From The Ramparts
by Junious Ricardo Stanton ~
“On September 10, 2001, Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld held a press conference to disclose that over $2,000,000,000,000 in Pentagon funds could not be accounted for. Rumsfeld stated: ‘According to some estimates we cannot track $2.3 trillion in transactions.’ According to a report by the Inspector General, the Pentagon cannot account for 25 percent of what it spends. Such a disclosure normally might have sparked a huge scandal. However, the commencement of the attack on New York City and Washington in the morning would assure that the story remained buried. To the trillions already missing from the coffers, an obedient Congress terrorized by anthrax attacks would add billions more in appropriations to fight the ‘War on Terror.’” http://911research.wtc7.net/sept11/trillions.html
Recently the corporate media revealed that billions of dollars sent to Iraq shortly after the illegal invasion of that country on bogus claims by the Bu$h administration about Weapons of Mass Destruction are unaccounted for. To make matters worse it is suspected that much of that money may have been stolen. “Reporting from Washington— After the U.S.-led invasion of Iraq in March 2003, the George W. Bush administration flooded the conquered country with so much cash to pay for reconstruction and other projects in the first year that a new unit of measurement was born. Pentagon officials determined that one giant C-130 Hercules cargo plane could carry $2.4 billion in shrink-wrapped bricks of $100 bills. They sent an initial full planeload of cash, followed by 20 other flights to Iraq by May 2004 in a $12-billion haul that U.S. officials believe to be the biggest international cash airlift of all time. This month, the Pentagon and the Iraqi government are finally closing the books on the program that handled all those Benjamins. But despite years of audits and investigations, U.S. Defense officials still cannot say what happened to $6.6 billion in cash — enough to run the Los Angeles Unified School District or the Chicago Public Schools for a year, among many other things. For the first time, federal auditors are suggesting that some or all of the cash may have been stolen, not just mislaid in an accounting error. Stuart Bowen, special inspector general for Iraq reconstruction, an office created by Congress, said the missing $6.6 billion may be ‘the largest theft of funds in national history.’” - Los Angles Times June 13, 2011 www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/world/la-fg-missing-billions-20110613
There are billions missing in Iraq they have no clue where it is, who took it and no one goes to jail!? Meanwhile here at home the wheels are falling off the wagon, cities, counties, states and even the US government are broke. Governments are cutting social programs, “borrowing” from their employees pension funds which are themselves already severely underfunded and have taken major hits in the crash of 2008 and people are OK with that? Yet no one goes to jail!? Bernie Madoff went to jail only because he turned himself in, not because of any investigation by the SEC, FBI or US Attorneys . Inside Job a documentary that reveals how the economic implosion happened and who caused it won an Academy Award but none of the culprits went to jail. At least with Enron and Worldcom a few folks were prosecuted, convicted and jailed. I guess the New Jack criminals who are ripping off our tax dollars in Iraq know how to avoid getting caught and prosecuted.
News like this is read while Americans stare blankly at the television screen but seem not to care. We have been so inundated by Hollywood degenerate excrement and Madison Avenue psychobabble designed to manipulate us into spending and buying things we don’t need but are conditioned to believe are indispensable for daily life and our self-esteem, we seem not to comprehend this country’s moral and fiscal implosions.
At this point we seem numb to what is going on around us, I believe this is by design. The US government at the highest levels is a criminal enterprise that facilitates the theft of trillions of dollars on behalf of the Kleptocrats who set policy to be enforced by the fat cat politicians they bribe and coerce into doing their bidding. The corporate media which always present a world view and values that reflect the aims and objectives of the owner class is not going to hammer these facts home. Yes, I will admit, they do mention these stories every once in a while but they don’t spend the same amount of time on them as they do on drivel about Congressman Weiner or Charley Sheen and that too is deliberate. Their goal is to keep us distracted, dumbed down and deceived.
The US, like most Western economies is undergoing major economic stress and depression right now. In fact the US government itself is actually on the verge of default, unable to pay its bills unless it raises the debt ceiling in order to continue borrowing money from around the world. One reason the US is broke is because of the fraud, theft and corruption within the government itself. On September10, 2001 the day before 9-11 Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld held a press conference to announce two point three trillion dollars was unaccounted for. That was the first time the world trillion was used in the context of government operations. Of course the next day, 9-11 everything changed. That “change” allowed the embezzlement, fraud and theft to continue unabated especially once the US invaded Iraq under the false pretext of Weapons of Mass Destruction. The Military Industrial Complex and the US Department of Defense are responsible for trillions of US dollars disappearing without a trace. No investigations, no one goes to jail or the firing squad. Yet if some poor slob fails to pay his traffic tickets or child support, he goes to jail.
Crime and punishment as we shall see in future articles is a function of race and to a lesser degree class in America. Meanwhile in the US Congress, our elected representatives are getting richer from the bribes, inside deals and investment opportunities they are offered while the rest of us watch our minuscule assets go up in smoke before our eyes. “Despite a stubbornly sour national economy congressional members' personal wealth collectively increased by more than 16 percent between 2008 and 2009, according to a new study by the Center for Responsive Politics of federal financial disclosures released earlier this year. And while some members' financial portfolios lost value, no need to bemoan most lawmakers' financial lot: Nearly half of them -- 261 -- are millionaires, a slight increase from the previous year, the Center's study finds. That compares to about 1 percent of Americans who lay claim to the same lofty fiscal status. Of these congressional millionaires, 55 have an average calculated wealth in 2009 of $10 million or more, with eight in the $100 million-plus range.” www.commondreams.org/newswire/2010/11/17-0 Former speaker of the House Nancy Palosi saw her wealth jump 62% in 2010. “House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) saw her net worth rise 62 percent last year, cementing her status as one of the wealthiest members of Congress. Pelosi was worth at least $35.2 million in the 2010 calendar year, according to a financial disclosure report released Wednesday. She reported a minimum of $43.4 million in assets and about $8.2 million in liabilities. For 2009, Pelosi reported a minimum net worth of $21.7 million.” http://thehill.com/blogs/on-the-money/801-economy/166599-pelosis-net-worth-rises-62-percent-
Pelosi’s Republican counterpart John Boehner saw his wealth jump considerably last year also. “Speaker John Boehner (R-Ohio) also remained a multimillionaire. He reported that his minimum net worth in 2010 was close to $2.1 million, with zero liabilities. His 2009 minimum net worth was more than $1.8 million” ibid.
How much did your assets or bank account increase last year? Did the value of your house increase or go down in 2010? I maintain if you extrapolate the billions lost in Iraq and the trillions stolen over the years in the Department of Defense across the other government agencies like HUD, Interior and add the white collar crime and graft in Medicaid you won’t have to wonder why or how the US is broke.
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