“Waste is alive and well at the Pentagon.” — GOP Senator Charles Grassley (2018)
In the Reagan ‘80s, the public was shocked at the revelations about the Pentagon spending $640 on toilet seats for the military, along with $74,165 (aluminum ladder), $7,622 (coffee maker), and $437 (tape measure). Hundreds were spent on each “portable hand-held calculator,” the military euphemism for a pencil. During Bush 41’s administration, the Department of Defense (DOD) billed the taxpayers $117 for a soap dish and nearly $1,000 for pliers.
To combat this egregious budget chicanery, Congress passed the Chief Financial Officer Act (CFOA) in 1990 requiring financial audit statements. However, loopholes called disclaimers allow the Pentagon to dodge accountability. Auditors thus cannot connect contracts with payments, greatly reducing eliminating accounting graft.
This corruption continues into the 21st Century. Under Obama $43 million was wasted on a gas station in Afghanistan. Under Trump, the $640 toilet seat now costs $10,000 — and that was just for the lid!
This robbery is in no way a reflection on the troops who protect and serve our country. The DOD is the only government agency not meeting the CFOA requirements and demands from Congress for an accountable spending audit. The US has the largest military budget in the world, bigger than the next 10 countries combined. How much of ours involves these outrageous payoffs to government contractors?
Don’t expect whistleblowers within the military to reveal secrets about the overblown military budget. Service careers are made by loyalty to the system, not the country. Those who violate the norms can expect promotion denials and early forced retirement. Rarely do members of Congress speak out for fear of being branded as unpatriotic in their campaigns for re-election. Their deafening silence makes both sides of the aisle complicit in these deceptions.
With the current fiscal crisis again taxing our budget constraints, the Pentagon needs to reign in their long held grip on taxpayer money used for bloated expenditures designed to enhance their military careers and subsequent lucrative military contractor lobbying. Military brass took an oath to defend the US, not help drive it to the brink of bankruptcy. The Military/Industrial/Congressional Complex at its worst.
Isn’t it time to flush this waste down the aforementioned toilet?
ED ENGLER, Sebring, Fla.
Do you go by what you hear him say in his own words and writing or do you just go by what others tell you what he said? He is being called anti-vac, yet he has said that he has been vaccinated a number of times, but he just does not trust the COVID-19 vaccine. Indeed, the so-called anti-vaccines do not say to never take a vaccine. What they do say is that we have the right to know both the benefits and risks of the vaccines we are told about so we could make an intelligent informed decision. So being well informed is being anti-vaccine?
Indeed, no vaccine is without risk. This is why a special court called VACCINE COURT was set up to help people harmed by vaccines. However, the COVID vaccines from Pfizer and the other two based on the same science are treated different if harm is done. “You Can’t Sue Pfizer or Moderna If You Have Severe COVID Side Effects. The Government Likely Won’t Compensate You For Damages.” (CNBC. 12/23/20).
The British Medical Journal was weary of the vaccine from day one. Indeed, even if these vaccines work to fight off the COVID-19 virus, the possible long term side effects from these vaccines are still unknown. And it is always possible to have a vaccine that may work in theory, but have a bad batch, or not making the vaccine right. So when someone such as Mr Kennedy is uneasy about jumping on the COVID Vaccine wagon, just remember the same printed sources telling us how wonderful and safe these vaccines are, also try to give us the other side. But we are being brainwashed to believe one is for science and vaccines or is ant-science and anti-vaccine. The bottom-line idea for all vaccines is the greater good for the greater number. But there are risks. This is what Kennedy talks about. Does this make him ant-vac? I do not think so.
DAVID RAISMAN, Brooklyn, N.Y.
Editor replies: We are familiar with Kennedy’s obsession with vaccines. Joan Walsh wrote at TheNation.com June 22 about her experience editing Kennedy’s error-ridden piece on a supposed vaccine-autism link that appeared at Salon.com 18 years ago. Walsh said she was “besieged by scientists and advocates showing how Kennedy had misunderstood, incorrectly cited, and perhaps even falsified data. Some of his sources turned out to be known crackpots.” The article eventually was retracted, but “Kennedy continues to peddle the lies he published and claim that dark forces cowed us and forced us to retract his story. The odious Joe Rogan has been going after vaccine scientist Dr. Peter Hotez on Twitter, after Hotez tweeted that [an interview with Kennedy] was ‘awful,’ ‘absurd,’ and promoting ‘nonsense.’ [Rogan] offered Hotez “$100,000.00 to the charity of your choice if you’re willing to debate [Kennedy] on my show with no time limit.” Twitter troll and site owner Elon Musk has been amplifying Rogan and Kennedy and going after Hotez.” The following Sunday a Q-Anon believer came to Hotez’s Houston home demanding that he debate Kennedy.
Sorry, but this editor scores Kennedy as an anti-vaxxer, who sought a job with the Trump administration in January 2017 to create a vaccine safety commission. He claims Trump gave him the go-ahead to form the commission before Trump distanced himself from the initiative. Now the main promoters of Kennedy’s Democratic primary campaign appear to be Steve Bannon, Roger Stone and disgraced former Gen. Michael Flynn. Progressive voters should steer clear of RFK Jr.
In Joan Retsinas’ story, “Whither Common Sense? Four Health Test Cases” [7/1-15/23 TPP], where she referred to Sen. Marco Rubio’s Wall Street Journal article about removing “empty calories” from the list of approved food stamp purchases. Retsinas failed to consider obesity in our overall population.
Hasn’t a professional chef served healthy entrees to Oprah Winfrey over the decades Oprah has battled her weight problems? Did Oprah’s chef ever serve her “empty calories”?
I am 72 years old, and I qualify for food stamps because of my disability. In 2017, during my early morning walk. I had a heart attack. I have a stent in my heart. I was walking to stay fit. Life is unfair.
The stereotype of people using food stamps is that we enjoy being fat.
During the pandemic, our local grocery store went out of business. We were reluctant to ride a bus to a new grocery store because COVID-19 is an airborne disease (recall my heart stent).
Many of us shop at Dollar General or Family Dollar — we reside in a food desert — because they serve meat products covered by our food stamps. Sometimes the meat tastes greasy … awful, really. Soda pop is bad?
“Common Sense” entails, in my opinion, requiring Ms. Retsinas to shop at Family Dollar.
WALTER KRASINSKI, New Kensington, Pa.
Whites in America can’t even keep racism out of “war.” Why can’t Black people in Sudan use “war” to get what they want? White people in Washington used “war” for two decades upon Afghanistan and Iraq. Using “war” to try and achieve their goals — why can’t Blacks in Sudan do the same?
Is the US government being part of an international push to stop the “warring” factions in Sudan, mean Washington opposes “war” — that Washington sees “war” as not being the answer, or is “war” onluy not the answer when Black people do it?
What moral right does the White man from America have to advise the Sudanese to negotiate for peace, after America “warred” upon the Middle East for 20 years?
What utter insanity!
The White man truly believes that only he can be entrusted with doing “war,” that people of color doing “war” is always going to be counter-productive.
All the US does is “war,” and now the US is going to advise the Sudanese that “war” is a bad idea. What a load of crap. America thinks it’s in charge of “war” on this planet.
And our mainstream media does nothing but reinforce this White supremacy approach. When the US does a “war,” the “war” violence is of most importance for our media — but when Blacks in Sudan do a “war,” our media has the primary focus on what the violence does to civilians.
Why are “wars” in Africa always seen as counter-productive and unnecessary, and should be stopped as soon as possible, but the White man’s “wars” are always necessary and need to be fought all the way through their imaginary entirety, and to the imaginary bitter “end”?
FRANK ERICKSON, Minneapolis, Minn.
I think Thom Hartmann’s theory that Americans are exhausted by relentless right-wing fear and hate propaganda is right on the money. But then, I think everyone in the world is exhausted by the conscious or subconscious realization that the world as we have known it is dying, and that we are killing it.
DAN RICHMAN, San Francisco
The forthcoming “artificial intelligence” technology could be a genuine boon to humanity in various applications. And yet, some prudent skepticism ought be be given regarding its future.
Our present challenge is just how much of our collective commercial and pefrsonal affairs should be given to public view. As things are generally going, our habits will soon be known—along with where we buy and characteristic behavior.
The momentum of electronic tracking of just about everyone may already be too great to circumscribe legislatively. Indeed, the ladies and gentlemen on Capitol Hill could perhaps be indifferent or unaware of the plight we shall soon confront.
WILLIAM DAUENHAUER, Willowick, Ohio
Is there anyone else out there in the universe besides me who doesn’t believe that one of the biggest sources of artificial intelligence in the world is Donald Trump?
MIKE EKLUND, Mercer, Wis.
From The Progressive Populist, August 1, 2023
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