Friday, April 15, 2005
DRAMATIC BROADENING OBSERVED
A Texan oil dude has been charged over oil-for-food:
Dramatically broadening the scandal surrounding the United Nations Oil-for-Food program, federal authorities in New York today charged David B. Chalmers, a Houston oil trader, and his company, Bayoil, with making millions of dollars in illegal kickback payments to Iraq while trading oil under the program.
InstaPundit has a useful wrap-up, including this, from an anonymous reader:
Now that the MSM can write about an TEXAS based OIL company owned by an AMERICAN, it will be saturation bombing time for them. I work for an MSM company, and I can see the froth beginning to churn.
Indeedy. Reader Larry sent word this morning that Triple J’s 8am news ran an item on this exciting new oil-for-food angle:
No mention of the subject for weeks (or ever). All changes now that a US firm is named.
He’s right; suddenly the ABC can’t run enough oil-for-food stories.
UPDATE. Hank Reardon in comments:
Convenient timing for the ABC to see the error of their ways and give this scandal some coverage. I only recently received a response from the ABC’s Denise Musto, Audience and Consumer Affairs Manager to confirm that my complaint of lack of coverage on this issue had been upheld in relation to 7:30 Report and Lateline.
UPDATE II. Brendan Loy notes:
The U.N. oil-for-food scandal gets the buried-on-Page-A22 treatment for months ... and then a Texas oilman is indicted, and suddenly it’s the top story in the New York Times. Sheesh.
As Brendan writes: “Welcome to the party, folks. This is actually one of the biggest scandals in world history ... glad to have you aboard.” The Sydney Morning Herald also expresses unusual interest.