Bush, Enron, UNOCAL and the Taliban

[UpInArms]

The Bush Administration’s entanglement with ENRON is beginning to unravel as it finally admits that Enron executives entered the White House six times last year to secretly plan the Administration’s energy policy with Vice-President Cheney before the collapse of the Texas-based energy giant. Meanwhile, even more trouble for our former-Texas-oil-man-turned-President is brewing with reports that unveil UNOCAL, another big energy company, for being in bed with the Taliban, along with the U.S. government in a major, continuing effort to construct pipelines through Afghanistan from the petroleum-rich Caspian Basin in Central Asia. Beneath their burkas, UNOCAL is being exposed for giving the five star treatment to Taliban Mullahs in the Lone Star State in 1997. The “evil-ones” were also invited to meet with U.S. government officials in Washington, D.C.

Testimony by John J. Maresca, Vice President, International Relations, UNOCAL Corporation to U.S., Congress, House of Representatives, Committee on International Relations, Subcommittee on Asia and the Pacific, 105th Congress February 12, 1998, Washington, D.C.

Mr. Chairman, I am John Maresca, Vice President, International Relations, of Unocal Corporation. Unocal is one of the world's leading energy resource and project development companies. Our activities are focused on three major regions -- Asia, Latin America and the U.S. Gulf of Mexico. In Asia and the U.S. Gulf of Mexico, we are a major oil and gas producer. I appreciate your invitation to speak here today. I believe these hearings are important and timely, and I congratulate you for focusing on Central Asia oil and gas reserves and the role they play in shaping U.S. policy.

Today we would like to focus on three issues concerning this region, its resources and U.S. policy:

The need for multiple pipeline routes for Central Asian oil and gas.

The need for U.S. support for international and regional efforts to achieve balanced and lasting political settlements within Russia, other newly independent states and in Afghanistan.

… snip …

Last October, the Central Asia Pipeline, Ltd. (CentGas) consortium, in which Unocal holds an interest, was formed to develop a gas pipeline that will link Turkmenistan's vast natural gas reserves in the Dauletabad Field with markets in Pakistan and possibly India. An independent evaluation shows that the field's resources are adequate for the project's needs, assuming production rates rising over time to 2 billion cubic feet of gas per day for 30 years or more.

In production since 1983, the Dauletabad Field's natural gas has been delivered north via Uzbekistan, Kazakhstan and Russia to markets in the Caspian and Black Sea areas. The proposed 790-mile pipeline will open up new markets for this gas, travelling from Turkmenistan through Afghanistan to Multan, Pakistan. A proposed extension would link with the existing Sui pipeline system, moving gas to near New Delhi, where it would connect with the existing HBJ pipeline. By serving these additional volumes, the extension would enhance the economics of the project, leading to overall reductions in delivered natural gas costs for all users and better margins. As currently planned, the CentGas pipeline would cost approximately $2 billion. A 400-mile extension into India could add $600 million to the overall project cost.

As with the proposed Central Asia Oil Pipeline, CentGas cannot begin construction until an internationally recognized Afghanistan government is in place. For the project to advance, it must have international financing, government-to-government agreements and government-to-consortium agreements.

[multigraincracker]

1. Yep

follow the money.

[UpInArms]

2. I contacted Bob Parry

With a lot of my research back then …

Those were his words … follow the money …

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3. Thank you for posting this

This is important to remember.

[UpInArms]

5. Etched with a knife across my brain

Cannot forget … will never forgive

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6. Same

[crickets]

4. Ah, Enron. *sigh* K&R for visibility.

[UpInArms]

8. This writing put me in a book ...

Scandals and Lies

There was no "scandal" when Wendy Gramm, the wife of prominent Republican Senator Phil Gramm, approved illegal partnerships and waived the code of ethics for those partnership formations while on the Board of Directors of Enron. There is no "scandal" when Kenneth "Kenny Boy" Lay (Enron and Lay contributed $2.16 Million to Republicans in the 2000 election cycle) the largest contributor to the sitting Republican President, George Walker Bush, currently being investigated for leading one of the largest American companies, Enron, into bankruptcy following fraudulently filed earnings reports.

There was no "scandal" when Enron was allowed to price-gouge consumers and the sitting Republican President George Walker Bush refused to allow the Federal Energy Regulatory Committee (FERC) to impose price caps to control excess profiteering. There was no "scandal" when the current sitting Republican President George Walker Bush appointed Elliott Abrams (convicted of lying to Congress about the Iran-Contra affair) to the Human Rights Commission of the United Nations.

The book

The I Hate Republicans Reader: Why the GOP Is Totally Wrong About Everything

To be included with these other writers …

Divided into such easy-reference sections as Greed, Corruption, Malicious Stupidity, and Big Lies, this collection includes appropriate excerpts from the likes of Eric Schlosser, Michael Moore, Joan Didion, Molly Ivins and Lou Dubose, and David Brock, as well as Ralph Nader, Paul Krugman, Hunter S. Thompson, Barbara Ehrenreich, I.F. Stone, Jimmy Carter, James Carville, Christopher Hitchens, Al Franken, and Bill Moyers.

I was honored …

[Hekate]

7. KnR

[BlueGreenLady]

9. Thanks, Up In Arms, for pulling this back out of the memory hole!

It's saddens me how few Americans remember why we started the Afghanistan, Iraq and the Vietnam wars, how many lives and dollars were lost and how little we have learned from them.

Hope you are well and staying safe from the Covid. Let's visit again one of these days..

[UpInArms]

10. Miss you ...

Maybe soon …

[BillyBobBrilliant]

11. For more information read

‘The Grand Chessboard,’ by Zbigniew Brzezinski

[UpInArms]

12. Mika

Is his daughter ..

Mika Brzezinski

Mika Emilie Leonia Brzezinski Scarborough (/ˈmiːkə brəˈzɪnski ˈskɑːrbəroʊ/;[3] born May 2, 1967)[4] is an American journalist, talk show host, liberal political commentator, and author who currently co-hosts MSNBC's weekday morning broadcast show Morning Joe. She was formerly a CBS News correspondent, and was their principal "Ground Zero" reporter during the morning of the September 11 attacks. In 2007 she joined MSNBC as an occasional anchor, and was subsequently chosen as co-host of Morning Joe, alongside Joe Scarborough.

Mika Brzezinski is a visiting fellow at the Harvard Institute of Politics.[5] Her main political interest is in wage equality for women. She is also the author of three books; two on her career as a journalist and one on food addiction.

In 2021, Forbes partnered with Brzezinski and her "Know Your Value" initiative, to shine a light on 50 diverse women over the age of 50 who have achieved significant success later in life, often by overcoming formidable odds or barriers.[6]

Brzezinski is the daughter of diplomat and political scientist Zbigniew Brzezinski, who served as adviser to both Lyndon B. Johnson and Jimmy Carter.