What the hell is this?
Out of context: Reply #18
- Started
- Last post
- 31 Responses
- CAJTBr0
i might as well blow your theory further out of the water, jasonx. i don't know where you got your ideas from?
there's nothing preventing US companies from trading with a few of those countries, including (with licensing) iraq.
you did say 'communist countries' without any reservation or qualification, if you didn't mean 'all' communist countries, which were you referring to?
about trade with iraq: iraq has an 'oil for food' deal. the word 'food' is slightly misleading, as they can buy pretty much anything other than things which may be used in the creation of wmds.
for example, dick cheney got in trouble a few years back because it looked bad that an ex secretary of defense was a major stakeholder in not one but two oil companies with large deals with iraq.
back then, rather than the US not wanting to deal with iraq, it was the other way round (baghdad put a ban on trade with US), and the oil companies had to get around this by bidding through overseas subsids. until recently, iraqi oil was the fastest growing oil import in the US. between the end of the gulf war and bush 2 coming into power, US companies (not including foreign subsids) had exported over $400 million of food, medicine and oil and water equipment. not a ton, but you're wrong when you say they don't do business with these countries.
iran, trade only takes place unofficially, but again a lot of that is due to iran. there was a big deal in the news last month because the iranian govt decided to ban advertising of US products.
sudan still trades with the US too. the christian right in america lobbied for a ban on trade to sudan, because the government there does nothing to prevent oppression of the minority christian pop. as soon as this lobby won through and trade was halted, a bunch of companies realised they were in trouble because they needed one of sudan's biggest exports. so the govt. agreed. now though trade for everything else has pretty much stopped, sudan exports around $75mil of gum arabic per year to the US.
syria too. the US trades with syria. trade is somewhat difficult (though it does exist) not because of US sanctions, but because of syria's stipulation that no syrian companies may do business with companies that have dealings with israel.
i'd guess you're probably right about lybia, but the rest you're just spreading pointless disinfo - and accusing someone of being 'in the dark' at the same time is a bit rich.