MICHAEL O. ALLEN

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Halliburton

A Recurring Nightmare

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The BP Deepwater Horizon catastrophe is a perfect Republican Party trap: Watch as a Democratic administration and Congress drown in the oil disaster while they clean up at the polls. Then Republicans return to office and begin the cycle by laying the bombs that’ll detonate under the next Democratic administration.

Does anyone remember Dick Cheney’s behind-the-door meetings with energy executives in W.’s maladministration? Or the two wars they bequeathed Americans?

For those who have forgotten, Brian Conners has written a recap at Associated Content that I think is worth reading. His earlier piece pointed fingers also.

Sure, President Barack Obama has been feckless in dealing with a disaster-not-of-his-making.

How difficult can it be to say that British Petroleum, besides paying for every penny that it costs to clean up the Gulf and other regions affected by this disaster, should have all of its officers brought to account for this disaster.

Yet, the president has  not been able to summon the passion to condemn this crime. Fine, set up a commission, if you must. But, first, BP executives should be wearing prison jumpsuits.

Cheney has some explaining to do. Before Congress.

A final question: Why is it that Halliburton (Dick Cheney’s employer) is always around looking guilty whenever something is hurting our nation?

June 3, 2010
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October surprise *

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Trey Ellis in HuffPo thinks we should be afraid, very afraid of what Republicans might have up their sleeves for October:

We taxpayers already have shelled out $100 billion on contractors in Iraq since 2003. They have 180,000 employees in country now building what they had assumed would be permanent bases for a permanent occupation of an oil-rich land.

Does anyone really believe that Cheney/Halliburton/Blackwater will relinquish the keys to the American treasury without the nastiest of fights?

For six years Cheney has unleashed a gusher of obscene profiteering with little or no oversight of his petro/reconstruction/military contracting cohorts. You don’t have to be a conspiracy-addicted fan of Jack Bauer’s to understand that they won’t just quietly retire to their yachts in the Gulf of Mexico after regime change and their operations in Iraq are forcibly ended. They understand that not only will they be out of business, but that they could also go to jail — if Democrats hold hearings into war profiteering, just as Truman did as a Senator in 1943.

Remember, when Halliburton et al. first entered Iraq, Republicans had a virtual one-party lock on governance. Democrats acted like frightened little forest animals. The contractors didn’t have to cover their tracks because the vice president of the United States, the de facto ruler of the free world, was their capo.

Me? I sometimes subscribe to the pessimism that the writer voices here. Other times, I am euphoric over Sen. Barack Obama’s chances of winning the presidency. Practically everyone I know supports Obama. My town, which not long ago was a Republican town, is now festooned with “Obama for President” lawn signs.

Yet, this is America we’re talking about. It is at the root of Bill Clinton’s restlessness. Republicans are counting on that thing that Bill feels inately. Bill knows. He has always known this country better than anyone. That’s why he was able to tap what was darkest in the heart of America into two terms in the presidency. Anymore than he wants his wife to win the presidency, he knows that Hillary, warts-and-all, would be easier for Americans to swallow than the pristine Mr. Obama.

Damn Bill!

August 18, 2008
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