I listened this story last night on NPR. Read the whole article. It is quite interesting.
A peek behind the walls of 'Fortress US'
By David Phinney
Things began looking sketchier than ever to John Owen as he boarded a nondescript white jet on his way back to Iraq in March 2005 after some downtime in Kuwait City.
Employed by First Kuwaiti Trading & Contracting, the lead builder for the new US$592 million US Embassy in Baghdad, Owen remembers being surrounded at the airport by about 50 company laborers freshly hired from the Philippines and India. Everyone was holding boarding passes to Dubai - not to Baghdad.
"I thought there was some sort of mix-up and I was getting on the wrong plane," said the 48-year-old Floridian, who was working as a general construction foreman on the embassy project.
He buttonholed a First Kuwaiti manager standing nearby and asked what was going on. The manager waved his hand, looked around the terminal and whispered to keep quiet. "If anyone hears we are going to Baghdad, they won't let us on the plane," Owen recalled the manager saying.
The secrecy struck Owen as a little odd, but he grabbed his luggage and moved on. Everyone filed out to the private jet and flew directly to Baghdad. "I figured that they had visas for Kuwait and not Iraq," Owen said in an interview.
The deception had all the appearances of smuggling workers into Iraq, but Owen didn't know at the time that the Philippines, India and other countries had banned or restricted their citizens from working in Iraq because of safety concerns and growing opposition to the war. After 2004, many passports were stamped "not valid for Iraq".
http://www.atimes.com/atimes/Middle_East/HJ27Ak01.html
Pelosi, Reid, Emanuel and Schumer are damn brave to face party members who are damn angry right about now.
Posted by Judith at July 27, 2007 05:53 AMLieberman is an independent. What is he doing whoring himself before the DLC? Oh well, let them have him.
Posted by Christopher at July 27, 2007 06:26 AMYou're so right, Mary, I never thought I'd see the day a Clinton turns away from the DLC. And I think Kos has finally crashed the gates now that O'Reilly is announcing he's going to "destroy" dKos. Remember how well that worked with Al Franken? It turned his Lying Liars book into a best seller. Markos has already been making appearances on the talk shows, and he's a damn good speaker; now, he'll be everywhere, and the blogs will be getting the attention they deserve just coming into the elections! Colbert's prominent display of dKos's address on his show probably helped tremendously as well. This is going to be fun!
Posted by iamcoyote at July 27, 2007 06:45 AMAfter seeing SiCKO, I wondered about foreign tourists visiting the US since most wouldn't have health insurance.
Nonny Mouse has an interesting post at C&L
that just adds to my disgust. I don't fly and I'm just as glad. If I board a plane to leave the US, I doubt I'm coming back.
Was there a White House plot to illegally suppress votes in 2004? Is there a similar plan for the upcoming elections? This week NOW examines documents and evidence that points to a Republican Party plan designed to keep Democrats from voting, by targeting people based on their race and ethnicity with key battleground states like Ohio and Florida of particular interest. One of the fired US attorneys, David Iglesias speaks.
NOW shows this evening where I live.
Web-Extended Interview: David Iglesias
Posted by Sharon at July 27, 2007 08:08 AMDick Cheney had his 14th heart replacement this morning in Bethesda, but doctor's decided there was no point as he doesn't use it. They simply tied everything back together (without a heart), and sent him back to rule the US. What an SOB he is.
Posted by tempus at July 27, 2007 08:22 AM....it appears that Billo has declared war on the left blogosphere....calls Kos hate propaganda....Bill can't spell "littlgreenfootballs" so he can't see the true hate of the blogs....oh Bill!!...or was that called "Kill Bill"..lol
Posted by Goyo at July 27, 2007 09:01 AMI hear Big Dick is going to have his battery in his pacemaker changed...suppose he'll hand over the reigns of the presidency to Junyah for a few hours?
Posted by emal at July 27, 2007 01:01 PMemal: would you??? I believe Lidsay Lohan is taking over, so don't worry about a thing!
Posted by tempus at July 27, 2007 01:40 PMoops: can't spell no-talent wonkettes names...
Posted by tempus at July 27, 2007 01:44 PM