"A North Carolina man who was charged yesterday with accepting kickbacks and bribes as a comptroller and financial officer for the American occupation authority in Iraq was hired despite having served prison time for felony fraud in the 1990’s.
The job gave the man, Robert J. Stein, control over $82 million in cash earmarked for Iraqi rebuilding projects.
Along with a web of other conspirators who have not yet been named, Mr. Stein and his wife received “bribes, kickbacks and gratuities amounting to at least $200,000 per month” to steer lucrative construction contracts to companies run by another American, Philip H. Bloom, an affidavit outlining the criminal complaint says. Mr. Stein’s wife, who was not named, has not been charged with wrongdoing in the case; Mr. Bloom was charged with a range of crimes on Wednesday.
In the staccato language of the affidavit, filed in Federal District Court in the District of Columbia, Mr. Stein, 50, was charged with wire fraud, conspiracy, interstate transportation of stolen property and conspiracy to commit money laundering."
You forget of course, that the CPA was one big abortion from day one. Look up the article on the Washington Post site where they talk about who they hired as staffers for the CPA - a bunch of 21 yr olds whose resumes they found on the Heritage Foundation website. Most of these kids had no experience at all in the duties they eventually assumed, and typically for only 90 days, at that.
Given that they could have hired dozens if not hundreds of people from NGOs and other organizations who have experience rebuilding countries, one can only conclude that they didn’t take the CPA seriously, or were so ideologically blinded that their fundamental incompetence just shined through. Either way, it’s clear - if you go in without a credible plan, and then use unreliable and unqualified people, you can count on massive failures. Anybody expecting success doesn’t know the first fucking thing about how to run an organization and is too stupid to even talk to. And gee, who might I be talking about?
Go to jail for a couple of years then come out as a multi-millionaire to live his life in the Bahamas or Rio and jetsetting to Switzerland to his banks and to enjoy some frolicking in the Alps?