Finally! News of a successful building project in Iraq

[underpants]

PHOTOS: The $592 Million U.S. Embassy In Iraq

http://thinkprogress.org/2007/05/29/photos-embassy-iraq/

Construction of the U.S. embassy in Iraq, set to open in September, is projected to cost $592 million, with a staff of 1,000 people and operating costs totaling $1.2 billion a year. It will be a 104-acre complex, which is the size of approximately 80 football fields. On May 10, Sen. Patrick Leahy (D-VT) criticized the ballooning size and cost of the embassy in a hearing with Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice:

Now, having said over and over again that we don’t want to be seen as an occupying force in Iraq, we’re building the largest embassy that we have — probably the largest in the world — in Baghdad. And it just seems to grow and grow and grow. … We agree that we should focus our aid locally not in Baghdad, but we have 1,000 Americans at the embassy in Baghdad. You add the contractors and the local staff it comes to 4,000.

The architectural firm designing the embassy, Berger Define Yaeger, has posted the designs for the colossus on its website. Some previews of the compound’s planned swimming pool and tennis courts:



The complex “will include two office buildings, one of them designed for future use as a school, six apartment buildings, a gym, a pool, a food court and its own power generation and water-treatment plants.”

[LibDemAlways]

1. The Iraqi people will have quite a structure there when

the last helicopter departs from the roof of one of those buildings as the last Americans flee.

[wakeme2008]

2. Chief of Mission's Home

[underpants]

3. Why isn't the butler wearing pants?

:shrug: that's strange

[trotsky]

6. Local custom.

Or Bush family custom - you pick.

[underpants]

9. ...

:rofl:

[L. Coyote]

4. US LIES: Journalist Quit Iraqi Media Project = $96M Propaganda Project

Before you believe ANYTHING AT ALL in the way of Iraq news, read "Assault on Reason" and these:
INSTALLING DEMOCRACY NOW! USG-seized IRAQ media run by defense contractor.

US Journalist Quit Pentagon Iraqi Media Project = $96M Propaganda Project - http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_mesg&forum=389&topic_id=980430&mesg_id=981323

======================
Wednesday, January 14th, 2004
U.S. Journalist Quits Pentagon Iraqi Media Project Calling it U.S. Propaganda
http://www.democracynow.org/article.pl?sid=04/01/14/155

Listen LINK

We talk to a longtime TV producer about the massive problems he saw in the new U.S.-funded Iraqi Media Network, which he said became an "irrelevant mouthpiece for Coalition Provisional Authority propaganda, managed news and mediocre programs." The U.S. has awarded a $96 million contract to a U.S. producer of communications equipment, Harris Corp., to create a U.S.-funded national media network in Iraq.

According to the head of Harris Corp, the Iraqi Media Network will have 30 TV and radio transmitters, three broadcast studios, and 12 bureaus around Iraq.

After U.S.-led troops ousted Saddam Hussein's regime in April, the state-run broadcasters were seized. Since then, they have been run by a U.S. defense contractor, Science Applications International Corporation. .........

TRANSCRIPT w/ Amy Goodman ........ longtime TV producer, Don North, about the problems he saw ...

==========================
Your tax $$$ purchased media outlets in Iraq, and bought reporters too - http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=389x980363#980750

We have to ask,
"To what extent is this happening today and everywhere?"
"To what extent is this happening with other issues too?"

I have been told by major news announcers, "We just read it."
And, worse still, they do not even know who writes it for them!

We have to ask,
"To what extent is news just propaganda and BUSH LIES?"

==========================
Pentagon pays Iraqi papers to print its 'good news' stories
Jamie Wilson in Washington
Thursday December 1, 2005 - The Guardian
http://www.guardian.co.uk/Iraq/Story/0,2763,1654661,00.html

Faced with suicide bombings, claims of Iraqi death squads, and kidnappings, the Pentagon has come up with an innovative solution to solving the problems in Iraq: buying good news. Using defence contractors or intermediaries posing as freelance reporters, the military has been paying Iraqi newspapers to publish stories written by a military propaganda unit lauding the US mission.

According to the Los Angeles Times, the articles are translated into Arabic and placed in Baghdad newspapers where they are often presented as unbiased accounts by independent journalists. Records obtained by the newspaper indicate the US has paid to publish dozens of articles since the operation began this year, with headlines such as "Iraqis insist on living despite terrorism" and "more money goes to Iraq's development".

One military official told the LA Times the military has also bought an Iraqi newspaper and taken control of a radio station, ...........

==========================
Pentagon OK's Propaganda for Iraq (and Possibly Elsewhere) - http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=389x980363#981355
Source: Los Angeles Times, March 4, 2006 - http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/world/la-fg-inf
http://www.prwatch.org/node/4517

Declaring it "within our authorities and responsibilities," the top U.S. general in Iraq, George Casey, announced that the Lincoln Group program that covertly places stories written by U.S. troops in Iraqi newspapers will continue. Navy Admiral Scott Van Buskirk is also reviewing the Iraq propaganda program. His review was previously described as finished but not public .....

===========================
The Sword Employs the Pen = "the military's practice of paying journalists"

Center for Media and Democracy » Spin of the Day » Feb 07, 2005

The Sword Employs the Pen - http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=389x980363#981426
http://www.prwatch.org/node/3260

The Pentagon is investigating "the military's practice of paying journalists to write articles and commentary ... and also looking more broadly at Pentagon activities that might involve inappropriate payments to journalists," writes Associated Press. CNN reported on Pentagon involvement with two news websites, Southeast European Times (focused on the Balkans) and Magharebia (focused on North Africa). Some 50 journalists were paid by the Pentagon through a private contractor, Anteon Corporation, ..........

==============================
Pentagon Paid Reporters for Stories Overseas
February 06, 2005 9:00 AM ET
http://www.editorandpublisher.com/eandp/news/article_display.jsp?vnu_content_id=1000789872

WASHINGTON (AP) The Pentagon’s chief investigator is looking into the military’s practice of paying journalists to write articles and commentary for a Web site aimed at influencing public opinion in the Balkans, officials said Friday.

At the request of Larry Di Rita, chief spokesman for Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld, the Pentagon’s inspector general, Joseph Schmitz, is reviewing that case and also looking more broadly at Pentagon activities that might involve inappropriate payments to journalists. ...............

==============================
Covert propaganda >> Instances of covert propaganda - http://www.sourcewatch.org/index.php?title=Covert_propaganda

[welshTerrier2]

5. the embassy is important

go ahead; make fun of it ... it's more than clear you don't have a clue how badly that embassy is needed.

imperialism is not some kind of little game you know; it's damned serious business. you think Big Oil makes all those hundreds of billions of dollars without the support of the US military and the US taxpayer? don't you understand that all sorts of other people are after Iraq's oil too?

you expect them to build all those pipelines and develop all those oil fields on a shoestring budget? it's ridiculous. do you think they can just setup operations over there and work out of a tent or something?

i, for one, am happy to see the lives of American troops "invested" in this effort. so we lose a few; big deal ... it's worth it. and then I hear all this whining from you lefty freepers about how, by the time all the bills for this war and occupation have been paid, it will have cost the US more than 2 Trillion dollars. 2 Trillion. and you're complaining about a capital outlay of just $592 million and some operating costs? give me a break!

it has always been the symbiosis between our government and business that allows these monumental profits to be generated. that's what makes the bush strategy so sound. the way some people here talk you'd think there was something wrong with making billions and billions of dollars from those pathetic people in the Middle East.

and besides, aren't the Democrats running the show now? aren't they the party controlling the budget? you think they would let Big Oil get away with anything unsavory? I doubt it. it must all be legit.

so, quit you're whining about the embassy. we need it. it's good for America and it's good for Iraq.

[underpants]

8. What's good for M&M enterprises...

well you know the rest

[Virginia Dare]

7. I see a problem here..

no lifeguard stations at the pool, very unsafe..

[underpants]

10. Someone could get hurt

and no one wants that