As I reported a few days ago, Representative Henry Waxman, the chairman of House government oversight and reform committee, on September 19 asked the Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice to turn over to him a copy of the secret draft report detailing rampant corruption in the Iraqi government produced by the U.S. embassy in Baghdad and other documents on corruption in the Maliki government and to produce three State Department officials who have worked on corruption issues in Iraq for interviews with committee investigators.

Rice did not do so. In response, Waxman has issued subpoenas to the State Department for the records and the witnesses.

Meanwhile, Waxman's committee is proceeding with a hearing on Iraqi corruption--scheduled for this Thursday--that will feature former Judge Radhi al-Radhi, whom Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki forced out as head of the Commission on Public Iraqi, an independent agency that is supposed to investigate corruption within the Iraqi government. In an interview with me three weeks ago, Radhi said that the Maliki government is so riddled with corruption and so dominated by criminal gangs it ought to be abolished. If he says the same when testifying, it will be a blow to the administration, which still fully backs Maliki. No doubt, such testimony will cause some lawmakers to pose the question: why send U.S. soldiers to their death to create a "breathing space" for a government that is corrupt to the core and not able to function?

Posted by David Corn at September 25, 2007 12:59 PM