- Iraq ‘Needs Tens of Billions’ (BBC): “America’s administrator in Iraq has warned that the country will need tens of billions of dollars to rebuild its shattered infrastructure. Paul Bremer said it was “almost impossible to exaggerate” the country’s economic needs. The bill to overhaul essential services like electricity and water - running intermittently in many areas at present - would reach almost $30bn, Mr Bremer said. The economic bill comes on top of the estimated one billion dollars per week the US already spends on its forces in Iraq as well as a spiralling budget deficit at home. President Bush pledged “no retreat” in Iraq in a speech to US military veterans on Tuesday which was seized upon by political opponents as “empty rhetoric”. The president said American-led forces were making good progress in restoring order to the country and insisted Iraq was part of the wider US-led war on terror. On Tuesday, the number of American deaths since the end of major combat operations on 1 May surpassed the number killed during the war - 139 compared to 138. The situation in Iraq is fast becoming an issue for next year’s presidential election, the BBC’s Justin Webb reports from Washington. One Democratic Party presidential hopeful, Bob Graham, described Mr Bush’s speech as “the same old sugar-coating of a very bad situation” whilst another, Dick Gephardt, said it was incomprehensible that more was not being done to get other nations to share the burden. Mr Bremer said in an interview for the Washington Post that it would take $2bn to restore the Iraqi national electricity grid by next summer and about $13bn over five years to overhaul it completely. Supplying clean water nationwide would cost an additional $16bn over four years. ...Parts of Baghdad have only eight hours power a day...$300,000 of oil is smuggled out of Iraq every day...Up to 70 vehicles are hijacked in Baghdad daily.”
- IMF Slams US Over Budget (Reuters): “The International Monetary Fund is set to reproach the United States for being too optimistic in its assumptions on government spending and revenues and lacking a coherent budget plan, according to a summary of a draft report. The report “criticizes the U.S. government’s excessively optimistic assumptions regarding the development of overall state spending and revenues and the lack of a medium-term concept to consolidate budgets and reform the social insurance system,” the draft said. The draft, a copy of which was obtained by Reuters, also says monetary policy-makers in industrial nations should continue to support the economic upturn.”
- Hondurans Riot over IMF Reforms (BBC): “Honduran demonstrators have clashed with riot police in the capital, Tegucigalpa, as protests escalate against reforms ordered by the International Monetary Fund (IMF). Twenty people were injured, buildings were damaged and streets were blocked overnight by burning barricades. Protestors, most of whom tried to hide their identity, have been angered by the government’s efforts to secure a $1bn (£637m) IMF loan. The money comes with demands for sweeping deregulation, including privatisation of utilities and wage-freezes for public-sector workers.
- Mortgage Demand hits 14-month Low (Reuters): “The number of applications Americans filed for mortgage loans fell last week to the lowest level in 13 months on a steep drop in refinancing requests, an industry survey showed. The Mortgage Bankers Association of America said Wednesday its seasonally adjusted gauge of mortgage requests fell to 638.6 for the week ended Aug. 22, down 13.3 percent from the previous week’s 736.7.”
- Car Sales Slow Despite Spending on Incentives (NYT): “In another sign of how competitive the car market has become, auto companies spent a record amount on incentives in July, yet their vehicles sat unsold on dealers’ lots for a record length of time.Moreover, Ford Motor and the Chrysler Corporation lost market share in July, though the average incentives for Detroit’s auto companies grew to the highest level ever, according to Edmunds.com, a company in Santa Monica, Calif., that offers consumers buying advice and tracks industry trends.”
- Pilots Upset About Slowness of Gun Training (WTimes): “Pilots groups yesterday called on President Bush to order the Transportation Security Administration to move more quickly in arming airline pilots as a last line of defense against terrorists. ”It’s been almost two years since the attacks of September 11 and we only have less than 150 pilots approved to carry a firearm,” said Capt. Bob Lambert, president of the Airline Pilots Security Alliance. About 10,000 pilots should be carrying guns in the cockpit by now, the pilots said at a press conference at Ronald Reagan Washington National Airport. The coalition held similar press conferences at five other airports in the United States. “
- Hundreds of Pilots Trained to Carry Guns (WPost): “Pilots have been discouraged from applying for the program because of certain TSA restrictions and the short notice that pilots were given for scheduling their attendance at the training sessions, which must be undertaken on their own time.”
- Recall Arnold (Sobran’s, via LRC): “Now for some people, becoming a Republican is a step in the right direction — just as, I suppose, becoming an Episcopalian would be an improvement over remaining a cannibal. But one mustn’t stop there.”
Posted by Mises.org News
