Another Benchmark Bites The Dust

by hilzoy

From the NYT:

"A carefully constructed compromise on a draft law governing Iraq’s rich oil fields, agreed to in February after months of arduous talks among Iraqi political groups, appears to have collapsed. The apparent breakdown comes just as Congress and the White House are struggling to find evidence that there is progress toward reconciliation and a functioning government here.

Senior Iraqi negotiators met in Baghdad on Wednesday in an attempt to salvage the original compromise, two participants said. But the meeting came against the backdrop of a public series of increasingly strident disagreements over the draft law that had broken out in recent days between Hussain al-Shahristani, the Iraqi oil minister, and officials of the provincial government in the Kurdish north, where some of the nation’s largest fields are located.

Mr. Shahristani, a senior member of the Arab Shiite coalition that controls the federal government, negotiated the compromise with leaders of the Kurdish and Arab Sunni parties. But since then, the Kurds have pressed forward with a regional version of the law that Mr. Shahristani says is illegal. Many of the Sunnis who supported the original deal have also pulled out in recent months. (...)

The legislation has already been presented to the Iraqi Parliament, which has been unable to take virtually any action on it for months. Contributing to the dispute is the decision by the Kurds to begin signing contracts with international oil companies before the federal law is passed. The most recent instance, announced last week on a Kurdish government Web site, was an oil exploration contract with the Hunt Oil Company of Dallas.

The Sunni Arabs who removed their support for the deal did so, in part, because of a contract the Kurdish government signed earlier with a company based in the United Arab Emirates, Dana Gas, to develop gas reserves. (...)

But the prime minister’s office believes there is a simpler reason the Sunnis abandoned or at least held off on the deal: signing it would have given Mr. Maliki a political success that they did not want him to have. “I think there is a political reason behind that delay in order not to see the Iraqi government achieve the real agreement,” said Sadiq al-Rikabi, a political adviser to Mr. Maliki. Mr. Rikabi was at Wednesday’s meeting."

This is very serious, and very bad. Once an oil law is in place, contracts will be on firmer ground, Iraq can collect more revenue, and it will be clear how that revenue is to be distributed to the various provinces. Money flowing to the regions, in turn, could help bolster provincial governments, and give people a stake in the continued functioning of the central government. But it takes actual cooperation to produce, enact, and sign off on that sort of legislation, and cooperation has always been in short supply. If, for some unfathomable reason, we needed more evidence that the Iraqi political process is dysfunctional, we just got it.

And if we needed more evidence about the depth of Sunni-Shi'a cooperation after the Anbar awakening, I think we just got that too.

Comments

[publius]

To completely derail the thread -- warner's in for VA. Mark it up. That's at least 2 very likely wins (CO and VA) before you even get to MN, RI, ME, NH and OR.

[Lesly]

The oil law — which would govern how oil fields are developed and managed — is one of several benchmarks that the Bush administration has been pressing the Iraqis to meet as a sign that they are making headway toward creating an effective government.

This must be the IMF-backed oil bill. If it is, the Sunni walkout is definitely political and I think, in the long term, best for Iraqi nationals to forge their own law and redistribute wealth as they see fit.

[Ugh]

How is it that we let an American oil company sign on to a deal that's wrecking progress in Iraq? Is there any better sign that the administration doesn't give a fnck?

[Hartmut]

I don't think there is any possible universally acceptable oil law.
Washington will not accept/allow any version that cuts into the profits of "Big Oil" or would enable the Iraqis to ignore US companies in favor of others (e.g. Chinese), the have-regions will not be willing to share with the have-nots and any central government would be mad to let go of its main lever, the ability to decide what the revenue is used for. And while no law is in place there is money to be made in smuggling.
The mere fact that Washington is pressing for the passing of an oil law is enough to kill the chance of acceptance and the actions against the oilworker union do not improve the situation.

[obscure]

I think of the presidents grandfather getting rich off the Nazis.
I think of the Heritage Foundation neophytes sent over to administer the new right-wing Utopia in Iraq.
I think of GWB helping wreck political progress because he can't resist the impulse to help his Texas oil cronies get on the gravy train.

I think it is egregious self-dealing riff-raff like Bush who generate egregious left-wing lunacy of the General Betray Us sort. It's an equal and opposite reaction.

[Amos Newcombe]

Josh over at TPM points out that Hunt Oil is run by Ray Hunt, a buddy, and political appointee (to the Foreign Intelligence Advisory Board) of the president. So I guess we're about to see if policy is really more important to the president than enriching his oil buddies.

And I agree with Lesly that this particular oil bill, precisely because it is being imposed from without, is not in the best interest of Iraq.

[kathy gill]

You should NOT be endorsing this bill!

It is a US crafted bill that sets the country up to be plundered by multi-nationals. I've written about this 3-4 times now. See US-Orchestrated Iraqi Oil Bill Stalled

Ds and Progressives do NOT tout this bill -- it is a big business (as usual) bill.

[BegoniaBuzzkill]

Posted by: Lesly
How is it that we let an American oil company sign on to a deal that's wrecking progress in Iraq? Is there any better sign that the administration doesn't give a fnck?

-----
An article in tomorrow's Times reports that the long-negotiated compromise which seemed to be leading towards an Iraqi oil law

the decision of the Kurdistan regional government to sign an oil exploration deal with Dallas-based Hunt Oil, run by Mr. Ray L. Hunt.

But remember, Hunt, in addition to being the son of legendary Texas John Birch Society extremist H.L. Hunt, is also a pal of the president's.

Indeed, President Bush has twice appointed Hunt to his Foreign Intelligence Advisory Board. So while the president is striving to get the Iraqis to meet these benchmarks one of his own pals -- and more importantly, political appointees -- is busy helping to tear the whole thing apart.

http://talkingpointsmemo.com/archives/053047.php

[John Thullen]

Ah, the Hunt family, the Zelig of American families.

If a movie could be shot about the Hunt family of Texas and the line it traces through U.S. foreign policy over the past 65 years, I'd let Oliver Stone write the screenplay, Orson Welles would direct, and Larry Hagman would play H.L. Hunt and all 14 of the Hunt spawn.

Joan Collins would play Osama Bin Laden, whose most recent video may be as fake as Joan Collins' dye job, according to a post up over at Balloon Juice.

The movie title would be "Weekend at Bernie's, the Sequel".

George Bush and Dick Cheney would reprise the roles of Andrew McCarthy and whomever the other guy was.

[Candied]

"I think it is egregious self-dealing riff-raff like Bush who generate egregious left-wing lunacy of the General Betray Us sort. It's an equal and opposite reaction."

How do people get this silly? Or is it just throwing left-wing around in any direction order to muddy the waters of what left is? General Betrayus is a Fox News, neo-con, Bushite probable Republican presidential wanna-be. They cant stop fawning over him, or singing his praises.
Silly rabbit.

[KCinDC]

Candied, I think "lunacy of the General Betray Us sort" refers to the MoveOn ad, not General Petraeus himself. I'm not sure what MoveOn's ad is supposed to be an equal reaction to, though, since right-wing lunacy is in the White House and thus has been so much more consequential.

[obscure]

Candied,

You wouldn't have written what you did had you heard, for example, Terry Gross' interview with Thomas Ricks following the Petraeus testimony. Ricks is the author of 'Fiasco' and has a very good handle on the facts. One of his remarks- Petraeus and Crocker were skeptics of the '03 invasion. Bush & Co only threw the operation in their lap after their belated recognition that the course they (the administration) charted was an utter shambles.