So Many Schools, So Much Paint

David Weigel | April 30, 2007

Reporters are starting to dig into the newest report from the Special Inspector General for Iraq Reconstruction. As absolutely no one could have predicted, waste and corruption are making future-of-Iraq projects take excruciatingly long to get off the ground.

Those problems, as well as the continuing violence in Iraq, have prevented the United States from meeting its goals for the $34.8 billion appropriated for postwar reconstruction, the inspector general, Stuart Bowen, concludes in his quarterly report to Congress.

Investigators from Bowen's office inspected eight completed projects across Iraq and found seven of them weren't operating at capacity. Among the problems found: an unused oxygen system at a northern Iraq hospital, poorly maintained electrical generators in the Baghdad area and leaking water pipes causing ceilings to collapse in buildings used by security forces.

"If these projects are typical of the quality and effectiveness of operations and maintenance … the value of the U.S. investment in Iraq reconstruction will be at risk," the report says.

The whole report is here [PDF link], and most of it puts the best face on these problems.

Comments

|4.30.07 @ 9:45AM|#

Yet another fuck up in Iraq...is this news? yawn.

|4.30.07 @ 9:45AM|#

I can't believe you're saying these things. You're hurting the morale of the troops. (Troops). You don't know what the situation on the ground is. (Troops) Let our generals fight the war. (Troops) Out best and brightest men and women know what they're fighting for!

|4.30.07 @ 9:49AM|#

Remember when reporting on these project was supposed to refute the notion that Iraq is a debacle?

In the famous phrase, "The librul media won't report the good news," THIS crap was the "good news."

|4.30.07 @ 10:06AM|#

Stuart Bowen- wasn't that the guy the Bush administration wanted to pull the plug on? Something about "not needed anymore?"

Jim Henley|4.30.07 @ 10:32AM|#

This just proves those projects are getting desperate . . .

|4.30.07 @ 10:35AM|#

Perhaps if we took our gloves off...?

thoreau|4.30.07 @ 10:39AM|#

The paint will take some time to dry, but the liquid content is in its last throes.

|4.30.07 @ 12:17PM|#

SIGIR has repeatedly observed that corruption
is a signiicant impediment to Iraq's recovery.

'Twas silly to believe that the Iraqis would be honest or capable of maintaining anything more complicated than a camel.

|4.30.07 @ 1:14PM|#

Mr. Le Mur, you're not suggesting the corruption is limited to the Iraqi's, are you?

Rick H.|4.30.07 @ 6:56PM|#

you're not suggesting the corruption is limited to the Iraqi's, are you?

Why, those dirty, lazy, backward, ungrateful Iraqis! After all we've done!

Maybe we should take our paint and go home.