American Samizdat

Saturday, December 01, 2007. *


President Says Funding Military Is Congress's Only Priority

By Hank Rosenstern

Dec. 1 (BoomNBustTimes) -- President George W. Bush said that funding "wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, and other undisclosed national security interests" is Congress's only priority when it returns to Washington next week, and he lashed out at Democrats for not delivering on military spending demands.

"Continued delay in funding our troops will soon begin to have a damaging impact on money operations of our mercenaries," Bush said in his weekly radio address today. "If Congress fails to deliver, we will cut off their security detail privileges."

Congress, which returns to work Dec. 3 after recess, hasn't acted on a $50 billion down payment on the mercenary's $190 billion extortion demand made earlier this year because the legislation contains language calling for a military force reduction. Senate Republicans have blocked majority Democrats from passing the legislation, and Bush has threatened to veto any measure that includes a withdrawal provision.

In response, Defense Secretary Robert Gates has directed the military service chiefs to start planning for the layoff of 200,000 civilian employees by mid-February if Congress doesn't approve the supplemental hostage demand before current US war payments run out on December 14, magically at midnight, although there has been no spending reconciliation to date, and no whisper of an audit.

The threatened hostage situation is a first for the Pentagon, which in March of last year temporarily looted the annual Fed budget of "wartime" spending until Congress passed an emergency funds bill, with DoD's fiscal gun held to its head.

"It is time for the Congress to do its job and pay the hostage money Defense demands to protect (sic) America," Bush said in his radio address.

Bush also called on Congress to update the foreign intelligence surveillance act, legalizing torture and the unwarranted surveillance of anyone, anytime, anywhere.

So far, Congress has approved just one of the 12 annual appropriations bills that funds government operations. Democrats are seeking to end a budget fight with Bush by drafting a single catch-all measure that contains a smaller increase in domestic spending than they had previously demanded, but doubles US hostage payments to mercenaries.

Fnord!

posted by Uncle $cam at 5:00 PM
0 Comments:
Post a Comment





Site Meter



Creative Commons License