I think we need to give the inept Iraqi political leadership a timetable. Its unconsionable that Iraq’s oil is the biggest funding source for al-Qaeda and other terrorists there.

al-Maliki et al give little hope and mostly despair:

The sabotage attacks that have crippled Iraq’s oil pipelines and refineries for the past three years are now being used to aid a vast smuggling network that is costing the Iraqi government billions of dollars a year, senior Iraqi and American officials here say.

Once thought to be only a tool for insurgents to undermine the government, the pipeline attacks have evolved into a lucrative moneymaking scheme for insurgents and enterprising criminal gangs alike. Ali Al Alak, the inspector general for the Oil Ministry, said the attacks are now orchestrated by both groups to force the government to import and distribute as much fuel as possible using thousands of tanker trucks

Not only does the inept Iraqi government have to import oil, which costs over ten times what it did some years ago, but..

as much as 30 percent of imported gasoline is promptly stolen and resold abroad by smugglers, according to American and Iraqi officials. The shortfall is part of what forces Iraqi families to spend more on fuel from the black market, where it is far more expensive than from legal outlets. The poisonous blend of smuggling and sabotage is yet another blow to the economy of a country whose huge oil reserves were expected before the 2003 invasion to pay for its reconstruction

…

Iraq spent $4 billion to $5 billion in 2005 to import fuel from abroad. Alak’s research indicates that because of the huge price incentives, between 10 percent and 30 percent of that fuel is smuggled out of the country again.

The chief of the Commission on Public Integrity, Radhi al-Radhi, who has investigated dozens of smuggling cases, agreed with Alak’s assessment, as did a Western diplomat in Baghdad, who spoke anonymously according to official procedure. Similar figures were also cited in little-noticed Congressional testimony in April by David M. Walker, comptroller general of the United States, after a visit to Iraq

In Iraq’s oil they’ve found their money raising Mecca.

Nothing the slanted media does – or doesn’t do – surprises me. Our local rag the Times-Picayune (New Orleans) beat the Foley thing to pieces, runs nothing but far left political cartoons, and has printed NOT ONE WORD, nada, zip, about the Harry Reid real estate scam. Go figure. Biased media? Naaaahhh.