When it comes to American taxpayer dollars, Iraq is a sieve.
That is why the report by the Government Accountability Office on the Iraqi government's estimated $ 79 billion budget surplus at the end of the year has caused such an uproar on Capitol Hill and around the nation.
The excuses from the administration for why Iraq is not being forced to pay for its own reconstruction are at once insulting and not persuasive. To contend that the Iraqis do not have the knowledge or the wherewithal to spend their own money on their own needs - there are parts of the country that still lack all-day electricity supply and clean water - is to beg the question," If not now, when ?"Given the shaky economy and the high price of gas, Americans are justified in asking why oilrich Iraq isn't supplying the U. S. at bargain prices, seeing as how their oil industry has been revived by American taxpayers.
- Vindicator, Youngstown, Ohio
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