From a few days ago:


[link|http://www.guardian.co.uk/Iraq/Story/0,,1734939,00.html|http://www.guardian....,,1734939,00.html]

[...]

Over the first 14 months of the occupation, 363 tonnes of new $100 bills were shipped in - $12bn, in cash. And that is where it all began to go wrong.

"Iraq was awash in cash - in dollar bills. Piles and piles of money," says Frank Willis, a former senior official with the governing Coalition Provisional Authority. "We played football with some of the bricks of $100 bills before delivery. It was a wild-west crazy atmosphere, the likes of which none of us had ever experienced."

The environment created by the coalition positively encouraged corruption. "American law was suspended, Iraqi law was suspended, and Iraq basically became a free fraud zone," says Alan Grayson, a Florida-based attorney who represents whistleblowers now trying to expose the corruption. "In a free fire zone you can shoot at anybody you want. In a free fraud zone you can steal anything you like. And that was what they did."

[...] more in the article


Once in khaki suits, ah, gee, we looked swell
Full of that Yankee Doodle-de-dum.
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Why don't you remember, I'm your pal --
Buddy, can you spare a dime?