Phi Beta Iota: China and Russia both appear to have explained to Goldman Sachs executives that they will be assassinated if they do not make good on their financial rapes against those two countries. Libya appears to have adopted the same response. Tony Blair appears to have been the key political proponent of the financial rape of Libya. Russian Television offers a useful glimpse into the reality behind the “get Guaddafi” invasion now occurring at our expense–an invasion that is illegal by both US Constitutional law and international law. Meanwhile, Wall Street seeks to force a rise is the US debt limit. Assassination of bankers is now on the table.
DAY ONE: June 3-4, 2011 — DJERBA, TUNISIA — On Libyan-Tunisian border, it's back to the future with refugees
DAY TWO: June 4-5, 2011 — TRIPOLI, LIBYA. WMR Exclusive. Western Libya portrait is not what is being painted by the Western media
Phi Beta Iota: Details below the line. The public is being lied to by the US Government and its corporate media co-conspirators. The Honorable Cynthia McKinney, daughter of Georgia, is doing what professional intelligence and investigative media should be doing. We need more of this. “The truth at any cost lowers all other costs.”
For months I have been reading in the press about Robert Gates “cancelling more than 30 [defense hardware] programs.” A May 24 Bloomberg article by Viole Gienger (“Gates Says Military Cuts May Protect F-35, Submarines”) came up quick on a Google search. Other articles credit Gates with “saving more than $300 billion” with these – presumably tough – decisions.
In case you are wondering where this imagery of Secretary of Defense Robert Gates as a tough task master for out of control DOD procurement is coming, you need look no further than Robert Gates.
At a May 24 farewell speech to the American Enterprise Institute in Washington, Gates repeated his own claim, made frequently earlier, that “All told, over the past two years, more than 30 programs were cancelled, capped, or ended that, if pursued to completion, would have cost more than $300 billion.” (See the speech at http//www.defense.gov/speeches/speech.aspx?speechid=1570.) A bit later he hammered home the point in case any of the press present missed the legacy Gates seeks for himself: “when it comes to our military modernization accounts, the proverbial ‘low hanging fruit' – those weapons and other programs considered most questionable – have not only been plucked, they have been stomped on and crushed.”
Robert Gates did not reduce the number of hardware programs in the Department of Defense; he increased them. A term he has repeatedly expressed distaste for (“math”) proves him wrong. DOD keeps periodic records on these sorts of things; DOD's Selected Acquisition Reports (SARs) track the number of major hardware programs and their acquisition costs. (Find them at http://www.acq.osd.mil/ara/am/sar/)
They show the following:
In September 2008, just before Barack Obama was elected and selected Robert Gates as his Secretary of Defense, there were 91 Major Defense Acquisition Programs (MDAPs). They were projected to cost $1,648 billion dollars.
In April 2009, Gates announced the termination of various defense programs. The SAR that next came out, in December 2009, showed the number of MDAPs had indeed declined: to 87 programs, costing a little less ($1,616 billion).
Nine months later, after Gates took some more whacks at the defense budget – if that's what you want to call them – the SAR that came out in September 2010 showed the number of MDAPs had increased to 94. Their cost also increased – to $1,679 billion.
The most recent SAR, for December 2010, shows another increase, both in programs (to 95) and money (to $1,720 billion).
So, thanks to Secretary Gates “termination” of more than 30 programs “saving” us $300 billion, we now have an increase of four programs costing an additional $72 billion.
I have two questions:
1)Just what legacy should we be giving Mr. Gates?
2) What type of “math” will Leon Panetta use when he is made Secretary of Defense later this year?
There are a number of points that don't ring true…….but before we look at these, one must identify who the “Taliban” Gates is talking about are….there is one Afghan Taliban (Mullah Omar), there is the Haqqani Network, there is the HIG (Hekmatyar), and now the Islamic Movement of Uzbekistan (IMU)is active in Northern Afghanistan. This is a loose confederation that will support one another when it is beneficial and bear arms against one another when necessary. The issues are: (1) abandon ties to Al Qeada……it is known that there is no strong linkage between the two at this point in time. The Taliban are not looking to exert control over any territory larger than current Afghanistan (and the Pashtun belt of Pakistan). (2) I am not aware of any pressure being put on by Coalition Forces that will induce the Taliban to the Peace Table. Statistics do not bear out any of the spin emanating from ISAF about the Taliban being ineffective. They are somewhat stagnant, however, they are demonstrating the ability to infiltrate into the heart of the Afghan military/government. They are very active in the areas Karzai has declared as secure enough to allow the nascent Afghan National Army to exercise control. The most interesting part: As wars conclude, Gates noted, it is inevitable that “peace is made between people who have been killing each other.” The Taliban, he added, is “part of the fabric” of Afghan politics. This suggests that this administration will declare victory and go home, only to aid the electoral process…..
Phi Beta Iota: Both the USA and Israel used terror tactics to achieve their original independence from British dominion. Terrorism is a tactic, nothing more. To demonize it is to betray one's substitution of ideology for intelligence.
The U.S. military is on track to spend $113 billion on its operations in Afghanistan this fiscal year, and it is seeking $107 billion for the next. To many of the president’s civilian advisers, that price is too high, given a wide federal budget gap that will require further cuts to domestic programs and increased deficit spending.
Phi Beta Iota: The President and Congress do not control the government. They have lost control in part because they lost their integrity. Washington operates on 2% of the relevant information and substitutes ideology for intelligence and corruption for integrity. Absent a compelling narrative rooted in the transparent truth, we expect no change between now and 2016.
The comments expressed in this interview exactly reflect my views–recommended!
Bill Moyers Interviews Andrew Bacevich
Thursday 2 June 2011
by: Bill Moyers, The New Press
Our finest warriors are often our most reluctant warmongers. They have seen firsthand the toll war exacts. They know better than anyone that force can be like a lobster trap that closes with each stage of descent, making escape impossible. So it was when the liberal consensus lured America into Vietnam during the ’60s, and again after 9/11, when neoconservatives clamored for the invasion of Iraq. With the notorious ferocity of the noncombatant, the neocons banged their tin drums and brayed for blood, as long as it was not their own that would be spilled.
Andrew Bacevich
One old warrior looked on sadly, his understanding of combat’s reality tempered by twenty-three years in uniform, including service in Vietnam. A graduate of West Point, Andrew Bacevich retired from the military to become a professor of history and international relations at Boston University, a public thinker who has been able to find an audience across the political spectrum, from The Nation to The American Conservative magazines. In several acclaimed books, including The New American Militarism: How Americans Are Seduced by War, Washington Rules: America’s Path to Permanent War, and his bestselling The Limits of Power: The End of American Exceptionalism, Bacevich speaks truth to power, no matter who’s in power, which may be why he reaches both the left and the right.
Gaddafi's Stolen Billions: Max Keiser Explains ‘Financial Terrorism' RT – 18 hours ago Watch video
