Thread: Iraq/Dinar News. 09/05 to 01/14/07

Originally Posted by cigarman

I don't know about ya'll but I'm more nervous than Dick Chenney's hunting buddy!! lol. I really feel good about this one!!!

do you remember about the 100's of billions/millions?? that was siezed in Switzerland? when the Iraqi's take control of the monetary duties will this reserve be released?

JS, the article says that IF they rescend, then all things frozen will be returned.

Diplomat "Misspoke" on U.S. Arrogance in Iraq

A senior U.S. diplomat who said the United States has shown "arrogance" and "stupidity" in Iraq said he "seriously misspoke".
Monday, October 23, 2006
News Photos: Check out at pics of today's top-stories.


BAGHDAD (Reuters) - A senior U.S. diplomat who said the United States has shown "arrogance" and "stupidity" in Iraq said he "seriously misspoke" in an interview aired on Sunday after President Bush said he was flexible on tactics, if not strategy.

In an attack that highlights the problems Washington faces in recruiting and training Iraqi security forces, 13 police recruits were killed and 25 wounded in an ambush on a convoy of buses near the town of Baquba on Sunday.

U.S. military deaths in Iraq in October have reached 83, making it the most deadly month for Americans this year and adding to pressure on Bush before Congressional elections next month in which Republicans could lose majorities in both houses.

"We tried to do our best (in Iraq) but I think there is much room for criticism because, undoubtedly, there was arrogance and there was stupidity from the United States in Iraq," U.S. State Department official Alberto Fernandez told Al Jazeera television, according to a Reuters reporter who heard the interview, which was in Arabic.

Fernandez, the State Department's director of public diplomacy in the bureau of Near Eastern affairs, said that he had misspoken during the interview.

"Upon reading the transcript of my appearance on Al-Jazeera, I realized that I seriously misspoke by using the phrase 'there has been arrogance and stupidity' by the U.S. in Iraq. This represents neither my views nor those of the State Department. I apologize," Fernandez said in a statement.

The State Department had said that the English translation of the comments posted on Al Jazeera's English-language Web site had misquoted Fernandez.

As violence rages, the Shi'ite-led government of Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki has been meeting Shi'ite clerics this week to enlist their support in calming militia infighting in southern Iraq as well as sectarian strife between Shi'ites and Sunnis.

Disarming militias such as the Mehdi Army, loyal to powerful young cleric Moqtada al-Sadr, is seen as crucial by the United States but has proved difficult for Maliki who relies on the support of the political groups linked to the militias.

"GOAL UNCHANGED"

On Saturday Bush held a videoconference with Vice President Dick Cheney, Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld, top White House officials and U.S. military officials in Iraq, who have admitted that a two-month plan to secure Baghdad has failed to rein in violence and that the strategy is under review.

In his radio address on Saturday, Bush said: "We will continue to be flexible, and make every necessary change to prevail in this struggle."

He added: "Our goal in Iraq is clear and unchanging."

The White House has drawn a distinction between flexibility on tactics and a big overhaul of the strategy in Iraq, and officials have suggested such a broad revamp was not imminent.

Longtime Bush family friend and former Secretary of State James Baker is leading a panel that is preparing recommendations for alternative strategies in Iraq.

But the Iraq Study Group's report will not be issued until after the November 7 elections, when some polls suggest Republicans could lose control of both the House of Representatives and the Senate. Democrats and some Republicans say it is time to reassess U.S. policy in Iraq three years after the invasion.

Some have suggested the administration might use the bipartisan group's findings as cover for an exit strategy.

Key Senate Democrats urged the White House on Sunday not to wait until after the elections to give the Iraqi government a timetable to assume a larger role in securing the country.

The top Democrat on the Armed Services Committee, Sen. Carl Levin, said the strategy blueprint being drafted should include a schedule for pulling out U.S. forces.

Sunday's ambush in Baquba highlighted a key problem -- how to establish security when police officers are often accused of sectarian or tribal loyalties, and police and army recruits are reviled by some for collaborating with U.S. occupiers.

A local official said a bomb blast hit the convoy and then gunmen ambushed the buses. The attackers left the bodies of the dead lined up on the highway, booby-trapped with explosives.

The U.S. military death toll in October rose to 83 on Sunday. On Saturday, a Marine was killed in western Anbar province and a soldier was killed in Salaheddin province. On Sunday in Baghdad, a soldier was killed by a roadside bomb and two other soldiers were killed by small arms fire.

The U.S. military also came under attack in Ramadi, in the western Anbar province. Witnesses reported heavy clashes and a military spokeswoman said the U.S. base there had suffered "multiple attacks" but there were no U.S. casualties.

(Additional reporting by Ibon Villelabeitia, Mariam Karouny and Aseel Kami in Baghdad, Caren Bohan and JoAnne Allen in Washington and Ghaida Ghantous in Dubai)
1530HOMER - The Sports Animal! Home of the Bengals!

I have a few problems with this article. 1. It came from a Sports Radio web page( but it is a Reuters press release). 2. What is someone from the State Department been doing even talking to Al-Jazeera the worlds source for truthful media in the Middle East? 3. How bad did this guy get his asrse handed to him for him to say he was "misquoted after reading the transcript"??? 4. When are people going to quit re-hashing the ISG report that isnt going to be released until AFTER the November elections?

On a side note . . .if the CBI had posted real auction numbers for last week, then how come all the forex exchange rates Ive seen still show the IQD around 1469.6 and not the 1473 the CBI shows??? But this is Iraq and nothing has to make sense

Originally Posted by cigarman

JS, the article says that IF they rescend, then all things frozen will be returned.

do you have any idea what that would mean for an rv level????????

Long read, or watch the video from today. I didn't read the whole thing.

On the economic side, it means building an economic infrastructure that contains not only a legal framework in which people have property rights and redress in cases of fraud, theft, or personal violence, but also the opportunity for investors to come in and realize that their investments are going to be made good, that you have the kind of respect for investment. They have passed an investment law that makes it now possible for international investors to come into Iraq.

Press Briefing by Tony Snow

federal reserve


Reforming Iraq’s Economy. By virtually any mea-sure, economic reconstruction ranks as one of thebiggest challenges facing postwar Iraq. According toBoston Fed economist Christopher Foote and three co-authors, Iraqi success in tackling that task will dependon the degree to which the country adopts the neoclas-sical policies advocated (and, in some cases, put intoplace) by Coalition Provisional Authority (CPA)Administrator L. Paul Bremer

.Foote and company all worked as economists forthe CPA and make little effort to defend (or evenexplain) this proposition to readers who do not alreadyembrace it. However, their FRB Boston working paperoffers an interesting insiders’ perspective on the U.S.-led effort to marketize an oil-dependent mixedeconomy that was characterized by tyranny andcorruption during Saddam Hussein’s reign and furtherdevastated by the effects of war and occupation.(Among other things, the paper provides a valuableaccount of the effort to create a single currency fromthe so-called “Swiss” dinars used in Kurdish sectionsof Iraq and the Saddam dinars circulating in otherareas of the country.)

According to the authors, the transition economiesof Eastern Europe and central Asia served as a modelfor the CPA’s economic initiatives in Iraq. Theoccupying forces sought to impose a familiar blend ofprivatization and liberalization measures, such as newfinancial and monetary statutes that allow widespreadentry of foreign banks in the Iraqi market, decontrolinterest rates and identify domestic price stability as amain objective of Iraq’s central bank (with the pursuitof sustainable growth, employment and prosperityrelegated to subordinate goals). In addition, the CPAlaid the groundwork for a flat tax and pushed theinterim Governing Council to revamp Iraq’s commer-cial laws and lift restrictions on foreign investment.Foote and his co-authors also appear to favor theredistribution of Iraq’s oil wealth through an owner-ship-society approach that partly evokes the Alaska Permanent Fund. (Didn't Susie say something about Alaska the other day?)

All these efforts to transform Iraq into a free-market paradise confronted several major barriers: an environment of pervasive and often lethal violence; theGeneva Convention’s restraints on an occupying powerenacting irreversible economic changes (such asselling off state-owned enterprises); and last butcertainly not least, Iraqi public sentiment. The BostonFed paper describes a “remarkable” series of forumsBremer conducted to sell Iraq’s elites on the benefits oflaissez-faire reform. But the authors (three-quarters ofwhom are public-sector employees) end their study bybemoaning recent poll results showing that the singlemost popular position an Iraqi political party couldadvocate was expanding government employment.Meanwhile, a promise to boost private-sector jobsappealed to fewer than five percent of the respondents– barely more than the portion voicing enthusiasm forimproved phone service and the continued presence ofcoalition forces in Iraq (Christopher Foote, WilliamBlock, Keith Crane and Simon Gray, “EconomicPolicy and Prospects in Iraq,” FRB Boston PublicPolicy Discussion Paper, May 2004) FRBB Public Policy Discussion Papers- Economic Policy and Prospects in Iraq


Cheers!
DayDream

Originally Posted by jsfletcher

do you have any idea what that would mean for an rv level????????

I wouldn't touch it with a ten foot pole.lol. IF the gold is still there, then they could easly start at $1.47 with room to spare, although I think it will start around the $1.47 MARK. You know the 2 sided sword theory and all.

Originally Posted by cigarman

It clearly states that the Iraq Government can recend the article when they choose!!! They DO NOT have to wait until Dec 31st!!! YAHOO!!! WOOT!!! WEEEEEEEEEE!!!!!!!!!!!!!! Got ya covered Suzie!!!!

Based on the current state of affairs in Iraq, I think open trade of Iraqi Dinars would be risky at best. Not unlike the Stock Exchange, it would be subject to public perception which could just as easily drive the price down. My understanding is the current exchange rate is regulated by the Central Bank of Iraq for this very reason. It seems to me the only favorable intervention at this point would be a internationally sponsored and regulated revaluation justified by the urgent need to rebuild, and the lack of funds to currenty do so.

For those of you curious about the mysterious $1 Million Dinar note for sale on eBay earlier, Here's the current status:

The seller ended this listing early because the item is no longer available for sale

He never replied to me after I asked for a picture of it.... too bad, I'd like to have seen whatever it was.....

Now back to the real news....

I have a question....on 9-12-2006...there was a big meeting...bla bla...and the MOD saID THE nid SHOULD BE 147 ..EVERYONE is assuming its $ 1.47
I did not get that feeling...I thought to go up from 1470 to 147 was a 10 fold increase in value....or your 800 dollar million of NID you bought, would be worth 8000...which is very good but not as good as...1.47 dinar to the USD

did anyone else get this feeling, or just me?.....