Enforcing Petro-socialism in Iraq.

In an April 20 dispatch from Qayyarah, Iraq, the Washington Times reported: "U.S. forces are cracking down on an unexpected problem in this oil-rich country--gasoline bootlegging."

Thanks to deeply embedded corruption, a lack of refining capacity due to Saddam-era price controls, and attacks by insurgents on pipelines and refineries, Iraq suffers from gasoline shortages. Motorists often have to queue up for hours to fill their tanks. However, "in many Iraqi cities, men with plastic containers full of gas line the roads outside gas stations, offering the same product for a much higher price but faster. Motorists pull up, hand a wad of dinars out the window, and wait as the bootlegger fills the tank using a funnel and a hose." Often the bootleggers will buy gasoline at a local station, and then deploy themselves a few hundred yards away, selling their gas at up to 100 percent profit. Of course, nobody is forced to pay the exorbitant mark-up, although in some cases bootlegging may contribute to the length of gas lines.

"In Nineveh and Diyala provinces, U.S. troops are shutting down bootleggers and giving their gas away for free in an effort to control the price of gasoline, protect the livelihoods of gas-station owners and employees, and in the long term, reduce the wait and encourage investment in gas distribution," ...