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Friday, October 12, 2007

Blackwater contractors running amok on American soldiers
Posted by Jill | 6:16 AM
This is how the Bush Administration supports the troops -- by allowing Blackwater's thugs to intimidate them:

The colonel was furious. "Can you believe it? They actually drew their weapons on U.S. soldiers." He was describing a 2006 car accident, in which an SUV full of Blackwater operatives had crashed into a U.S. Army Humvee on a street in Baghdad's Green Zone. The colonel, who was involved in a follow-up investigation and spoke on the condition he not be named, said the Blackwater guards disarmed the U.S. Army soldiers and made them lie on the ground at gunpoint until they could disentangle the SUV. His account was confirmed by the head of another private security company. Asked to address this and other allegations in this story, Blackwater spokesperson Anne Tyrrell said, "This type of gossip has led to many soap operas in the press."

Whatever else Blackwater is or isn't guilty of—a topic of intense interest in Washington—it has a well-earned reputation in Iraq for arrogance and high-handedness. Iraqis naturally have the most serious complaints; dozens have been killed by Blackwater operatives since the beginning of the war. But many American civilian and military officials in Iraq also have little sympathy for the private security company and its highly paid employees.


This is the modus operandi of George W. Bush: use people as props and then legislate to screw them over. Use soldiers as props for your war, then cut veterans' benefits, extend their tours of duty, and make those tours one day less than enough to qualify for educational benefits. Surround yourself with "snowflake babies" to sign legislation banning embryonic stem cell research, but if those babies' families can't get health insurance, veto legislation that would provide it for them.

Greed, venality, corruption, hypocrisy: That's what will be the Bush legacy.

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