WASHINGTON - U.S. government mismanagement of assets in
Iraq, from the lack of proper documentation on nearly $100 million in cash to millions of dollars worth of unaccounted-for equipment, are setting back efforts to fight corruption in the fledgling democracy, auditors and critics say.
Yeah, because it's their democracy that's corrupt.
The latest indication of that came Wednesday when investigators released a report saying $96.6 million in cash could not be properly accounted for. The total included more than $7 million that was simply gone, according to the report from the Special Inspector General for Iraq Reconstruction.
Seven million. Seven frickin' million. Just... gone.
Part of the problem was a last-minute push to spend millions on reconstruction projects before the interim Iraqi government took over, the report said. One agent got $6.75 million in cash a week before the hand over, with the expectation that the money would be spent before the Iraqis took power, the report said.
Several of these agents "were under the impression that it was more important to quickly distribute the money to the region than to obtain all necessary documentation," the report said.
Controls over the cash were so lax that two of the agents hired to distribute the money were allowed to leave Iraq before they had accounted for all of it, the report said. Between them, those two had been given more than $1.4 million in cash which remains unaccounted for, the report said.
Of course it does. And I guarantee this is the last we're going to hear about it.
Seriously, how can this be so fucking sloppy? The instant the Iraq invasion was discussed, the Bush administration and all of their rich buddies' eyes were replaced with cartoon dollar signs. It's an orgy of money over there, and no one is keeping track.
Do I really need to state the obvious "if we used that money over here" usual comments? I didn't think so.
Now if you'll excuse me, I have to go fill my car with gas. At $2.55 a gallon.
Cross-posted from my blog.
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