PrairiePundit

Houston Chronicle: Halliburton said Monday it has completed all work in Iran and has left the country, making good on an earlier pledge to exit the Middle Eastern nation once it served out its last contracts there. The announcement comes more than two years after Halliburton said it would depart Iran and as tensions rise between the West and a nation President Bush has identified as part of an "Axis of Evil." On Monday, Iran drew threats of additional U.N. sanctions and wide condemnation from the West after announcing it had dramatically expanded its nuclear program. Relations are also cooling after Iran held and then released 15 British sailors recently. Halliburton, along with other U.S. firms such as General Electric Co. and Houston's Dresser-Rand Group, have faced sharp criticism for doing business through affiliates in countries subject to U.S. government sanctions. The company's move to quit Iran now leaves the remaining American companies alone to deal with the...

Tony Blankley: In the last week, two news items caught my attention. News item No. 1: Dateline Abu Dhabi — The Louvre Museum is selling the use of its name for a museum in Abu Dhabi for $520 million, and will rent out some of its art exhibits and provide technical museum management services for another $747 million. News item No. 2: Dateline Dubai — The Halliburton Corp. is moving its worldwide corporate headquarters to the United Arab Emirates city of Dubai. It will keep most of its staff in Houston, will maintain its legal incorporation in the United States, will remain listed on the New York Stock Exchange, but will list its shares on a Middle East exchange also. Twenty years ago, even 10 years ago, these items would have given rise to Third World screeching about Western cultural and economic imperialism. But today it is French and American whining that greets these moves. Rep. Henry Waxman, a Democrat, threatened hearings on the Halliburton move (birds gotta fly, fish ...

Houston Chronicle: Halliburton Co. surprised the energy world, members of Congress and the city of Houston on Sunday by announcing it will open a new corporate headquarters in the United Arab Emirates and relocate its chief executive officer there. The world's second-largest oil-field services company and biggest U.S. contractor operating in Iraq, said the new office in Dubai will help strengthen its presence in the Middle East, Africa and the Far East, where its business is growing. The move raised questions about Halliburton's future in Houston, the company's corporate home since relocating from Dallas four years ago. And it sparked concerns on Capitol Hill about the national security implications of such a change. On Sunday, the company posted a press release on its Web site saying its chairman and CEO, Dave Lesar, had announced that he would be relocating to Dubai to open a "corporate headquarters office." Lesar made the announcement at a regional energy confe...