No war for (Russian and Chinese) oil!

Irony of ironies - with American troops dying almost daily amid "No War for Oil" protests, it's odd that nobody's even saying boo about Iraq's decision to allow the Russians and Chinese bid to drill for the very petroleum that the Americans liberated.

Worse still is the Bush Administration's apparent assent to Baghdad's snub of the sacrifices that the US, Britain and a few other Coalition countries made to free Iraq. It's outrageous to let the Russians, Chinese and others who were not part of the Coalition - and who indeed opposed Operation Iraqi Freedom - to reap the benefits. For some reason the administration doesn't agree.

Nobody who opposed the liberation of Iraq should be allowed to profit from the nation's reconstruction. I have yet to hear a single politician in Washington make that statement.

Congressman Henry Waxman's latest headline grab has been about a Texas oil company's concessions in Kurdistan. He ought to be focusing on who in the State Department or elsewhere let in the Russians and Chinese. But then, maybe that's asking too much. Waxman has never really objected much to anything that Moscow or Beijing has ever done.

While we're at it, the Chinese are buying up Afghanistan right from under our noses. The administration, Congress and some enterprising journalists ought to look at the huge mineral deals the Chinese have been doing there, while the State Department either approves or looks the other way. Beijing is profiteering from America's military sacrifice.