While I agree that there is considerable waste within the defense establishment, this is not the sole fault of the executive. There's plenty of blame to spread to congress as well. Nearly all members of congress, R, D, or whatever. Defense spending has been out of control for years - it did not begin or end with the Bush family.

The US Army Corps of Engineers has not yet announced a winner for the bid to reconstruct Iraq's oil infrastructure. Halliburton's subsidiary KB&R did assist the Corps of Engineers on a preliminary assessment, but that's not the big prize. If you don't believe me read this. (Source)

After indicating in June that it planned to solicit bids, the Corps of Engineers held a conference of prospective bidders in Dallas on July 14. Records of the meeting show that it was attended by some of the most experienced engineering and construction companies in the world - including, besides Halliburton and Bechtel, Fluor, the Parsons Group, Schlumberger and Foster Wheeler.

Among those companies, only Fluor and Parsons have indicated so far that they plan to make bids by the Aug. 14 deadline. A winner will be announced by Oct. 15, according to the Corps of Engineers.

Please note that truthout is not exactly friendly to the Bush administration.

The first part of the second paragraph you cite, and the title sentance to your post, makes it sound as if there was an enormous piggy bank in the bunker of the whitehouse, marked "surplus". Clinton didn't hide the surplus under the matress in the Lincoln bedroom - the surplus went into paying off the national debt. Though I don't have the time or inclination to go digging, there is a lot of world history out there. I'll bet we can find several instances of bigger government contracts/payouts call-it-what-you-will as expressed in

a) real dollars
b) percentage of GDP
c) percentage of gov't revenue

The "Nazi alumni" is pure hogwash. George Herbert Walker repudiated Prescott Bush's anti-Semitism and pro-Nazi sympathies. He joined the Navy and flew combat, even though Prescott probably could have pulled strings and kept him out of action, if not uniform.

I agree about the Saudis. The Saudis must be stopped. But here's the thing - I think Bush is setting up to deal with the Saudis. Not today, not tomorrow. But soon. 2005 is probably the earliest time we can collapse the House of Saud and not be too damaged ourselves.

Look at a map. Iraq is in the center of where we need to be to fight terror. It's got borders with Syria, Saudi, and Iran. The US military is leaving Saudi, because we don't have to protect the oil from Saddam anymore.

In 2005 Iraq should be exporting a fair amount of oil, and Russia will be exporting huge amounts of it. In fact, Russia will be producing so much that there will be, probably, an oil glut.

Saudi Arabia's social system is based on payouts to the tribes and royal family. All of the money comes from oil. The Saudis don't make anything else. If they're suddenly not getting income from selling oil, the House of Saud might lose control.

Failing that, all of the refineries in eastern Saudi might mysteriously catch fire and unknown parties might mine the ports - and the Russians and Iraqis will pick up the slack, without disruption of the oil supply to the industrialized nations of the world.