against the government's policies could be declared an "unlawful enemy combatant" and imprisoned indefinitely. That includes American citizens
So, in other words, the world is right, we are the terrorists. We are the country that cares more for war and stripping it's liberties than it's people.
Over 3 million American children went to bed last night without enough to eat. What the hell happened to our caring nature? What happened to our priorities? When did we become so scared, we just stopped feeling for our own people?
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3 comments:
There is no outrage, Laine. Why should there be? We don't need the money anyway.
Isn't this a strange story?
The money we are spending in Iraq would go so incredibly far in helping this countries troubled regions....like New Orleans.
We need a CentCom America and decalre war on ourselves.
You people must understand that cash, lots and lots of cash, is sorely needed in Baghdad! Those Iraqi "founding fathers" need all the money you can scrape up because the real-estate-prices have sky rocketed in places like Provence and the U.K.
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