We have a significant number of conservative posters here who are supporting the Bush administration policy that victory is the only acceptable outcome in Iraq, and that the US will stay the course until victory is achieved.
Now is the chance for you to literally (well, figuratively) put your money where you mouth is. Here is a website that is selling Iraqi dinars, which are selling for fractions of a penny, a discount of over 99% of the pre-Gulf war value of $3US. Imagine if you bought 2 million dinars for $2100, then watch as the rosy future predicted by the Bush administration actually comes to pass:
It’s enough to make a budding Daddy Warbucks positively giddy!
Since you believe we should stay the course until victory is achieved, and Bush plans to carry out that policy, this should be a gold-plated opportunity for good capitalists to cash in on the March of Freedom. And it will help the Iraqi economy at the same time!
Do you think this is a good investment? Will you be buying dinars?
Um, is it your contention that we should only stay in Iraq if their currency increases in value agains the US$? I don’t understand what the debate topic is. Seems like a complete strawman to assume that a person who supports Bush’s strategy must also believe that the Iraqi currency is going to strengthen against the dollar. Who exactly is making the assertion that it will?
The people on the website. But generally, exchange rate tracking is one way to judge the strength of an economy. If the value of a currency increases against a stable currency, like the dollar, euro, or pound, that’s a sign that the nation’s economy could be improving.
So you are saying that all the great predictions for recovery in Iraq could come to pass, yet the currency would not get any stronger? Why would someone have to specifically make such an obvious prediction? I should think, what with freedom on the march and all, that predicting a stagnant currency would be much riskier. It’s a gold mine, I tell ya! How many dinars can I put you down for?
Well, yea. I’m just a little confused as to what you’re objecting to here. If you support Bush’s strategy, it’s fair to assume you think that continuing with it will make Iraq more democratic and prosperous, and therefore the Iraqi economy will improve, and therefore the dinar will increase in value. I don’t think many Bush supporters are saying, “We need to stay in Iraq to make the Iraqi economy and Iraqi society worse.”
Well, I’m not that optimistic about Iraq, nor am I a Bush supporter…but it sounds like a pretty good investment to me. I’ll wait to see how the elections go in December first though.
I’m a complete skeptic on the Iraq question, and yet I still might be willing to take a flyer on 25,000 dinars ($45, with free shipping!) And even if I were an optimist on the question, I might wonder about the coupling of speculation in Iraqi currency with the outcome of the current dilemma. The two might have nothing to do with each other.
I might like to reframe the OP this way: bet your prestige as a poster on the outcome in Iraq. In other words, if you’re bullish on Iraq, paint for us the outcome that you think will happen, and give it a timeframe. No wishful thinking – give us what you think will happen.
So, as a pessimist, here’s what I think will happen: America will start to bail next year. The American appetite for this adventure and its costs has worn thin, and luckily, the December 15 elections give us a pretext to declare victory, and come home. Maybe we leave a few troops for show. Meanwhile, Iraq is left with a weak, Shi’ite dominated central government, aligned with Iran. Conditions of life remain generally poor, and the insurgency continues. By 2007, Iraq will be fighting a civil war, with flashpoints being big ethnically mixed cities, like Baghdad, Mosul, and particularly Kirkuk. Think Lebanon in the '80s, or Yugoslavia in the '90s. The UN will make fitful and unsuccessful attempts to mediate. Eventually, after six or seven years, the war will die down. And all this time, America will look on with indifference. Bush will admit no responsibility, claiming the U.S. did the best it could, and that the Iraqis themselves had no interest in making democracy work.
So let’s all gather round in 2007 and see how our predictions came out, eh?
Boy, those few troops left for show will really be in peril.
Let’s see now, they need logistic support in the form of maintainance, fuel, food, dedical services and so on.
I suppose if we put them on a dock in Basra with navy ships just off shore for support and a place to retreat to it might work, but otherwise I think it would be a case of needing a few volunteer for super hazardous duty.
I agree. In fact, unless Iraq goes completely tits up and totally melts down it still might be a good investment even if Iraq becomes Iran light. As long as they still use the dinar as their currency SOMEDAY it will be worth a lot again…all that oil you see.
Hm. Ok, I’ll bite. I think that after the December elections the Iraqi’s will start to push to get their shit together militarily. There will still be quite a bit of sectarian violence, and the insurgents and terrorists will continue to blow up anything they can (probably mostly Shi’ite civilians). The Iraqi military though will continue its rocky climb to spinning up to be a credible force (augemented unfortunately by local militia units). The US will begin to disengage sometime in early spring taking a more defensive posture and letting the Iraqi’s take on more of the load as far as patrolling and such goes. By mid summer the US regular forces will be mostly disengaged and sitting in defensive positions on the bases we made, with perhaps and occational raid or sorte, or perhaps some joint patrolling. Our Special Forces units will be more actively engaged directly in hunting terrorist cells. If this happens the US will begin drawing down our forces by this time and moving out our heavy equipment. By late fall I predict the US will be at half or less of our current regular force (and hopefully my own son will be home).
Iraq itself will have a rocky road but I think they will make steady though slow progress. Eventually SOME of the Sunni’s will come around if for no other reason than they will be feeling self-disenfranchised and will want to rally their own folks to ensure their voices are heard. Others will fight on, and the local militias will be a huge factor in future instability in the country…something the Iraqi’s will eventually have to deal with one way or the other. I don’t think Iraq will disintegrate at this point, though I do believe the insurgency will continue…perhaps for years to come. But it will be the Iraqi’s doing the majority of the heavy lifting by next years end with the US increasingly in a support role (probably mostly air support, logistics and perhaps Special Forces or joint strike operations).
Within 5 years I think Iraq will have a stable government (of some kind), will be friendly to Iran but still have a relationship with the US and the insurgency will pretty much be done.
We’ll see how accurate my predictions are by next year. If they are like my predictions in the past they will all be completely wrong.
No, it isn’t fair to assume that. Iraq’s economy is largely out of our control, and is, I susepct, highly dependent on the oil market. We could produce a shining Jeffersonian democracy in Iraq, and the world oil market could tailspin tomorrow, sending Iraq’s economy with it.
According to the State Dept (pdf), the value of the Iraqi dinar has been pretty stable in the past year. Currently, one dollar buys 1,475 dinars. Exactly one year ago, one dollar bought 1,460 dinars. In December 2003, one dollar bought 1,955 dinars. (Last two figures I cannot find online, but I have earlier editions of that cited report at my desk here.)
Compared to that, the rates being offered on the website here are positively awful. The $45 purchase option has an effective exchange rate of about 555 dinar to the dollar; the $5,175 purchase has a rate of about 966 dinar to the dollar.
I’m certainly no expert in monetary policy or investments, but anyone who buys dinars from that website is a fool. Not because the website says that Iraq’s economy is improving, but because they are ripping people off.
I apologize for beating a dead horse, but where is Bricker? This kind of wagering to demonstrate your confidence in something seems right up his alley.
Well, strictly speaking, it is only a scam if they never sent you the dinars. The fact that they are selling them above the market price only indicates they are not the most advantageous place to buy them. There are hundreds of places to buy Iraqi dinars, no the least of which is eBay, where they are trading closer to your figure. The exact exchange rate is immaterial for the purposes of this debate. The question is, will Iraqi dinars increase in value as a result of the American policy to stay the course?
One might easily support the US efforts in Iraq even if one thinks the economy there will get worse, since it might get even more worse if we left.
One might easily think that the dinar will increase in value, but why speculate on that currency in particular? Other currencies might offer an even better return on investment. I don’t even think the Iraqi dinar has an internationally recognized exchanged rate.
One might easily think the dinar will increase in value, but not as much as hundreds of other investment opportunities having nothing do with currency exchange rates.
One might support the US efforts in Iraq, even if one gives it only a 60% chance of success. If the effort fails, the Iraqi dinar may very well plummet in value. The odds don’t look too appealing.
Sorry, Fear, but few if any people are going to bite. Shall we all just agree that Bush is a poopy pants and move on?
I think you are stretching things quite a bit in your reaction to the OP. setting that all aside, however, I don’t think that someone who is as keen as Bricker was to wager on elections outcomes ($100 per net congressional seat, IIRC) is concerned about the relative merits of different investment strategies.
I’d also put it in the category of “scam” for the convenient neglect of any mention of the fact that Iraq’s central bank has been entirely overhauled. I don’t see much difference between this website and someone who’d seek to sell shares of a defunct company. What the share price of a defunct company was 5 years ago has no bearing on its future performance; neither does the past exchange value of a defunct currency from a defunct central bank. I view this website and its ilk – apparently there’s quite a few of them – as committing a lie of omission.
As I said earlier, I’m no central banker, but it’s not hard to realize that under trying circumstances, a country has a hell of a lot more interest in keeping a stable currency than trying to increase its value. Besides, just because the Turkish lira is weaker than the Iraqi dinar does not mean that Iraq’s economy is growing faster. The entire premise of the question – and the website – is bunk.
Let’s say that’s true. There is still no reason to link support for Bush’s policy in Iraq with a belief that Iraqi dinar will strengthen against the dollar. And even if you thought the dinar was going to stengthen, perhaps the dollar will also strengthen. Or, the Iraqi central bank may WANT to keep the dinar cheap to encourage exports.
And no, I’m not stretching my reaction to the OP. He think he’s set a clever trap to make “conservative posters” look like they don’t really support Bush’s policy in Iraq. It would be equally stupid if someone had said: Hey liberal posters… you think France is so great, how about buying futures in the French Stock Market?
Interesting you would equate the future of the Iraqi economy with Bush’s toilet habits. Is that a new talking point?
No, I’ll see your tut-tutting, and raise it a har-rumph. Though I certainly understand the reluctance of Bush backers to tie Victory to any measurable metric at all.
