Bush Iraq oil policy

Eight universities were in the running to get the Bush Presidential Library but Hunt Oil Co. head Ray Hunt, of Dallas, an economics major from Southern Methodist University, co-chaired the SMU search effort and came out on top. His long time pals-ship with “The Decider” may have had more than a bit to do with it.

Hunt has done a lot for Bush and vice-versa. Bush named Hunt in 2001 to his President’s Foreign Intelligence Advisory Board, and reappointed him five years later. Hunt also sits on the National Petroleum Council that gives industry advice to Bush’s Energy Secretary.

… Now it turns out Hunt Oil clinched a separate deal last September with Iraq province Kurdistan he might not have won if he were not Bush’s Good Buddy. Some folks think, according to a front page New York Times report July 3, the deal “runs counter to American policy and undercut Iraq’s central government.” Baghdad reportedly is furious over it.

The Hunt deal, though, may resemble the national oil law Bush seeks to push through Parliament. This law, writes Antonia Juhasz, an analyst for watchdog Oil Change International, would “allow much (if not most) of Iraq’s oil revenues to flow out of the country and into the pockets of international companies.”

Smirking Chimp