Today, Vice President Cheney appeared on The Paul Gallow Show in Mississippi. During the interview, he and the host lamented the media’s alleged bias in its Iraq coverage, suggesting that they should cover more good news — such as the Disneyland-style amusement park being developed for Baghdad:

GALLOW: You know, I look at this, and every once in a while, we’ll see a story, Mr. Vice President, things like an amusement park opens in Iraq or in Baghdad, which is totally counter to what we’re hearing over here, as far as the marketplaces being open, the schools, and things such as that. But I saw a story several weeks ago about an amusement center maybe over there, and I’m thinking this is not what you get in today’s media.

CHENEY: No, that’s true. It’s — what gets covered obviously is bad news. That’s — you know, if everything is going swimmingly, then that’s not news, so it doesn’t get the kind of attention.

Cheney and Gallow must be living in Never Never Land. This amusement park is not good news. The Pentagon is fast-tracking the development of the “Baghdad Zoo and Entertainment Experience, a massive American-style amusement park that will feature a skateboard park, rides, a concert theatre and a museum.” The firm designing the project also developed Disneyland. The financier, Llewellyn Werner, has admitted that he is doing the project not to help Iraq, but because he wants to make boatloads of money:

After explaining skate…boarding, Werner tells the assembled Iraqi business and government men, “I’m a businessman. I’m not here because I think you’re nice people. I think there’s money to be made here.”

More significantly, the Pentagon is also now backing a $5 billion plan to create a “zone of influence” around the new $700 million U.S. embassy. The area will include luxury hotels, a shopping center, and condos in an effort to “transform” the Green Zone into a “centerpiece for Baghdad’s future.”

In Iraq, however, many people are opposed to the plan. Some U.S. embassy officials have called the plan “unrealistic.” One added that Iraqis, a majority of whom oppose the U.S. presence, are unlikely to want the U.S. to “turn this area into downtown Kansas City.”

It’s hard to report that things are going swimmingly…when they’re not.

Digg It!

Llewellyn Werner, chairman of C3, a Los Angeles-based holding company for private equity firms, is pouring millions of dollars into developing the “Baghdad Zoo and Entertainment Experience.” In pitching his Disneyland idea to a deputy Baghdad mayor, Werner – displaying little sense for Iraqi culture – said the waterpark is “integral to the sex appeal” of the new amusement center. Speaking in deliberately slow English, Werner told the Iraqis, “One of the fastest growing sports in the world is skate…boarding.” NPR’s Eric Westervelt reported:

After explaining skate…boarding, Werner tells the assembled Iraqi business and government men, “I’m a businessman. I’m not here because I think you’re nice people. I think there’s money to be made here.”

Listen here:

[flv http://video.thinkprogress.org/2008/05/nprbaghdaddisney.320.40.flv]

On April 24, Fox News interviewed John March, executive vice president of Ride and Show Engineering, to discuss the contractor’s plans to develop the “Baghdad Zoo and Entertainment Experience.” Host Bill Hemmer asked March whether there are safety concerns associated with the park’s development. March answered:

Well, you live here in Southern California and there’s drive-bys and everything else. So there’s danger everywhere, and I think the key thing is this will be tremendous for Baghdad.

March added that the Disneyland-style project is being “fast-tracked” by the Pentagon. Watch it:

[flv http://video.thinkprogress.org/2008/05/disneybaghdad.320.240.flv]

The White House has repeatedly insisted that the United States has “no desire for permanent bases” in Iraq. Nevertheless, the Bush administration is seeking to leave its footprint on Iraq through other means. The AP reports that the Pentagon is backing a $5 billion dollar plan to “transform the U.S.-protected Green Zone” into a “centerpiece for Baghdad’s future,” resulting in “big paydays for early investors“:

For Washington, the driving motivation is to create a “zone of influence” around the new $700 million U.S. Embassy to serve as a kind of high-end buffer for the compound, whose total price tag will reach about $1 billion after all the workers and offices are relocated over the next year.

“When you have $1 billion hanging out there and 1,000 employees lying around, you kind of want to know who your neighbors are. You want to influence what happens in your neighborhood over time,” said Navy Capt. Thomas Karnowski, who led the team that created the development plan.

An incentive for the project, which would include hotels, resorts, and commercial development in the Green Zone, appears to be lining the pockets of investors and allies rather than re-building Iraq’s economy. In fact, Karnowski acknowledged that American officials would vet potential investors because of a “vested interest” — mirroring the cronyism of Saddam’s Hussein’s regime.

Some Iraqi leaders even have drawn parallels to the U.S.-backed development plan and what Saddam Hussein did in the area — known by its Iraqi name of Tashri during his regime. Hussein stocked the neighborhood with family and tribal allies, political loyalists and members of his elite Republican Guard. Karnowski called the accusation “partially true.”

Many U.S. embassy officials have called the plan “unrealistic.” One added that Iraqis, a majority of whom oppose the U.S. presence, are unlikely to want the U.S. to “turn this area into downtown Kansas City.” “The Iraqi government wants to limit U.S. power in the Green Zone,” a top adviser to Prime Minister Maliki said.

But the permanent U.S. footprint in Iraq is already making inroads. In addition to construction of the U.S. embassy in Baghdad, the largest in the world, the Los Angeles-based company that developed Disneyland is developing a “massive American-style amusement park” in Baghdad “that will feature a skateboard park, rides, a concert theatre and a museum.” That project has the support of Gen. David Petraeus.

“If you talk to people at the State Department, they still believe a hotel isn’t going up. But it is a done deal,” Karnowski said of the Marriott project. Another “possible $1 billion investment could come from MBI International, a conglomerate that focuses on hotels and resorts and is led by Saudi Sheikh Mohamed Bin Issa Al Jaber.”