Editor’s note: Marc Leavy,CFP? is a regular financial columnist for Business Reform Magazine, the leading Christian business magazine with over 100,000 readers. Each issue features practical advice on operating successfully in business while glorifying God.
King Solomon wrote in Proverbs11:26, “He that withholds grain, the people shall curse him; But blessing shall be upon the head of him that sells it.”
God, through King Solomon, establishes blessings on a King who deals justly with people. Saddam Hussein has withheld grain and enslaved his people. His judgment is slow but it is sure. UN imposed Economic Sanctions have hurt the Iraqi people and have had no distinguishable effect on governmental policy. The sanctions only cause the Iraqis to curse those who impose the sanctions along with the secret cursing of Saddam.
Tony Blair stated that one benefit of war with Iraq is that it will end the sanctions and bring liberty to the nation. Those who oppose the war prefer economic sanctions because it averts televised bloodshed and keeps the current power brokers in place. It is better for the Iraqis to starve secretly than to let that conservative Christian cowboy damage the UN.
Now that war seems a foregone conclusion, President Bush and Prime Minister Blair are discussing a liberated Iraq. Blessings are on those who will deal fairly with the people. The Iraqis themselves should be first to profit from the liberation of the country’s rich oil reserves. They should also pay for their liberation and the building of their infrastructure with those oil resources. Then, they should “dance with the one that brought ’em.”
French and Russian oil contracts signed with Saddam Hussein should be abandoned. Kurdish Prime Minister, Barhim Salih, stated, “The new Iraqi government should respect those who stood by us and not those who stood beside the dictator.” This man certainly has more sense than “Mr. Coffee” Annan.
Looking to the UN to establish liberty, economic or otherwise, is foolish. It is the UN who punished the Iraqis with sanctions. The Oil for Food program failed due to the corruption of the Iraqi government and the incompetence of the UN. Security Council members France and Germany made money with Iraq through the sale of nuclear technology and resisted the liberation of Iraq to keep those contracts alive.
Now is the time for the liberation of the Iraqi people and the liberation of the United States from the United Nations. Our sovereignty cannot be subjugated to an organization whose primary goal is to establish itself as a statist power.
I pray our government does not take a hard won victory by the coalition of the willing and hand it to the coalition of appeasers. France, Russia, Germany and others who resisted the liberation of Iraq should in no way benefit from freedom that was bought by the blood of others.
Almost all market movement has been attributed to war psychology. This is certainly not the case. The Dow hit its support level of 7500 this week and bargain hunters and covering short sellers moved in driving the markets higher. When the war noise clears, real economic data will carry the day. Right now economic data is too mixed to paint a clear picture. The next support level for the Dow is around 8000. When the market punches through that limit on strong volume, we may have something. The economy can be summed up with the medical weasel words, “The patient is in stable condition.” Or financial equivalent, “We are cautiously optimistic.” The liberation of Iraq will be a benefit to mankind but I hope it will not be a benefit to the United Nations.
Marc Leavy, CFP? is a Certified Financial Planner. Principled Investing teaches Solomon’s principles of investing and offers wisdom regarding comprehensive financial planning. You may contact Marc at [email protected] or visit www.principledinvesting.org.
