Source: TomDispatch

Tom Englehardt explains why, if the Bush administration track record is anything to go on, we should be very concerned about our fast-failing economy:

[T]he government was being staffed, top-to-bottom, with ill-prepared political pals, while a small set of crony corporations, of which Halliburton is certainly the best known, was given the nod in every rebuilding situation. It really didn't matter where you looked, they were the ones camped out, making money, on the landscape of destruction. With their no-bid, cost-plus contracts, these companies ran up the hours and then tended to jump ship when the going got bad. The same corporations that had essentially looted Iraq -- it was labeled "reconstruction" -- were the first ones called in when New Orleans went down. (Of the initial six contracts the Bush administration offered for the reconstruction of the city, five went to companies previously involved in Iraq's reconstruction program.)

It's all connected, and that's why as the economy falters, we can expect this administration to focus on bailing out its buddies. It's crony capitalism, the same thing we used to bitch and moan about a decade ago when Asia was rife with it.