Becuase Everything Else Sucks

Gates seeking to “institutionalize” Bush defense spending

By Sam
Published Saturday, January 31st, 2009, 2:21 pm
Filed under: War

In testimony before the Senate Armed Services committee last week, Bush administration secretary of defense holdover Robert Gates said he was looking to “institutionalize,” i.e., make permanent, Bush-era defense spending.

“One thing we have known for many months is that the spigot of defense funding opened by 9/11 is closing,” Gates said.

Gates noted that the Pentagon beauracracy is arranged primarily to “plan for future wars, to prepare for a short war, but not to wage a protracted war.”  He hoped to change that.

“The challenge we face” is how to ”institutionalize the irregular capabilities gained and means to support troops in theater that have been” developed during the Bush years.  Gates hopes to incorporate supplemental war appropriations used to fund the illegal invasion and occupation of Iraq and Afghanistan into the “base budget.”

War spending “must have a home and enthusiastic constituencies in the regular budgeting and procurement process,” added Gates.

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2 Responses to “Gates seeking to “institutionalize” Bush defense spending”

  1. I often imagine how our society could be improved if we put 10% of the defense budget into our infrastructure.

    Comrade Kevin
    01/31/09 at 5:06 pm

  2. I clicked the link for the Pro-Military manufacturing jobs above. Then I cut out the original petition body and sent this instead:

    Dear President Obama,
    Why, during a near collapse of the American economy, would any leader promote the massive production of an overpriced, fighter jet that has no current target enemy and has yet to be put into reliable service?
    The F-22 is a giant boondoggle that is currently un-deployable and is target at a cold-war era enemy that no longer poses a threat to our Nation.
    If you are going to generate jobs to help resuscitate this Nation’s economic muscle, I urge you to create jobs in the alternative energy fields of Solar, hydro-electric, geothermal, waste and weed based biodiesel and other infinitely more practical and implementable solutions.

    Thank you,
    Abner Doubleday

    (Note that the big push of the original petition was the importance of the 95,000 jobs and efficiency of the F-22 “Raptor” building program. Be aware that the reason that the public has only witnessed the F-22 fly in formations of two or more in mega-blockbuster movies like “Independence Day” is because Hollywood producers have the budget to computer generate them on the big screen. Just like an “Army of One”, The F-22s are a fleet of 1. There is one flyable F-22 Raptor in existence. this is a flying testbed and is not fully operational, after all these years of development, production and promises. Don’t ask how I know, but I’ve been in contact with this plane and it’s crew. 95,000 jobs and countless billions of jobs and we’ve got a single plane that isn’t strong enough to defend even it’s own reputation.)
    Interesting how the Air Force has begun naming weapons systems after viscous animals, insects and even death itself. Note: F-18 Hornet, AGM-88 HARM missile; MQ-1 Predator; MQ-9 Reaper.
    Even the Bald Eagle is a keen predator without many natural adversaries. The Air Force has adopted the slogan “Above All”, a direct translation of the third reich’s motto:”Uber Alles”.

    Fun ko-inky-dink or revealing foreshadow of human history repeating itself?

    72 Dodge Dutchter
    02/1/09 at 1:53 pm

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