Cheney Makes the case against Iraq.

This is a quote from Cheney's speech.

"The risk of inaction is far greater than the risk of action," he said, in remarks clearly designed to win over public opinion at home and address skepticism abroad over military action to oust Iraqi leader Saddam Hussein.

"And the entire world must know that we will take whatever action is necessary to defend our freedom and our security."

Of course Cheney didn't feel that way about Saddam, back when he was a businessman, and CEO of Haliburton.

It was then that Cheney actually circumvented U.S. law about doing business with Iraq. He used a subsidiary in Great Britain, to sell spare parts to the evil dictator Saddam Hussein.

Cheney has got to be one of the biggest hypocrites U.S. politic's recent history.

Anyway. Here's an article on Cheney's speech.

http://www.reuters.com/news_article...SCRBAEOCFEY?type=politicsnews&StoryID=1373435

When it meant that he could make a buck from the deal, the risk of Saddam wasnt' so great. He was not only 'inactive' in dealing with the leader, he went around existing U.S. law to do business with Hussein.

Cheney's also done the exact same thing with Khadafi in Libya, and Iran. He's had more dealings with terrorists than Mullah Omar.

Hussein might have already been gone, or in very serious trouble of being ousted from within his own country, if people like Cheney hadn't gone out of their way to circumvent sanctions just so they could make some money.

Now, after circumventing laws designed to bring Saddam down, he's willing to sacrifice American lives? I wouldn't mind seeing him brought up on charges of treason. This is not unlike people like Henry Ford trading with Hitler.

How dare Cheney who went around and disobeyed laws that might have helped bring Hussein down without a military invasion decide that now it's ok to spend untold human life to carry out what he was unwilling to participate in peacefully.

 

http://peaceworks.missouri.org/afghanistan/cheney.html

This is an exerpt from an article from the financial times of London.

From 1995 until August this year Halliburton's chief executive officer was Dick Cheney, US secretary of defence during the Gulf war and now Republican vice-presidential running mate of George W.Bush.

From September 1998 until it sold its stake last February, Halliburton owned 51 per cent of Dresser-Rand. It also owned 49 per cent of Ingersoll-Dresser Pump, until its sale in December 1999. During the time of the joint ventures, Dresser-Rand and Ingersoll-Dresser Pump submitted more than $23.8m worth of contracts for the sale of oil industry parts and equipment to Iraq. Their combined total amounted to more than any other US company; the vast majority was approved by the sanctions committee.

It's ashame when Cheney hides behind subsidiaries like Dresser Rand, and Ingersoll-Dresser Pump to make bucks, by doing business with such a dangerous man.

 

Cheney's hiding. He tried to say to Sam Donaldson that he didn't do any business with Iraq. That's not true. He also had to use foreign subsidiaries and not his company here in the states, or the deals wouldn't have been improved.

He sold the parts to the govt. of Iraq. Now the guy wants to send soldiers there, some of whom will die. I'm not even arguing the point of whether or not troops should go into Iraq, but Cheney is the last person that should be willing to send them in after he did business with the guy.

 

Cheney is also a liar and a crook. Haliburton under Cheney as CEO was fined millions of dollars for overcharging the pentagon. It's great when the VP of the country is guilty of ripping the govt. off.

This is from another article, that shows Cheney through Haliburton's subsidiaries and other shady deals circumvented sanctions as peaceful means for dealing with terrorist countries. He's been fined for dealing with Libya as well.

In addition to Iraq, Halliburton counts among its business partners several brutal dictatorships that have committed egregious human rights abuses, including the hated military regime in Burma (Myanmar). EarthRights, a Washington, D.C.-based human rights watchdog, condemned Halliburton for two energy-pipeline projects in Burma that led to the forced relocation of villages, rape, murder, indentured labor, and other crimes against humanity. A full report (this is a 45 page pdf file - there is also a brief summary) on the Burma connection, "Halliburton's Destructive Engagement," can be accessed on EarthRights' Web site, www.earthrights.org.

Human rights activists have also criticized Cheney's company for its questionable role in Algeria, Angola, Bosnia, Croatia, Haiti, Rwanda, Somalia, Indonesia, and other volatile trouble spots. In Russia, Halliburton's partner, Tyumen Oil, has been accused of committing massive fraud to gain control of a Siberian oil field. And in oil-rich Nigeria, Halliburton worked with Shell and Chevron, which were implicated in gross human rights violations and environmental calamities in that country. Indeed, Cheney's firm increased its involvement in the Niger Delta after the military government executed several ecology activists and crushed popular protests against the oil industry.

Halliburton also had business dealings in Iran and Libya, which remain on the State Department's list of terrorist states. Brown and Root, a Halliburton subsidiary, was fined $3.8 million for reexporting U.S. goods to Libya in violation of U.S. sanctions.
http://www.sfbg.com/reality/04.html

Cheney also lied about his involvement. Here is part of a transcript in which Cheney flat out denied his involvement.

Donaldson: I'm told, and correct me if I'm wrong, that Halliburton, through subsidiaries, was actually trying to do business in Iraq?

Cheney: No. No. I had a firm policy that I wouldn't do anything in Iraq – even arrangements that were supposedly legal.

And that was it! ABC News and the other U.S. networks dropped the issue like a hot potato. As damning information about Halliburton surfaced in the European press, American reporters stuck to old routines and took their cues on how to cover the campaign from the two main political parties, both of which had very little to say about official U.S. support for abusive corporate policies at home and abroad.

I think whoever said that Media had a corporate bias as opposed to liberal or conservative bias seems to have been on the money.

So Haliburton under Cheney was fined for ripping off our own govt. as well as breaking the sanctions dealing with Libya. Of course he went through loopholes to do business with Iraq, and now he Cheney has the nerve to advocate sending other people to die in order to remove part of the problem he helped support?

 

I don't know about the London financial times not being neutral. I do agree that the websites that copied the article from the financial times are against Cheney. The thing that gets me is that it's mostly facts and numbers. Like the fact that Haliburton owns those subsidiaries, and the fact that Hlaiburton has been fined while under Cheney's leadership.

I don't know about any records saying that Cheney was the man initiating these shady deals, but he was in charge, and he's said recently that he's 'proud' of Haliburton, and that it's a terrific company. Here are some quotes of Cheney talking about how much sanctions make it hard for him to do business. These are Cheney's own words.

I have not stressed the commercial arguments against sanctions. And I won't bore you with giving you a long list of how difficult it is for an international company like ours to function when our partners overseas are periodically reminded that we may not be able to carry through on a particular project because somebody here at home decides to sanction the particular country involved—thus causing us to be viewed as being an unreliable partner. There is a whole long, separate speech I could give on the difficulties U.S. firms encounter as a result of the use of unilateral economic sanctions and on the subsequent commercial and economic consequences to the U.S. economy.

Here's another specifically talking about Iran.

Unfortunately, Iran is sitting right in the middle of the area and the United States has declared unilateral economic sanctions against that country. As a result, American firms are prohibited from dealing with Iran and find themselves cut out of the action, both in terms of opportunities that develop with respect to Iran itself, and also with respect to our ability to gain access to Caspian resources.
http://www.cato.org/speeches/sp-dc062398.html

Cheney is actually upset that U.S. companies are cut out of the action in Iran. I guess that's why he went around those companies through subsidiaries to go ahead do business with Iran.

Here is just a tidbit about the 2 million dollar fine Haliburton had to pay for overcharging the pentagon.
Cheney's Haliburton Pays $2 Million for Defrauding the Government

The New York Times reported on February 8, 2002, that Kellog Brown & Root, a military contractor will pay the government $2 million to settle accusations that it defrauded the government. The US attorney's office said the company, a Houston subsidiary of the multinational energy services corporation Haliburton was accused of inflating contract prices for maintenance and repairs at Fort Ord, a now closed military base near Monterrey, California. Vice President Dick Cheney was Haliburton's chairman and chief executive when the government says Kellogg Brown & Root made the false claims and statements. http://www.gwbushwatch.com/March_30_2002.htm

 

Here's a little more on Cheney, and whether he knew about the deals, personally. It also helps prove that he was lying when questioned on the issue by Sam Donaldson.

Two former senior executives of the Halliburton subsidiaries said they knew of no policy against dealing with Iraq. One of them said he was certain Cheney knew about the deals, though he had never spoken about them to the vice president directly.
http://www.newsmax.com/archives/articles/2001/6/24/80648.shtml

I hope that helps.

 

I agree those websites are leaning left. That doesn't mean their facts are wrong. I think it's the fault that more journalists haven't picked up these stories and made more of a big deal out of them.

On television I have heard them brought up on Crossfire, and by Ariana Huffington. Ariana Huffington isn't a liberal.

These news stories though are few and far between. I will say that when they were brought up on Crossfire, the side leaning right had no answer to the charges because there truly is no way to justify Cheney's behavior.

The fact that Cheney wants to attack Iraq, or wanted to persue the gulf war to baghdad, only makes him more inhumane for turning right around and then doing business with Iraq. He's willing to send people to die, bringing Iraq down, but doesn't want to sacrifice money making opportunities in the effort. His priorities of $$ over human life, is sickening.

When Cheney's subsidiaries are doing more business with Iraq than any other corporation in the U.S. I think it's reasonable to presume that the CEO would have some knowledge.

The quotes from Cheney's speech also show he disagrees with policy toward dictatorships and terrorist nations interfering with business.

 

I'm not tarnishing Cheney's name. Cheney tarnished his own name by doing business with Saddam Hussein, Iran, Libya, and ripping off the Pentagon. Cheney lied about it, and has been caught.

The fact that Cheney obviously has no qualms or moral problems about doing business with someone, but then feels that the person deserves to have their country invaded is despicable.

I thought Bush was going to be integrity back to the Whitehouse. This is a horrible way to do that.

Reading Cheney's speech about him being upset that someone back at home who wanst sanctions and was concerned about doing business with nations that support terrorism is getting in the way of his business opportunities is disgusting. Especiall after what happened on 9/11.

You're right, I'm frustrated, sad, and angry, that someone who cares more about money, than values, principles, and evidently human life, is in such a high position of power. I guess my goal in this thread is to expose the kind of behavior that passes in government today.

Clinton was horrible, lying and being dishonest about his affairs. He was tacky in some of the ways he raised money, and he bombed a medical plant in Sudan. That stuff got a lot of attention, and probably deserved some of it.

But this is at least as bad, if not worse considering Cheney wants to send U.S. men and women into harms way.

 

Well I don't think it is insignificant amount of sales. We are talking about tens of millions of dollars. If Cheney doesn't know where that much money of his company's money is coming from, he's a lousy CEO. But that only takes care of one of the problems. He obviously has no qualms about doing business with terrorists. Cheney even complained that sanctions were interfering with his ability to do business. His priorities are way off. He lied about doing business with Iraq, even if it had only been .00000000001% he still did business with Hussein. His company ripped off the Pentagon, and was fined for doing business with Libya. Yes technically the Iraq deal was legal. That's part of the problem. He didn't like the U.S. laws so he went around them by using foreign subsidiaries.

This stuff doesn't even touch on the lawsuit by Judicial watch, or his other unethical dealings involving Burma, Nigeria, Angola etc. Frankly I didn't bring that up because I think there are plenty of companies that engage in that kind of business, which I do think is wrong. But I won't single Cheney out for that. But his company was the largest U.S. corporation to do business with Iraq, and he lied when asked about it. That, I will single him out for, as well dealing with other nations that support terrorism, and are now in the 'axis of evil.' He may not take terrorism seriously, but I do. If Bush wants to go after people who support terrorism, he should look no further than his own vice president.