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 Schadenfreude  |
Posted on 11/04/2003 11:50:42 PM PST by Timesink
Today's NY Times includes an op/ed written by Mark Medish, "a lawyer, [who] was deputy assistant secretary of the Treasury from 1997 to 2000." In it, Mr. Medish argues that the Iraq debts accumulated by Saddam over the course of his reign must not be cancelled. As he sees it, "A country like Iraq, with the world's second-largest proven oil reserves, should be expected to be able to pay its obligations. Furthermore, the moral charge that the debts are odious is simply too sweeping. Acting on it would be bad for Iraq and would set a damaging precedent for the international financial system". Mr. Medish continues by stating that contracts must be honored and the threshold for cancelling contracts must be kept high. "In the case of Iraq, the threshold has not been met."
Mr. Medish doesn't stop there. He also believes that most of the Iraqi debt is perfectly valid because "much of the debt...went to finance civilian construction," and besides, much of the debt "was incurred in the 1970's and 1980's, before sanctions were imposed, when the United States was willingly doing business with the Hussein regime."
Finally, Mr. Medish concludes by issuing a warning to the Iraqi people: "The Iraqis should also favor an orderly debt repayment process. The country has been a financial rogue state for the past 12 years. What the new Iraq needs is a reputation for honoring its word."
Now, I may disagree with the opinions expressed above, but surely would respect such opinions were they expressed by an objective voice. After all, not all minds think alike. There's just one little problem. Mr. Medish is not an objective voice!
I did a bit of research and learned some things about Mr. Medish. He has quite an impressive background. He has held many positions in government and now sits as a partner for the Akin, Gump law firm. Mr. Medish has expressed his views on matters relating to the Iraq War before. Here's a column published in the Washington Post.
It's a very interesting column. And if you actually took the time to read it, you may notice something special...like the disclosure at the bottom? It reads:
Mark Medish is a lawyer in Washington and was a senior Treasury and National Security Council official in the Clinton administration. He represents international corporate creditors of Iraq.
Did I just read that he represents Iraq's creditors? That lil tidbit was worthy of inclusion on the Washington Post disclosure, why not with The New York Times? Akin, Gump's clients have included Hyundai Engineering and the Kingdom of Jordan, both of which hold outstanding Iraqi debt. Very interesting...
But that's not all folks. If Mr. Medish's opinions on other international debt matters were unkown, that would be one thing. But Mr. Medish has voiced the contrary position in the past and continues to do so today. For years, Mr. Medish has loudly advocated the cancellation of Soviet-era debt still outstanding on Russia's books.
This is just bananas! Almost all of Mr. Medish's op/ed arguments simply fall apart when viewed in the context of his position on Russia's Soviet-era debt. After all, doesn't Russia have a significant amount of untapped oil reserves? And isn't the Russian economy improving to the point where the government can pay back its old debts? Did the Soviet empire meet Mr. Medish's threshold for the reversal of contract obligations? If so, why not Saddam? Doesn't Russia need a reputation for honoring its word?
I want to write a few more things about Iraq's odious debt. Mr. Medish claims that most of the debt was incurred for civilian construction projects and that most of it originated decades ago. Would these civilian projects include the building of Saddam's glorious palaces and mosques? And is it possible to separate military debt from civilian debt? In the end, isn't it all from the same basket? And even if the debt originated in the 1970's, wouldn't Saddam have been able to pay it back were he not spending all the money on palaces, mosques, weapons and bribes? I'm just so curious!
There's still some things I would like to know about Mr. Medish's column. Who wrote the NY Times disclosure? Was it the NY Times editors? They certainly knew who he was. And will they issue a correction? Stay tuned...
Update: Here is a letter posted on the Jubilee Iraq website, written by Mr. Medish.
Second Update: Y'all come back again, ya hear! ;0)
Posted on November 04, 2003 at 01:06 PM
COVERT OPERATIVE OUTED AT NY TIMES Glenn Halpern at the HipperCritical blog sends us word of an astonishing ethical lapse in the New York Times' ongoing campaign to throw sand in the gears of US efforts in Iraq. An op-ed today by Mark Medish argues that Iraq must honor all its debt to external creditors -- which would add considerably to the cost of post-war reconstruction. The Times identifies Medish as "a lawyer, was deputy assistant secretary of the Treasury from 1997 to 2000." Halpern points out that Medish wrote a similar op-ed for the Washington Post on October 19. The Post had the integrity to identify Medish fully as "a lawyer in Washington and...a senior Treasury and National Security Council official in the Clinton administration. He represents international corporate creditors of Iraq." In other words, he's just a lobbyist. But that was news that wasn't fit to print.
Posted by Donald Luskin at 10:13 PM
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Schadenfreude |
Yeah, but integrity at the Compost is also a highly variable item:
| David Kay rebukes Washington Post ^ |
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| Posted by JohnHuang2 On 11/04/2003 1:19 AM CST with 17 comments WorldNetDaily.com ^ | Tuesday, November 4, 2003 | Kenneth R. Timmerman MEDIA MATTERSDavid Kay rebukes Washington PostWMD-search chief says reporter misidentified source in weapons hunt Posted: November 4, 20031:00 a.m. Eastern By Kenneth R. Timmerman© 2003 Insight/News World Communications Inc. The head of the CIA's Iraq Study Group that is investigating Saddam Hussein's weapons of mass destruction programs issued a stinging rebuke of the Washington Post on Saturday. David Kay alleged that Post reporter Barton Gellman knowingly misrepresented information he had gathered in Iraq about the hunt for Saddam's WMDs and had misidentified a key source as well as the information Kay had provided Gellman in an interview. Gellman's front-page story, which ran... |
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Mark Medish is a lawyer in Washington and was a senior Treasury and National Security Council official in the Clinton administration. He represents international corporate creditors of Iraq.
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