corrente

Go read this. Now.

You're still here. Why?

Oh all right, I guess I must explain. The Pulizer Prize committee can just save some time and print up another award now for the Washington Post, this time for Rajiv Chandrasekaran.

He got the CPA people to talk. Had to give them anonymity--although he got Bremer on the record for comments that blew my mind, and I bet he is going to really regret--but this is huge. And it's just the first installment of a three part piece. Which is running the Sunday, Monday and Tuesday of the week which, on Friday, will see the opening of "Fahrenheit 9/11."

You're still here. I sigh at your obstinacy. Okay then, here are tidbits:

BAGHDAD -- The American occupation of Iraq is formally ending this month having failed to fulfill many of its goals and stated promises intended to transform the country into a stable democracy, according to a detailed examination drawing upon interviews with senior U.S. and Iraqi officials and internal documents of the occupation authority.

Discussion of the things which are still broken: The army. The police. Reconstruction. The electrical system. Back to you, Rajiv...

In an interview last week, Bremer maintained that "Iraq has been fundamentally changed for the better" by the occupation... Among his biggest accomplishments, he said, were the lowering of Iraq's tax rate, the liberalization of foreign-investment laws and the reduction of import duties.

Bremer acknowledged he was not able to make all the changes to Iraq's political system and economy he had envisioned , including the privatization of state-run industries...

Despite the scale of their plans, and Bremer's conclusion by last July that Iraq would need "several tens of billions of dollars" for reconstruction, CPA specialists had virtually no resources to fund projects on their own to create much-needed local employment in the months after the war. Instead, they relied on two U.S. firms, Halliburton Co. and Bechtel Corp., which were awarded large contracts to patch Iraq's infrastructure.

The CPA also lacked experienced staff. A few development specialists were recruited from the State Department and nongovernmental organizations. But most CPA hiring was done by the White House and Pentagon personnel offices, with posts going to people with connections to the Bush administration or the Republican Party.

Was I kidding? Yes, yes, we have known all these things for months if not longer. But this is the story that brings it all together for the rest of the world, the folks who have been increasingly uneasy but are still clinging to the notion that "the price has been high but we're doing good there, it will be worth it in the end."

Yes it has, no we're not to any measurable degree, and no it won't. Now stop reading my blather and click the link already.