Pork Processing Plant

In April, 2009, President Obama’s Defense Secretary, Robert M. Gates, drafted the proposed 2010 Defense Budget. It was definitely both a wartime budget and one that placed an emphasis on projecting and supporting troops in foreign theaters and fighting the asymmetrical wars that the US is currently engaged in prosecuting. Since it took both the changing face of warfare and America’s current financial situation into account, it was both painful to some and highly pragmatic.

Then it was submitted to Congress…

us capitol building
The US Capitol: Largest Pork Processing Plant In America

Senators, in a frankly treasonous orgy of earmarks, diverted $2.6 billion in funds from the 2010 Defense Appropriations bill into various various pet projects. Most of the monies diverted were stolen from the US military’s Operation and Maintenance accounts (O&M).

The O&M accounts are not for projects or new technologies; those are the accounts that pay for for: troop training, repairs, spares & supplies for vehicles, weapons, ammunition, ships and planes, food and fuel – the day-to-day operating expenses that are needed to maintain the operational efficiency and survivability of our servicemen and women.

From the Washington Times:

Senators diverted $2.6 billion in funds in a defense spending bill to pet projects largely at the expense of accounts that pay for fuel, ammunition and training for U.S. troops, including those fighting wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, according to an analysis.

Among the 778 such projects, known as earmarks, packed into the bill: $25 million for a new World War II museum at the University of New Orleans and $20 million to launch an educational institute named after the late Sen. Edward M. Kennedy, Massachusetts Democrat.

While earmarks are hardly new in Washington, “in 30 years on Capitol Hill, I never saw Congress mangle the defense budget as badly as this year,” said Winslow Wheeler, a former Senate staffer who worked on defense funding and oversight for both Republicans and Democrats. He is now a senior fellow at the Center for Defense Information, an independent research organization.

Shaun Waterman
The Washington Times

Mr. Winslow Wheeler, Senior Fellow at the Center for Defense Information, described the US Senate’s ransacking of Defense Appropriations bill as amounting to “rancid gluttony.”  Senator Tom Coburn (R-OK) called the looting, “a disgrace.” I call it what it is truly is – Treason.

TITLE 18, PART I, CHAPTER 115, § 2381 of the US Code clearly and unambiguously states:

Whoever, owing allegiance to the United States, levies war against them or adheres to their enemies, giving them aid and comfort within the United States or elsewhere, is guilty of treason and shall suffer death, or shall be imprisoned not less than five years and fined under this title but not less than $10,000; and shall be incapable of holding any office under the United States.

The United States is currently at war in two countries, Afghanistan and Iraq. There are two additional threats looming on the horizon, Iran and North Korea. The Senate’s raping of those parts of the Defense Appropriations bill pertaining to supporting American troops in those combat zones is giving aid and comfort to the enemy; indeed, it is an overt attempt to murder the men and women in the US military.

Traditionally treason during time of war is punishable by death. While such retribution would be satisfying to every American, I’ll settle for having the filth removed from office permanently.

President Obama’s administration’s budget requested $156 billion for the regular O&M account and $81 billion for O&M for the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. The bill passed by the Senate cut $2.4 billion from the regular account and $655 million from the war O&M fund.

In addition to the $2.6 billion in earmarks the filth in the Senate added, the bill now includes $2.5 billion for 10 Boeing C-17 cargo planes that the military says it does not need or want, and $1.7 billion for an extra DDG-51 destroyer never requested by the Pentagon.

President Obama, while campaigning, had said that he wouldn’t sign any bills that contained earmarks. This bill currently has 778 of them and raped America’s armed forces in order to fund them! So the question devolves to will President Obama refuse to sign the bill or was his promise not to do so just one more jabbering mouthing drooling from his mendacious face?

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2 Responses to “Pork Processing Plant”

  1. ichabod Says:

    Hi jonolan;

    Some time ago you and I discussed a presidential line item veto. You had an excellent answer in opposing it.

    However, the above example show a need for line item vetoes, or if nothing else, a law preventing this type of activity going on.

    Pork in the form of earmarks in and of itself does not make any sense whatsoever except that the writers of the original bill are “buying” the votes needed to pass it.

  2. jonolan Says:

    ichabod,

    I agree that something has to be done, but we’ve – as you mentioned – already discussed my misgivings about any proposed Line Item Veto capability give into the POTUS. There’s got to be another way to do this.

    Of course Obama could do as he promised and not sign any bills with earmarks. But we all know that this will just turn out to e another one of his lies.

    Hope and Change = Despair and Entropy…at least so far and with no signs of improvement until Obama is removed from office somehow.

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