After Saddam Hussein�s government was removed from power in April 2003, the effort of �reconstruction� in Iraq attracted many Americans. However, before any American could go to Baghdad they had to make it through Jim O-Beirne�s screening process at the Pentagon. Applicants needed not be experts in Middle Eastern affairs or in post-conflict reconstruction. In fact, the most important qualification for these applicants was that they were loyal to Bush.

Applicants were openly asked who they voted for in the 2000 elections, and whether they support the way the �war on terror� was being waged. Two applicants were even asked their views on Roe v. Wade. Consequently, this politically exclusive screening process resulted in a staff that was more concerned with remaking Iraq in the image of a conservative United States than with the CPA’s stated goals of strengthening Iraq’s army and police forces and increasing electricity production.

Many of those chosen by O’Beirne’s office to work for the Coalition Provisional Authority, which ran Iraq’s government from April 2003 to June 2004, lacked vital skills and experience. A 24-year-old who had never worked in finance — but had applied for a White House job — was sent to reopen Baghdad’s stock exchange. The daughter of a prominent neoconservative commentator and a recent graduate from an evangelical university for home-schooled children were tapped to manage Iraq’s $13 billion budget, even though they didn’t have a background in accounting.

The decision to send the loyal and the willing instead of the best and the brightest is now regarded by many people involved in the 3 1/2 -year effort to stabilize and rebuild Iraq as one of the Bush administration’s gravest errors. Many of those selected because of their political fidelity spent their time trying to impose a conservative agenda on the postwar occupation that sidetracked more important reconstruction efforts and squandered goodwill among the Iraqi people, according to many people who participated in the reconstruction effort.

The CPA had the power to enact laws, print currency, collect taxes, deploy police and spend Iraq’s oil revenue. It had more than 1,500 employees in Baghdad at its height, working under America’s viceroy in Iraq, L. Paul Bremer, but never released a public roster of its entire staff.

One former CPA employee wrote an email to a friend, criticizing the employment process: “I watched r�sum�s of immensely talented individuals who had sought out CPA to help the country thrown in the trash because their adherence to ‘the President’s vision for Iraq’ (a frequently heard phrase at CPA) was ‘uncertain.’ I saw senior civil servants from agencies like Treasury, Energy . . . and Commerce denied advisory positions in Baghdad that were instead handed to prominent RNC [Republican National Committee] contributors.”

One such �talented individual� was Frederick M. Burkle Jr., a physician with a master�s in public health and postgraduate degrees from Harvard, Yale, Dartmouth and UC Berkeley. Burkle specialized in disaster-response issues, was a deputy assistant administrator at the U.S. Agency for International Development, and had worked in Kosovo, Somalia, and Iraq during the Gulf War. Burkle was sent immediately to Baghdad, yet after only one week he was told he was being replaced because the White House wanted a �loyalist� on the job.

Burkle was replaced by James K. Haveman Jr., a social worker who was unknown amongst health experts, to oversee the rehabilitation of Iraq�s health care system. One of Haveman�s first actions was to mount an anti-smoking campaign, despite the fact that the CPA�s limited resources would�ve been better served raising awareness about how to prevent childhood diarrhea and other fatal diseases. Haveman also didn�t like that medical care in Iraq was free so he instituted the payment of fees and privatized the drug-delivery system. He also allocated almost all of the Health Ministry’s reconstruction funds to renovate maternity hospitals and build new medical clinics, leaving no funds for emergency rooms and operating theaters in war-torn Iraq. Thanks to Haveman, 40 percent of the drugs deemed essential were out of stock in hospitals, and of the 32 medicines used for chronic diseases, only 26 were unavailable.

The CPA had $18 billion at their disposal for reconstruction efforts in a comparatively calm post-Saddam atmosphere. However, instead of successfully training the army and police, increasing electricity generation, and assembling a viable government, the CPA was more interested in instituting a flat tax, selling off government assets, and ending food rations. By June 2004, Iraq�s army, which was dissolved and refashioned by the CPA, was one third its expected size. Additionally, seventy percent of the police force was not screened or trained, Iraq�s interim government was selected by Americans rather than through elections, and electricity generation was so low that the country was starting to look as bad as New Orleans. While Iraq was plunging further into this Republican hell whole, most of the CPA spent their days in a walled-off enclave with posh villas, well-stocked bars, and huge swimming pools.

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