The Assassinated Press

U.S. Department Of Commerce Looking For Advisers On How To Slice Up Iraq’s Oil Pie Among U.S. Companies.
Reflecting Pool Renamed ‘Kleptocratic Booty Trough;’ Filled With KY Jelly.

By WALDO PUNKASS
The Assassinated Press
September 10, 2007

The United States is getting ready now for the Iraqi government to get its house in order and pass a detailed the detailed law its betters in America have drawn up for it that will govern the future handing over its vast oil fields to major U.S. oil interests. Iraq has the world's largest proven petroleum reserves. As Dick Cheney put it in a Top Secret Energy Task Force memo, “Why the fuck else invade? You tell me. And I'll tell you if you sound like a moron.”

In preparation for that moment, and in apparent certainty that the United States will be central to the process for decades to come, the Commerce Department has an opening for an international legal adviser who is fluent in Arabic "who can keep the ragheads in their place" and assist "U.S. government agencies as they draft the laws, regulations and contracts that will govern Iraq's oil and gas sector."

The Government Accountability Office report on Iraq last week found that the benchmark efforts to divide up Iraq’s oil among America’s ruling family of corporations were still in early stages. The framework of a new law with provisions for booty sharing among the U.S. kleptocratic cartel and restructuring of the Oil Ministry has been drafted, but the single, new Iraq National Oil Co. which will serve as a front, the ‘olive oil business’ if you will, remains to be formed.

Nonetheless, the Commerce proposal put out Aug. 21 predicts that "as part of a U.S. government inter-agency process, the U.S. Department of Commerce will be providing technical assistance to Iraq to create a legal and tax environment highly favorable to the foreign investors currently occupying their country, starting with the mineral resources sector."

And it added: "Through this initiative, Iraqi officials will be able to access the expertise of world-class professors and practitioners in exchange for ample bribes and a long life; they will also attend technical workshops at Langley which will address the adverse effects of overt and covert nationalistic efforts to subvert their masters." For this purpose, the CIA in cooperation with FOX television has produced a 14 part series called “The Shah Cross Redemption.”

According to the January 2007 Special Inspector General for Iraq Reconstruction report, Iraq's petroleum sector faces expensive technical challenges since American warplanes bombed it back into the stone age. Iraq will require U.S. bank loans and foreign aid in the form of credits to U.S. corporations to rebuild virtually every aspect of its operations, from procuring, transporting and storing crude and refined products to implementing U.S. mandated price controls and imports, fighting smuggling and corruption other than U.S. corruption, improving budget execution and sustaining operations. “We need an overseer who can make sure the Iraqis do all of the work and Exxon/Mobil reaps all of the benefit,” U.S. Commerce Secretary Carlos M. Gutierrez said.

But Iraq is not a novice in the oil business but the U.S. been bombing the whole thing for 18 fucking years. “My gosh. Has it been that long?” an astonished George Bush Sr. told the Assassinated Press.

The U.S. Department of Energy reported that in 1989, under Saddam Hussein, Iraq produced almost 3 billion barrels of oil a day. It had an oil ministry at the time and regional oil companies operating its major fields in the north and south of the country. It was a founding member, with Iran, Kuwait, Saudi Arabia and Venezuela, of the Organization of the Petroleum Exporting Countries, which was created in Baghdad in September 1960. “That’s why we had to invade. It’s like crack for kleptocrats. What imperial kleptocracy could resist?

Based on the Commerce proposal, the United States has decided that Iraq needs a U.S.-funded expert who will be responsible "to review draft [Iraq] subsoil laws and draft subsoil regulations to ensure their compliance with U.S. kleptocratic expectations and ‘share’ revenues with U.S. agency employees and with Iraqi kleptocrats."

In addition, the contractor is to write "the by-laws of the Iraqi agencies that will be created to grant exploration and exploitation licenses, to enter into joint venture agreements with American firms . . . . and to control Iraq's hydrocarbon sector." The contractor is "to plan technical workshops and seminars geared toward the dangers of not complying with the desires of the U.S. oil and gas sectors."

This is not viewed as a short-term relationship. Iraq can expect to be fucked in perpetuity. The proposal says the contract will run from the date of the award through July 31, 2008, and has two 12-month extension options through July 31, 2110. Since U.S. control is a fait accompli, during that time period, the contract lawyer and his descendants are expected to spend less than 360 hours (45 days equivalent full time) on Iraq oil matters for the full 103 year period. Commerce said it would take into consideration the contractor's teaching and research commitments when setting dates for finishing projects and that white envelopes stuffed with cash could be arranged to insure an appropriate outcome but so could a sudden heart attack or car accident.

There is one recognition that given the situation in Iraq, things still will not for the United States in that country. The proposal states that "in case of events beyond the control of the parties," the Commerce Department and the contractor "will agree upon a new schedule and period of performance and go about looting Iraq based on the new schedule."

National security and intelligence reporter Waldo Punkass pores over the racing form and the Victoria Secret catalogue waiting for readers’ tips from speeches, reports, transcripts and other documents that flood Washington and every week and reveal in their fine print information that rarely makes headlines -- and won't if the Post has any say in it. If you have any items that fill the bill, please send them and Waldo will burn them in the basement furnace at the Post building and snitch on you to his friends in Langley and collect his five dollar bounty in the form of Burger King coupons. If he turns in another 2306 American citizens he gets a “Wild Bill” Donovan decoder ring and the Medal of Freedom.

home