Comments on: The Mother Of All Heists

Steve Kroft Reports On Disappearance Of More Than $500 Million To Equip Iraqi Army

[vfein]

Gee ... I wonder if it's with that $9 billion already "lost" - along with Chalabi - since 2003 ...

[Fred Lane]

Given the lives lost and the financial losses, maybe its time "We The People" take our country back by having another Boston Tea Party only this time, we'll call it the great "American Coffee Clatch" and not pay taxes to the IRS this April 15th 2007 until we get someone in office who is willing to be held fiscally responsible and accountable. Where do we sign up???

[tibu987]

DUH!
A billion here, a billion there, after a while it adds up to real money.
It (the U.S.), is the pot at the end of the rainbow that has an endless supply of money for all sorts of things. Just put your hand in the pot and take what you need. Not to worry that it might not be in our best interest.
'Nuff said.

[beckygg1]

This doesn't surprise me one bit. It's the typical MO for Bush. He does exactly as he pleases with no regard to the consequences that others might suffer because of it. It makes me sick to think that my tax dollars are being spent on this war in iraq. And you mean to tell me that 500 million dollars is missing???? And we're looking the other way while this genocide in Darfur continues???? God help us.

[halistarr]

We need more stories like these!! I was shocked and angered at how stupid our administration is, to let 800 million go to crooks.....and not even care. That money sure would do a lot of good here for the hungry and homeless. I could use a few thousand to get me out of debt.

We also need to care about our brothers and sisters in other countries. How can we ignore this atrocity?

Nancy Pelosi....WAY TO GO!

Andy Rooney....you said it all!

Let's all get involed to change things for the better! We get to complacent in our "luxury" lives here in America. We tend to ignore issues that make us feel uncomfortable.

[locojerr1]

Having watched 60 minutes many years, I call upon your ethical journalistic practices, to publically call for an end to this fiasco the Bush administration has us mired in. The graft and theft of such large amounts of funds made possible by the lack of supervision of our pentagon and the administration should have cancelled most of our debt(?) to this country who doesn't want us there anyway. Just because we have tried to satisfy or repair the damage incurred by our "INVASION" by making profitable expenditures to our planted approved Iraquis and favored American companies of the administration, we are not responsible to bring this country into the 21st century. They appeared to be happier in the 19th. Bring our troops home and spend this "committed money" on our own needy population!

[mhardiman2]

Thank you for interviewing and featuring Judge Radhi, who leads the Iraq Commission on Public Integrity (CPI). He and his investigators are certainly some of the bravest people in Iraq, with many both inside and outside the government trying to kill them because they are fighting corruption.
CPI was a creation of Ambassador Bremer and the Coalition Provisional Authority. However, its authority was confirmed and funding expanded under the transitional and permanent Iraqi governments. This acknowledgement of massive corruption and the decision to fight it is a success story of the occupation and the new Iraqi government.
The lack of cooperation from US and other international authorities is accurate and disheartening. Another example was when the Minister of Labor Layla Abdul Latif was arrested in May of 2005. Incredibly, many American advisors objected to her arrest because she was an attractive, English speaking woman and so put a politically correct face on the Iraqi cabinet! Never mind the evidence!
Full disclosure: I was in Iraq for nearly all of 2004 and 2005 as a a civilian advisor to the Iraqi government, with 12 months of that time at CPI.

[kesac4650]

Iraqi's may or may not have stolen Iraqi money. Now watch all the far left and far right, start pointing fingers at the other. Of course they point the same fingers, just because the sun came up this morning. I wonder how many of them expect to be taken seriously?

[nothappyatall]

Yeah, crooked, corruption in every portion, from the RepubiCON party on down. Pallets of US money were shipped over there never to be seen again, no accountability, everyone's hands in the cookie jar, MEANWHILE we have people HERE licing in cardboard boxes in city parks for lack of a home and job, denied help by financially strapped decayed social services.
MEANWHILE we US citizens like an elderly may I read about who died of carbon monoxide poisoning a few years back using kerosene heaters to heat his house because his power was SHUT OFF when he couldn't pay the bill and he had no electricity.

MEANWHILE the Bush regime has pumped half a TRILLION dollars into the fiasco and the regime appoints morons like "good job Brownie" and Bolton who no mention yet seems to be made that he was not officially appointed yet working because his butt buddy Bush put him in.

[herman1232]

In case you missed it, read this. Highly on-topic!

http://www.guardian.co.uk/g2/story/0,,1522804,00.html

[bill_alex-va]

Woodward: Bush Says He Will Not Withdraw From Iraq Even If Laura And Barney The Dog Are The Only Ones Supporting

Him... I would like to see Mr. Bush, his wife, and his dog stay in Iraq so I want to start a Fund from Americans to Send Them . "FAST Fund" Ok not the dog Barney. He was Led Into This situation with false
Information.

[carlylaine]

JFK was more Republican than Democrat for those times. Read what he said and did. And he was far superior than Clinton with their pants up or down.

Bush did what he had to do. What would you have had him do....do nothing like Clinton did? OMG!

[gozo2]

Ostlundgo has got to be kidding. US and other coalition troops are dying protecting a corrupt system. US and other coalition taxpayers' money is funding that system yet Ostlundgo wants us ot understand it is Iraqi money they are stealing.
That is like offerring a thief board and lodging as long as its not my house he robs.

[ostlundgo]

Everyone needs to understand that this was Iraqi money - not US taxpayer/congressionally appropriated funds. That's why no U.S. government official would comment on the situation other than to say "this is a purely Iraqi problem."

[r_harbison]

ONLY a half billion? Halliburton has certainly misplaced (stolen, embezzeled) far more than that and yet our media continues to avoid these grand thefts. Of course there is no help from our administration, it might lead to investigations of where the rest of the money has gone. With or without elections coming near, there is no way our government neocons will aid in locating or recovering the monies that have been and continue to be stolen from the Americdan people. This war has proven to be a debacle of theft justified by the neocons to spread democracy. To the idiot that compared JFK to Bush, it is like comparing FDR to Marcos, Samoza, or Pahlavi.

VOTE the lying, stealing thieves and self justified murders OUT of office, and then see if we can prosecute them for high treason!

[aristotle11]

JFK would be more likely to support democratic intervention in the ongoing genocide Darfur than Iraq. JFK would also be more likely to have supported Colin Powell's plan to rebuild Iraq than Rumsfeld's (the failed plan that Bush agreed to).

FYI: Just because JFK supported democracy does not mean he would support a miserable, bungled attempt to further narrow U.S. political interests in the *name* of "democracy."

[staff2--2008]

j-whitman ...you too dude...stay on topic...

[staff2--2008]

hamiltongrad post...dude stay on topic...

[j-whitman]

hamiltongrad,,, you never learned much about JFK did you?

[j-whitman]

Anyone actually believe Bush is good for any country's National Security? ,, He's certainly damaging ours.