Nearly 95% of the money would, Mr Obama said, go to the Pentagon to "help the people of Iraq to take responsibility for their own future, and work to disrupt, dismantle, and defeat al-Qaeda in Pakistan and Afghanistan".I understand and agree with needing to stablize the region (since it's our responsibility directly, now.) But the articl states that the Obama administration is requesting $150bn, which is a scant $22bn less than Goober Bush, and this time, the Democrats are going to be signing off on the check. No blaming the Republicans this time (though they never seemed to have a problem with this funding since the start of the 'war' . . . .)
The rest of the money would be used to confront other threats to US security, from "securing loose nuclear weapons to combating fear and want under repressive regimes".
According to an article from The Center for Arms Control and Non-Proliferation, Obama is spending more on national defense than Bush did (adjusting for inflation.)
In the article:
The reason is quite simple. President Obama and members of his defense team plan to end the use of emergency supplemental bills to pay for the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. War spending under the Bush administration was largely requested in “off budget” supplementals that were excluded from White House deficit projections and long-term plans. By integrating war budgets into the regular Pentagon budget, the Obama administration will make war funding part of the normal budget process and therefore subject to budget oversight laws.So in other words, he gets to keep a campaign 'promise' and spend more money on the war anyway?
Since war funding is going to be shifted from emergency supplementals into the regular Pentagon budget, however, the regular Pentagon budget will increase in the years ahead due to the infusion of war funds. The United States will most likely spend less on defense overall; the money will just be presented up front in a single large chunk. This integration process will take time – there will still be a separate war supplemental next fiscal year – but the $534 billion Pentagon budget in fiscal year 2010 already includes some of the spending that used to be included in war supplementals.
The Republicans say: We dont' care.
The Democrats say: We pretend to care.
(Ted Rall)
