Apr 09 2009

Obama’s Military Budget Higher Than Under Bush

( – promoted by buhdydharma )

US Secretary of Defense Robert Gates said before presenting his FY2010 budget that the event was special due to the “scope and significance of the changes”.

Change was expected, given the arrival of a new administration and the fiscal pressures applied by the economic crisis, but what specifically has changed?

Military analyst Miriam Pemberton tells the Real News that while some major steps have been taken to cut back expensive Cold War era weapons systems, the department’s overall budget is $20 B higher than it ever was under President Bush.



Real News – April 08, 2009

Obama’s military budget

While media plays up program cuts, total defense budget surpasses Bush by $20 Billion



Miriam Pemberton is a Research Fellow at the Institute for Policy Studies. She heads a group that produces the annual “Unified Security Budget for the United States” and she is a former Director of the National Commission for Economic Conversion and Disarmament. She is co-editor, with William Hartung, of “Lessons from Iraq: Avoiding the Next War”.

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    • Edger on April 9, 2009 at 00:16
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    • Edger on April 9, 2009 at 04:06
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    The pentagon, and mainstream media, pretty well across the board, have been reporting defense budget cuts, in some case very large cuts, while in reality there is an increase in the proposed budget.

    Right now when I google “obama military budget cuts” I get over 6,000,000 results.

  3. just recently:

    “Narcotecture,” that’s what people call the mansions in Kabul that are home to drug lords, corrupt politicians, and private contractors. These lavish homes are due to bribery, private military contracts, and Afghanistan’s flourishing opium trade, the last of which the UN estimates contributed $500 million to the Taliban and criminal groups last year.

    It was troubling enough to interact with the armed guards who stood outside the barbed-wire gates of these homes, threatening to shoot me if I pointed my camera toward them. What I found even more disturbing though was seeing the disparity between this narcotecture and the tents and bombed out shelters just a block away–squalid conditions in which too many Afghans live.

    This narcotecture is such a powerful image. It reinforces the fact that by escalating this war, our country is propping up a corrupt Karzai government while doing little to remedy Afghanistan’s humanitarian crisis. These are issues congressional oversight hearings could help address. If you haven’t already, join over 42,500 people who have already signed the petition for oversight hearings, and then pass this petition to all your friends and relatives. Help us reach 50,000 names!

    Yours,

    Robert Greenwald

    and the Brave New Foundation team

    Here is a video of Robert Greenwald’s trip and thoughts (not complete).  

    I think we know that THIS is the wrong course.  The best thing I have read was that we should send Peace Corps people in there to try to offer aid and consolation for what we have done.  

    On the other side of the coin, as was expressed to me and others, Obama wants to try and use different “diplomacy” efforts, more devoid of “military efforts.”  But, there are still “drone” attacks going on in Pakistan.  How do we feel about that?  I say, there are people down below and they suffer death consequentially.  Not the answer — no way, easy for us, but “death” for them.  Pakistan is probably more of a problem than Afghanistan, but, maybe, none of them would have been a problem were it not for our interference.  As relates to the Taliban, I don’t know how others feel about them, but I rather see it as more of a “fundamentalist” religious cult, the restrictions of which should more appropriately be dealt with by the Human Rights Comissions! What do I mean?  Well, it seems that the major conflict in Afghanistan centers mostly around, more liberal and fundamentalist Muslims.  Thinking on that, do we REALLY have a right to interfere in that situation?  I repeat, I think the problem is more one of a Human Rights concern.  At the same time, I feel heartsick for what was promised to these people by BushCo., most of which were never, ever fulfilled.  It is just one more “quagmire” that we have created in this world, for which others continue to suffer.  

    We live in a ruthless nation — small wonder that most people, no matter how many acquisitions they achieve or have, are STILL not happy!  Happiness is NOT on how much you have, but HOW you view and live your life!  (Sh.t, don’t really mean to sound preacherous — ugh!)  

  4. cause the death of many U.S. soldiers, many more injured, etc. in a quest to defeat some Muslim gang.  Not to mention the innocent civiliams.  That just can’t be the reason for this.  Impossible.  

    • Valtin on April 9, 2009 at 08:00
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    We know who rules this country, don’t we?

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