What a Shock: Iraq Worse Off Now

From The New York Times yesterday as reported by James Glanz:

Iraq Utilities Are Falling Short of Prewar Performance
WASHINGTON, Feb. 8 — Virtually every measure of the performance of Iraq's oil, electricity, water and sewerage sectors has fallen below preinvasion values even though $16 billion of American taxpayer money has already been disbursed in the Iraq reconstruction program, several government witnesses said at a Senate Foreign Relations Committee hearing on Wednesday.

Of seven measures of public services performance presented at the committee hearing by the inspector general's office, only one was above preinvasion values.

Those that had slumped below those values were electrical generation capacity, hours of power available in a day in Baghdad, oil and heating oil production and the numbers of Iraqis with drinkable water and sewage service.

Only the hours of power available to Iraqis outside Baghdad had increased over prewar values.

Also published on February 9, and written by James Glanz:

Report Says Number of Attacks by Insurgents in Iraq Increases
WASHINGTON, Feb. 8 — Sweeping statistics on insurgent violence in Iraq that were declassified for a Senate hearing on Wednesday appear to portray a rebellion whose ability to mount attacks has steadily grown in the nearly three years since the invasion.

The statistics were included in a report written by Joseph A. Christoff, director of international affairs and trade at the Government Accountability Office, who testified before the Senate Foreign Affairs Committee during a hearing on Iraq stabilization and reconstruction.

Read the full version of the first story here, and the second here.

Yup. We're doing some fine work in Iraq. Couple these accounts with Haliburton missing billions of dollars and then please explain to Hellena exactly what the fuck we are doing over there.