By David Swanson
"Iraq for Sale: The War Profiteers," by far the best film Robert Greenwald has created, is not about the military industrial complex. Rather, it is about the remaining shell of the former military, having embedded within itself not just the media, but numerous other corporate entities. The U.S. military no longer cooks its own food, washes its own laundry, repairs its own vehicles, or guards its own V.I.P.s. We've privatized everything, right down to the shooting -- mercenaries make up the second largest contingent in the Coalition of the Killing.
Private corporations cost more and provide less, or in the case of the reconstruction of Iraq: provide virtually nothing. There has been no reconstruction, and various corporations have provided literally nothing – at great expense. Halliburton has sent drivers to risk their lives hauling empty trucks back and forth across Iraq. And when a $75,000 truck breaks down, for lack of a spare tire or an oil filter, they blow the truck up or abandon it.
I suppose it's old news at this point that the Bush administration lied us into the Iraq war and that the cost of this mess will be fully realized by the next generation when Bush leaves office with the biggest budget deficit in U.S. history. And, while Democrats have been complaining for years about the GOP-led Congress abandoning its oversight of the executive branch's wrongdoing, a vote that took place in the Senate last week shows how the Republican desire to ignore fraud and abuse extends right into killing legislation that would help stop defense contractors from ripping off the American people.