Source:
New York Times: KrugmanBy PAUL KRUGMAN
Published: September 14, 2007
To understand what’s really happening in Iraq, follow the oil money, which already knows that the surge has failed.
(Skip)
What’s particularly revealing is the cause of the breakdown. Last month the provincial government in Kurdistan, defying the central government, passed its own oil law; last week a Kurdish Web site announced that
the provincial government had signed a production-sharing deal with the Hunt Oil Company of Dallas, and that seems to have been the last straw.
Now here’s the thing:
Ray L. Hunt, the chief executive and president of Hunt Oil, is a close political ally of Mr. Bush. More than that, Mr. Hunt is a member of the President’s Foreign Intelligence Advisory Board, a key oversight body. Read more:
http://select.nytimes.com/2007/09/14/opinion/14krugman.html?hp
Some other links I found explaining how Bush's buddy Roy Hunt got the first american oil contract in Iraq, and it's undermining Bush's own attempts at making the oil contracts legal and binding and safe and profitable.
http://www.sourcewatch.org/index.php?title=Ray_L._HuntHunt was appointed in October 2001 by President George Walker Bush to the President's Foreign Intelligence Advisory Board.<3>
Hunt joined the Halliburton Company Board in 1998. He is Chairman of the Compensation Committee and member of the Audit and the Management Oversight Committees. He also serves as a member of the boards of directors of PepsiCo, Inc., King Ranch, Inc., Electronic Data Systems Corporation, the Federal Reserve Bank of Dallas, and Security Capital Group Incorporated.<4><5> <6>
Hunt currently serves as a Member of the Board of Trustees of the Center for Strategic and International Studies in Washington, D.C.; the Board of Trustess for the George Bush Presidential Library Foundation
Hunt has served as chairman of the National Petroleum Council in Washington, D.C. (an industry advisory organization for the Secretary of Energy) and served as its chairman from June 1991 to July 1994. In 1980-81 he served as president of the Domestic Petroleum Council <8> He is currently a member of the board of directors of the American Petroleum Institute. He also has served as president of the Dallas Petroleum Club.<9>
http://hevallo.blogspot.com/2007/09/kurdish-oil-goes-to-george-bushs-friend.htmlHunt now serves as Chairman of the Board, President, and CEO of Hunt Consolidated, Inc.; Chairman of the Board and CEO of Hunt Oil Company; and Chairman of the Board, Chief Executive Officer and President, RRH Corporation. He has been Chairman and Chief Executive Officer of Hunt Private Equity Group since its inception in 1990. <2>
http://www.sourcewatch.org/index.php?title=Ray_L._Hunt