….In World War II France, Kelly (Clint Eastwood), a former lieutenant demoted to sergeant as a scapegoat, captures a German colonel in Intelligence. Kelly only wants to know the locations of good hotels and restaurants in the town of Nancy, that his unit can enjoy when they get there, but when he notices his prisoner has a gold bar, he gets him drunk to try to get information. Before he is killed by an attacking German tank, the drunken prisoner of war blurts out an interesting tidbit: there is a cache of 14,000 gold bars (valued at $16 million) stored in a bank vault 30 miles behind enemy lines in the town of Clermont….

From the NYTimes piece:

….It is unclear how much influence their work had on the ministry’s decisions.

The advisers — who, along with the diplomatic official, spoke on condition of anonymity — say that their involvement was only to help an understaffed Iraqi ministry with technical and legal details of the contracts and that they in no way helped choose which companies got the deals…. Three Democratic senators, led by Charles E. Schumer of New York, sent a letter to the State Department last week asking that the deals be delayed until after the Iraqi Parliament passes a hydrocarbons law outlining the distribution of oil revenues and regulatory matters. They contend the contracts could deepen political tensions in Iraq and endanger American soldiers.

Criticism like that has prompted objections by the Bush administration and the secretary of state, Condoleezza Rice, who say the deals are purely commercial matters. Ms. Rice, speaking on Fox News this month, said: “The United States government has stayed out of the matter of awarding the Iraq oil contracts. It’s a private sector matter.”

Shit like this just makes me proud to be an American. After liberating those those poor Iraqis and teaching them all about Democracy, these altruists still helped them hand over all their oil reserves draft the oil contracts. Give, give, give, and never count the cost.

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