MIA

Or MIM, Missing in Media.

I don't know about you, but I don't recall hearing a lot about the supposed scandal involving the Iraqi oil-for-food program of late. For those with short memories, this was the claim that Saddam Hussein in effect ran rings around the UN by salting away billions of dollars via a system of payoffs to political leaders and journalists to overlook his sticky dealings with the companies distributing the oil, which, in exchange for some kickbacks, claimed they paid a lot less for Iraqi oil than they really did, with the excess going to Saddam.

Got that? It's charged that over the 7 years the program was running, Saddam may have skimmed off around $10 billion - about $1.4 billion a year. That's a good hunk of change.

The problem with the whole business, especially the part trying to implicate high UN officials in the scandal, is that

none the documents which are said to support this claim have been seen, let alone authenticated by any neutral observers,

as Josh Marshall reminded us last week. The documents were then, and as far as I can tell from a Google news search still are, in the control of the Finance Committee of the Iraqi Governing Council. (Sidebar: Marshall says the actual name is the Interim Governing Council and I'm prepared to concede his greater knowledge of such matters, but as I have seen it repeatedly referred to in other media as the Iraqi Governing Council, I'm going to continue to do so until I can determine it should be otherwise.) The Finance Committee is controlled by

Ahmed Chalabi and

the man picked personally by

Ahmed Chalabi

to head the investigation is Claude Hankes-Drielsma, a British financial adviser and an old friend of

Ahmed Chalabi.

Marshall says

thus far, Hankes-Drielsma and Chalabi have resisted turning over the relevant documents to either the investigators at the CPA or the Volcker Commission which was appointed by Kofi Annan to investigate the matter on behalf of the UN.

Again, I've seen nothing in recent days saying that situation has changed.

Frankly, while it's altogether possible that Saddam pocketed trunkfuls of bucks is this deal quite apart from any potential guilt on the part of UN officials, it's also clear that Chalabi has a real interest in discrediting the UN as an agency in Iraq. If he's to maintain his dream of political power in the future, it can't be based on his popularity among Iraqis - he has none - but only on the continued support of his backers in the US. The more the UN is involved, the less his influence.

Of course, those over at the extreme starboard side of the USS America worked themselves into a froth about this, but even they have been relatively silent the last week or so. (Fox News was reduced today to blaring "Ex-Oil-for-Food Head Defiant to Questions" in an article that really boiled down to his refusing to be interviewed by a reporter who approached him on the street.)

Now personally, I can't help but wonder if all the fuss and fuming over what Saddam Hussein did years ago (You mean he was not only a brutal tyrant, he was crooked? Oh my gosh! Well, I guess the invasion was the right thing to do, then!) was to provide covering fire for this, from EPIC, the Education for Peace In Iraq Center:

According to a special investigation by National Public Radio's Marketplace and the Center for Investigative Reporting, it is estimated that 20% of Iraq Reconstruction funds are being lost to corruption. The report documents the failure of the US government to effectively oversee expenditures in a reconstruction effort that is costing 10 times more per capita than the Marshall Plan.

Another 20% of the reconstruction funds are being used to provide security for contractors, though many contractors are leaving Iraq. According to a coalition source, 25% of contractors have currently pulled out of Iraq and the other 75% have pulled back to their base. There appear to be major delays with the disbursement of reconstruction funds. As of early April, only $2 billion of the $18 billion allocated by Congress last October had been disbursed. The corruption, security environment and delays are putting U.S. efforts to rebuild and stabilize Iraq in grave danger.

No way Saddam is going to outdo the entrepreneurial spirit of the good old US of A!

The link to the NPR series is here.