Will the old-school nativists and New American Century interventionists finally shut the fuck up about how Kofi Annan is a venal monster and international elitist bureaucrat at the helm of a power-hungry and corrupt UN? It's bullshit. Conservatives get so shrill about the blue helmets, they sound like goddamn Larouchies half the time, and I wouldn't wish that on anybody. My advice to them: calm down, wipe the spit from the corner of your mouth, and read the exhaustive audit commission, which found no bribery, corruption or other improprieties, other than improper oversight of contractors. (And we all know the Republicans never hire questionable contractors.) The commission, by the way, is led by Paul Volcker, former Fed honcho and Chairman of the Trilateral commission, so the audits can't be accused of being internationalist cover-ups.
Speaking of contractors, I'm sure the privatizers and unilateralist howlers all think that Halliburton and it's subsidiary Kellogg, Brown & Root would have done a better job administering Iraq's Oil For Food program. I mean, look at the great example they're setting in Iraq now, where both entities are under investigation for defrauding the US Government in Iraq -- during wartime! (Remember the $61 million fuel and $27.4 million dinner bill?) Or Bechtel, responsible for a $1billion in cost overruns in the Big Dig, and currently executing a contract for twice that amount to rebuild infrastructure in Iraq. Small coincidence, then, that 2003 was a banner year for Bechtel? No corruption there! And certainly the inquiry by the Iraqi Government Council -- seems there may yet be some sovereignty left over there -- into Halliburton's bribing its way into the lion's share of reconstruction contracts will turn up nothing.