Arthur Chrenkoff covers positive news out of Iraq, while many members of the "mainstream" "media" ignore it. Roger L. Simon has been on the Enronesque U.N. Oil-for-FoodPalaces scandal since Day 1, and lately he's been working with Wall St. Journal reporter Claudia Rosett, one of the few MSM reporters to actually dig into this multi-billion dollar scandal. He writes:
"This blog has new information from sources close to the investigation of the United Nations Oil-for-Food Scandal by Paul Volcker's Independent Inquiry Committee. After some delay, the committee is releasing its preliminary results at noon Tuesday. This report may reveal, among other things, startling information tending to indicate Secretary General Kofi Annan had more knowledge of, or was closer to, his son Kojo's activities with Cotecna - the company whose role in the scandal seems so pervasive - than previously thought....."
There will be follow-ups from both Simon and Rosett on the rest of Mouselli's testimony, but they do offer some previews. Looks like a bombshell is about to hit. It will be interesting to see if the liberal media covers this, and how.
Joe,
Who said citizen journalists were amateurs? Great investigative piece by Roger Simon.
See my quips at his site:
I have long argued to the blogsphere is MSM. Once you start taking money for ads you are as good as any newspaper. So MSM is watching.
The point you may not be thinking about is the fact that US overseas subsidaries are involved. The law of large numbers makes it impossible for them not to be. $21 billion is too much for anyone to ignore.
Kofi Annan and much of the bureaucracy at the UN will collapse and leave well paid like any analyst from Wall Street during the dot.com era. I will not find any justice in that.
Roger will be on Kudlow this afternoon (PST), for those who can catch it.
I don't see anything that looks like a "bombshell" in Simon's account of the Oil-for-Food scandalette. Certainly, nothing suggests that Kofi Annan was in any way aware of alleged corruption on the part of his son.
What I do see coming is the usual wingnut bombshell of selective outrage, aimed at the UN. Nine billion AMERICAN tax dollars are unaccounted for in Iraq, and yet the wingnut right is getting their panties in a bunch over far smaller sums of money that were not taxpayer dollars, and were apparently skimmed from a program that the US government supervised.....
I'm still reserving judgment. It still seems equally plausible that we're talking beuracratic incompetence here as much as high corruption.
Kojo certainly would have had an incentive to let people think he had his father's blessing and there was probably little he needed to do to create that impression. And the source seems suspect to me, though Roger Simon (centrist nut) believes him to be credible.
If there is even a question of the Secretary's involvement he will certainly have to step down, but does that just leave the impression that the U.N.'s problems have been solved? I hope not.
Patrick
Well it hit.. not exactly an "explosion," more like a dud. Oh well.