How did Afghan President Karzai amass a fortune of over $320 million on a $150,000 a year annual salary? Just asking..

This is not surprising with all the greed, corruption and gross mismanagement by incompetent gov't bureaucrats, none of who will be held accountable. Afghanistan to follow suit. Our Congress is equally responsible for sloppy to non-existent oversight, spend, spend spend! Just rack it up to the National Debt.

Iraq war reconstruction: $6 billion to $8 billion wasted, US official says - Gotta love these a$$holes. This would be funny if it were not PATHETIC. Throw ALL the corrupt fools out in NOV.

How is that $8 billion anything but welfare for corrupt Iraqi officials and US defense contractors?

Talk about entitlements....

It was a looting of American taxpayers by the Republicans and their hand picked contractors/supporters. If you weren't a Republican supporting company, you didn't get a contract in Iraq.

We have known that money is being wasted, abused, or fraudulently taken by both Western and Iraqi officials and contractors for years.

My question is, "Why is this still going on?" Stop pumping money into that bottomless pit of snakes!!!

How much of that wasted money found its way into the pockets of Bush and Cheney's buddies? Halliburton comes to mind. A post on another forum mentioned that Ike warned us to never ever elect as president someone in the oil business.

Why are we not going after the contractors that stole this money. Is that because they have good friends in congress protecting them.

I advocate bypassing the destruction phase and set right to rebuilding these messed up countries. Bypassing the war/destruction/stupidity would allow us to help folks AND rebuild our own Social Security benefits so our own folks here in America can live nicely too.

I hope some day war is declared illegal. It does nothing for anyone. Bomb people with loaves of bread!

Before you start snarking comments toward this view I have to say that it is really that simple. Little kids get along until we teach them who to hate and who to fear and who to trust!

If you want to add insult to injury google the cost of killing 'enemy' combatants. The money we spend killing another human being is beyond my words to describe.

Where is the republican outrage? They don't mind this waste. Disgusting and criminal. Charlie Sheen donates a million dollars to wounded vets and this money is just being thrown into the fire. This world is truly backwards!!

Those that preach piety rarely act on it.

No money in paying it back.

These wars are all a waste of money, except as pork for the war machinery producers, and a jobs program. We spent trillions killing and invading, while back here at home, there's no money for basic services. That's what happens when war is a country's main enterprise.

Makes you want to pay your taxes, doesn't it.

You gotta wonder, how much of that missing $6 to $8 BILLION went to Dick Cheney's old firm, Halliburton, which was incredibly deeply involved in everything to do with the war in Iraq.

Hey Harold, this article was about fraud, waste and abuse in IRAQ. How much of that missing money went to the deep recesses of the books for Halliburton?

The entire GOP/Republican/ Tea Bagger parties are WASTE FRAUD AND ABUSE!! Those are the exact kind of projects they support...especially here at home. Hey, as long as they profit at the top end is all that matters right? This should be there motto.

Hope I do agree with you. And what is severely neglected in wars is the facts that it kills more than just people---it kills wildlife, clean air, clean food and clean water as it also kills trees, birds, food organisms etc.

Gee thanks Bushie for the expenditure; was it really worth it to financially break this country just so Cheney could gain some control of their oil.

Is Afghanistan really worth the cost---first they attacked our buildings and now they are raping our finances and laughing about it.

Man what ever happened to the concept of Intelligent Leaders in this country. Has the intelligence been forfeited to control issues?

hahaha.....we get to spend all that money to rebuild after we destroyed it........oh and we get to help re-arm them too after we destroyed all the arms we provided them in the 1980's....our foreign policy is as retarded as our goverment is..

Sen. Coleman of Mn. was in charge of repubs to investigate the fraud in Iraq. He investigated NOTHING! All of the skids of millions of dollars of cash that disappeared, he did nothing. He instead traveled the world on junkets. Minnesota knew about it and dumped him.

Romney is hiring all the same advisers from Bush Cheney regime and is taking orders from Rove/Norquist and they want to go to war for more profits and crash the economy to make more profits again.

No biggie, we'll just have the 1% pay their fair share so the Government can waste more money in foreign countries, problem solved.

Repubs try to slash benifits for our vets! Ref www.silverbuzzcafe.com Also visit www.disabledvets.org

Just when we thought they couldn’t stoop any lower (after cutting emergency food
benefits for infants, children, women and seniors last week), the Republicans
are now going after Veteran’s healthcare benefits. A little-discussed part of
the Ryan Plan would cut healthcare benefits for the 1.3 million Veterans who
have access to US Department of Veterans Affairs care and claim Priority Group 7
or 8 status. The Republican’s reasoning is that they want to cut the deficit and
this change will save $6 in the first year and $62 billion over the first ten
years.

Priority Group 7 covers Veterans with gross household income below the
geographically-adjusted income threshold (GMT) for their resident location and
who agree to pay copays, plus some special cases with income above the GMT.
Priority Group 8 covers similar individuals whose eligibility has been
downgraded or whose income exceeds the GMT by less than 10%.

Republican philosophy: Punish the brave and reward the
rich
Of course, it didn’t occur to the Republicans that continuing
the Bush tax cuts for the top 2% of wealthy Americans is already going to cost
us an extra $690 billion over the next 10 years. With additional debt service
that number jumps to $830 billion. Either way, the “fiscally conservative”
Republicans, herded by a rabid Tea Party, will happily kick Veterans in the
teeth while making a gift of 10 times the savings they’ll make to the richest 2%
of Americans. How are they going to make enough savings to pay the other 90% of
their gift? Shoot seniors before they qualify for Medicare or Social
Security?

Savings From The Republican’s VA Cuts Versus Other
Expenditures

What about the cost of the unfunded Iraq War? The Republicans didn’t have any
problems voting for an unjustified war that has cost us $783 billion to date.
Neither have they shed a tear for the nearly four and a half thousand Americans
killed and over 33,000 wounded in that war. If you want to find the real cause
of our rising deficit, you need look no further than the Bush tax cuts for the
rich, the Iraq War and the unfunded $1.2 trillion Medicare Drug Benefit giveaway
to the health insurance companies.

How is this Bush's fault? Did you democrats not read the article? It states that the majority of money was due to bad record keeping.

These are all govt. agencies. One of the govt. agencies represented was the US agencies for international development (USAID). This service provides free birth control, hiV testing etc. All of which you democrats should be for.

So spare us your lecture.

I'd be more concerned if it weren't such a small (by Govco. and Govco. only standards) amount and if this didn't send up red flags that Republican and Democrat Statists will NEVER see, and those red flags are trying to point out that the ENTIRE Federal Government is like the clu$terf**K highlighted (in a transparent media attempt to continue the near decade long "it's all Bush's fault" campaign in hopes of Democrat election glory in a couple of months) in this article, which is why we have a $16,000,000,000,000 National Debt that just surpassed our annual GDP and is going up a Trillion dollars a year on average !!!

Our federal government has been noted for wasting money since before I was born. I'll be 57 this fall. Prime example-they spent $250K to study the flight of the bumblebee and on paper proved it could NOT fly. They spent the same amount studying the F4 Phantom jet only to find the same thing but they still bought it and it served our country for over 50 years. It was 25 when I entered the service.

This is our money, taxpayer money, money we worked hard for and that everyone seems to take from we the people with impunity.

Considering the huge number of people in turmoil in this country, the huge number of bad schools, the huge number of "sacrifices" that we the people are burdened with, to read that this country just throws the money away is nauseating. Our elected officials hem and haw about a puny payroll tax cut and a bill to stabilize student loans, but Clinton can walk into Egypt and FORGIVE its BILLIONS OF DOLLARS DEBT and at the same time OFFER $250 MILLION IN NEW LOAN GUARANTEES because she "worries about their economy.

Need I say more?

Hey Unhappy

Bush was arguably the worst president in American history It was on his watch that 9/11took place: it was Bush who failed to kill or capture bin Laden: it was Bush who failed to destroy Al Qaida and the Taliban after 8 years of war: It was Bush who lied to the entire world about WMD in Iraq: It was Bush who turned a record Federal surplus into a record deficit: It was Bush who created the conditions that have lead to the
biggest economic crises in since the great depression: it was Bush who failed to act when New Orleans was hit with a natural disaster; It was Bush who destroyed Americas standing in the world

What does the Idiot do he invades Iraq based on a pack of lies (let’s face it folks it was all for oil) a country that wasn’t a threat, runs up trillions of dollars in debt, doesn’t pay for the war but cuts taxes for the rich not once but twice. Than the idiot takes one of the biggest government surpluses in history and turns it into a deficit, runs the economy into a ditch and than gets out of dodge. And here we are years later still in Afghanistan because of the Conservative’s faliuries.

Unhappy........Cheney....no bid contracts...had to be repub firm to get contracts....Sen Coleman in charge of investigating fraud and loss....never investigated one case. Never investigated anything and the money was reported disappearing every day. That was the way Bush Cheney wanted it, privatized as much as possible.

Bush Cheney said the oil from Iraq would pay foor the cost.

Bush/Cheney had NO plan after Saddam was captured. ALL OVER THE NEWS<, NO PLAN AFTER SADDAM CAPTURED! Mission accomplished remember? Literally skids of money delivered to iraq officials and it disappeared. reporters found some of them in France. Coleman did not investigate. Blame Bush hell yes forever!

The biggest waste was the lives and the wounding of our soldiers. Families destroyed along with them.

Because two fools lied the nation into war.

Vote on thursday....end tax breaks for taking companies overseas. Gives company 20% tax break for bring them back. Pretty simple, give jobs to foreigners or get them back. Dems want them back.

Repubs block it every time. Let's all watch repubs block it once more like traiters to our country, thursday.

Lets all bail out the 1 % again

Iraq War: 6 to 8 Billion wasted, U.S. Official Says

Six to eight Billion? That's all these 'tards will fess up to???????? Twenty thousand bucks says it's at least TIMES more than that. To say nothing about the incredibly wasteful loss of our troop's lives.

..........and to think these dimwits in Washington want war with Iran. So how much are we going to have to fork over for THAT boondoogle? I want to see the balance sheet please.

eight billion here, eight billion there, after a while , you are talking about some real money.

trudat you are the idiot, the banks i guess that was your money or the auto industry where did the money go where did it come from who gets the bonuses i know you cant understand simple text but hey maybe when you grow up but i really doubt it

Bush and Cheney did a great job. Cheney wanted no bid contracts, therefore Haliburton and their friends had quite a time on the tax payers watch and went wild and as for an above comment about voting them out in November....Uh, just a reminder, the country already did that. Now we need to get out of Afganistan and let the corupt Karzi government do whatever the hell they want with their country. Our mission in Afganistan is complete....Bin Laden....DEAD! (and I do believe that was accomplished on Obama's watch).

Halliburton had NON-BID contracts on MANY of these jobs. I didn't see Cheney or Halliburton mentioned at all. FYI folks. Remember the BP oil spill? THAT was a safety judgement call made by HALLIBURTON. Thank you, Dick Cheney for your ongoing service to ripoff the American people! He didn't hesitate to kill Americans, maim Americans, blast our budget to hell, substantially weaken our American Safety Network, take our money to spend on FAKE construction jobs after bombing and killing Iraqis, polluting our gulf coast/ecosystem with BP and probably now he's on the phony XL pipeline to Hell ride. Folks, an oil spill of that type has all ready rendered a substantial river in our heartland poisonous to its population. The oil SINKS to the bottom and saturates into the riverbed. This pipeline will only create about 5-8,000 TEMPORARY jobs and poses a DEADLY threat to a northwest state's water supply. The Republican governor of that state asked President Obama to stop the pipeline until a realistic environmental study could be implemented, but most Repubs will lie and just say Obama is killing jobs. LIES!

I don't understand how people can think the Republican party is somehow good for America. They had & have gutted the budgets of our national agencies that protect us and gutted our treasury to line the pockets of the war machine contractors. They want to break America first, then come in and be our "savior". Does this sound familiar?

Just want to add -- our tax money going to "government contractors" (i.e. private corporations) is not a new story; Eisenhower's warning about the 'military-industrial complex' applies even more strongly to today's corporate-political-military machine.

If you have not read it already, get hold of Naomi Klein's book, The Shock Doctrine. Parts 5 (Homeland Security) and 6 (Iraq) are the most relevant to this article. She nails it.

Unhappy-1583758

How is this Bush's fault?

Unhappy,

If we had not rushed into Iraq, we would not have had to rebuild Iraq.

We'll never ben done paying for the thievery that occurred on the Bush/Cheney watch. You people obsess about where the President was born, claim that he's a Muslim, claim he's a socialist. The GOP wants "less regulation" and claims that their thieving ways will bring this country prosperity. I trust President Obama. I don't trust the Military, the Defense Contractors, Corporate outsourcers, or banksters. Most of all, I don't trust Romney. He's a carney barker that would steal the half dollars off the eyes of a dead man.

$51 Billion would have gone a long way in rebuilding and upgrading many US Cities with Taxpayer Monies,

My question is, Why the hell did we spend 51 billion dollars on this @!$%#hole? I mean really why? A backwater country who kills not only others but it's own for religious reasons. Absolutely worthless.

trudat you are the idiot, the banks i guess that was your money or the auto industry where did the money go where did it come from who gets the bonuses i know you cant understand simple text but hey maybe when you grow up but i really doubt i

Please tell me youre drunk or drugged up. I wont even bother trying to make sense of that, its like you vomitted on the keyboard.

It's not NO BID Contracts, the article plainly states it is incompetent BOOKKEEPING.

As much as the lunatic liberals want to blame Bush for everything, the problem in this case is decades of incompetence in bureaucracy.

As far as the surplus - it never existed, if you would just take 2 minutes and look at the government budgets. Another liberal lie.

As far as WMD - they were in Iraq, but again, you would have to actually study in order to discover the facts rather than bellying up to the liberal liars bar.

Bush and our government did act in the New Orleans disaster, although the response was not swift. Believe it or not, this is another case of poor bureaucracy. Incompetent lifetime government employees.

As for Afghanistan, Obama owns this war, claimed it as his own, expanded forces and expenditures.

These liberal loon rants are beyond idiotic, and expose the dimwits still supporting the insanity in DC.

We have a federal government problem. Both parties lie, spend to much, direct billions to their friends, lie some more, and blame each other. Just listen to the "leaders". From Prince Harry deciding for 330 million Americans that bills passed by the House will not be voted on in the Senate, to Nancy Pelosi enriching herself with her insider information, overseas investments, and sweetheart deals for her husband and constituents, to McConnell being the dim of the dimwits, to Orangeman crying and blaming, they are all stealing us blind.

We need a moderate 3rd party without fringe loons at the controls. Something neither existing party can offer us.

people forget that there are costs associated with shutting down as well. It is not likely that we can simply walk away. The last time we walked away from Afgan was right after their war with Russians. And the Al Qaeda and the Talibans took advantage of the gap in the Afgan gov. We should not be the overseers, but we should not simply walk away either. We are human. We live in a social community. Our futures are effected by our past and present... So did we learn from our lessons from past?

The official in charge of monitoring America’s $51 billion effort to reconstruct Iraq has estimated that $6 billion to $8 billion of that amount was lost to waste, fraud and abuse.

Hmmmmm, that’s not actually too bad.

Lemme show you government lovers some real waste, fraud, abuse and corruption (WFAC).

~ The federal government made at least $92 billion in improper payments in 2010.

~ Washington spends $25 billion annually maintaining unused or vacant federal properties.

~ Government auditors spent the past five years examining all federal programs and found that 22 percent of them–costing taxpayers a total of $123 billion annually–fail to show any positive impact on the populations they serve.

~ The Congressional Budget Office published a “Budget Options” series identifying more than $140 billion in potential spending cuts.

~ Examples from multiple Government Accountability Office (GAO) reports of wasteful duplication include 342 economic development programs; 130 programs serving the disabled; 130 programs serving at-risk youth; 90 early childhood development programs; 75 programs funding international education, cultural, and training exchange activities; and 72 safe water programs. Estimates of the cost range between $150 billion and $200 billion annually.

~ Washington will spend $2.6 million training Chinese prostitutes to drink more responsibly on the job.

~ Health care fraud is estimated to cost taxpayers more than $200 billion annually.

~ A GAO audit found that 95 Pentagon weapons systems suffered from a combined $295 billion in cost overruns.

~ A Department of Agriculture report concedes that much of the $2.5 billion in “stimulus” funding for broadband Internet will be wasted.

If you’d like, I have over 400 more examples of WFAC in our criminal government.

The saddest part is that most of you want MORE government, you must be chugging the Yellow Kool-Aid. What’s even more unbelievable is that many of you want the government to raise taxes. I don’t care if you’re living in poverty, middle class or Bill Gates, you shouldn’t give our incompetent government another penny until all this massive WFAC is eliminated.

There is no amount of money you can send to our government that they won’t find a way to waste a significant part of it.

Wake up America, more government is NOT THE ANSWER!!!!!

What a shame, I'm sure the rich people in this country could have used that money.

I don't see why the Iraq operation should cost us one red cent. Hell, THEY'RE the ones with the oil industry! Let THEM pay the expenses of American intervention. So far, Iraq/Afghanistan has just been the cover used to hide as they pilfered and looted OUR Treasury. Many of our senior officials-politicians, intelligence and military, not to forget certain corporate leaders, could be found decorating lamp posts in the morning and I wouldn't shed a tear.

Vote ONLY 3rd party candidates this election or you'll surely be voting for a continuation of the Same Old Sh/t. The problem makers will NEVER be the problem solvers. See you at the booths!

trudat.........it is you who appear to be compromised and not thinking straight it seems.........so time for you to stop insulting others who point out your shortcomings

Amazing nobody's talking about the pull out in Afgahnistan where troop levels are so low Marines are getting killed left and right....and for what?...an election by an unqualified junior senator. POS

Trudat i get it now you are a clown sorry lol

The Bush administration didn't want any accountability or auditing.

Remember the pallets stcked high with 100 dollar bills they shipped over.

*************************************************************************************************

***********************************************************************************************

Harry-3603195

Halliburton had NON-BID contracts on MANY of these jobs.

Correct me if I’m wrong but I don't think Cheney was in office in May of 2010? was he?

Bloomberg Businessweek: May 8, 2010, KBR Inc. [aka Halliburton] was selected for a no-bid contract worth as much as $568 million through 2011 for military support services in Iraq, the Army said.

Now, as far as pipelines are concerned.

This pipeline will only create about 5-8,000 TEMPORARY jobs and poses a DEADLY threat to a northwest state's water supply.

Let’s see if there are any pipelines in America.

~ There are between 30,000 and 40,000 miles of small (2-8 inches) gathering lines for crude oil in the U.S.

~ There are approximately 55,000 miles of trunk lines (48 inches) in the U.S.

~ There are approximately 95,000 miles of refined petroleum lines in the U.S.

~ There are about 20,000 miles of natural gas gathering lines in the U.S.

~ There are approximately 278,000 miles of natural gas transmission lines in the U.S.

~ There are approximately 1.8 million miles of natural gas main lines which deliver gas under streets to homes and businesses in the U.S.

Hmmm, how many of these have created a DEADLY threat to ANY WATER SUPPLIES?

Please stop with the typical Liberal talking points they’re too easy to disprove. You need some new material.

Every dime spent in Iraq was a dime wasted. If the U.S. was so intent on taking Saddam out, it shouldn't have cost much more than the price of a bullet and a real Jason Bourne.

Jim

NICE! Stupefy them with facts. You will now hear crickets as libs don't like disputing reality. If you want to get a tyrannical to shut up you just did the best thing you can do.

No matter what is said and done, I'll bet the Republicans will place all the blame on Obama.

CHONG: "OH MAN! We overspent by like...6 or 8 BILLION DOLLARS! We are in DEEP S---!!"
CHEECH: "RELAX...EVERYBODY over here pockets a few hundred million on this job, or a few hundred million on that job. Nobody really cares, man."
CHONG: "Really!? So, like...you think that it's okay and all?"
CHEECH: "Oh man! NO PROBLEM MAN! Just chill out, man... sit down, and roll another one of those really big joints, OK!"
CHONG: "Oh, OK man! ...OH! and I got this like REALLY BIG kilo of coke, man."
CHEECH: "Really man? How'd you get that man?"
CHONG: "Well, I like borrowed some money from that million dollar stack of money that you left on the back of the toilet man."
CHEECH: "OH MAN! Did you take all of it?!"
CHONG: "No man! I only took like what I was able to fit in my pockets man. ...OH! WAIT A MINUTE! I remember now...It wasn't from the money on the back of the toilet, it was like, the money that you had in the freezer, man."
CHEECH: "Heh, heh! That's not my money, that's YOUR money!"
CHONG: "OH! Well far out man! I still got lots more! With that kind of money, we can stay messed up for like, 50 years man!"
CHEECH: "Hey, we should like, join the military next year too man!"
CHONG: "Oh Yeah, man...that'd be like, really far out!"

Does anyone know the entire cost of the 2003 Iraq war? How much will it cost to rehabilitate the wounded vets and benefits for those killed and critically wormed that will never function again?

2.) Did the DoD ever find the missing 2-3 billion dollars that was announced missing on September 10 2001? How much have we wasted on Homeland Security for the joy of being fondled in the airport and having our email read.

3.)How much have we wasted in Afghanistan that they GOP supported for 9 years, until they changed their opinion because the Kenyan supported it? The Vietnam debacle will look brilliant compared to Bush's War on Terror.

How much will the Iran mission cost, that Romney supports?

I'm sure that it is all OK as long as we wear our flag lapel pins and put yellow ribbons on our cars. Tax cuts for the rich and corporations will pay for it.

We should be very lucky if it is 6-8 Billion, I am 99.99% sure that it is MUCH more than that.

Now, you're all crying, mooh! Yet, almost on a daily basis many of you urge your nation to use its might to invade foreign countries, to send in the seals, over some nonsensical issue, over the silly rantings of a foreign leader or the prodding of an ever belligerent ally. America is fast becoming its own enemy. Those of us who come here to warn you of the coming collapse aren't your enemies. We're, in fact, friends of America irritated by America's growing foolishness.

Tell the Bushies, including Cheney, to write us a check.

Drop in the bucket compared to what Obama has spent in the last three and a half years - increasing the deficit by $5.1 trillion, including a near-trillion dollar "stimulus" bill that was supposed to keep unemployment from going above 8%, create millions of shovel ready and green energy jobs, fund wondergreenmobiles like Chevy's Volt, etc. And then there's Obamacare that nobody knows what in the hell it will cost utlimately (Obama said $800 billion, CBO said $1.7 trillion). Nah, no whining about that!

Tell the Bushies, including Cheney, to write us a check.

Only after you tell every single Democrat in Congress that voted for the Iraq and Afghanistan wars to write their checks.

plain bob 2012...

JimSpence, amen brother.

If it wasn't for all the waste, fraud, and duplicate programs that didn't help anyone I wouldn't be so pissed off when I hear politicians talk about raising taxes. When I read articles like this one, and the one about billions vanishing in, I think it was Iraq, it just baffles me why pople think it's ok to raise taxes on a certain group of people. It's not like the money will be put to good use, it'll go to Egypt, Pakistan, more to Iraq, Afganistan, Mexico, etc etc.

I would be ok with paying a little more out of my measley pay if it would help Americans, foreign countries with huge oil deposits that hate us? Not so much.

To those questioning why there are those blaming Bush,

One question, would we have to rebuild Iraq if we never went to war with them in the first place??????

It has been proven Iraq had nothing to do with 911. It was proven that they never had WMD. So tell me how is this NOT BUSH's FAULT????????

Iraq was a completely useless war and it was BUSH who sent us there......for absolutely no reason other than OIL. Oil for which we pay almost double for now. Due to this all products that require shipping cost double. Resulting in the cutting of work force to recoup the loss.

Not to mention the biggest eff up, he deregulated the banks which allowed them give out bad loans such as mortgage to those they knew wouldn't or couldn't pay back. Allowing them to make such risky investiments that we had to bail them out.

Bush is the worst thing that ever happened to this country. He will go down in history as such.

It is the fall of Rome all over again because we didn't learn our lesson the first, second........time. Just like all other great empires greed and hubris will be our down fall.

Devils son 1.4....You stated 2004-2007(asking who was president at that time). The article stated that the investigation started in 2004 and was ongoing for eight yrs.....Why would you make up such a stupid blatant lie? Are you proud of your lie? Grow up....try to be a man. Not just another lying dishonest punk.

Kolchack, slow down on the bath salts man.

Damn! I could have used at least $30,000 of that to pay off my garage. I owed $650.00 last year to the IRS.

epistemologist

Does anyone know the entire cost of the 2003 Iraq war? How much will it cost to rehabilitate the wounded vets and benefits for those killed and critically wormed that will never function again?

From the Congressional Research Service Report: The Cost of Iraq, Afghanistan, and Other Global War on Terror Operations Since 9/11 from March 2011.

With enactment of the sixth FY2011 Continuing Resolution through March 18, 2011, (H.J.Res. 48/P.L. 112-6) Congress has approved a total of $1.283 trillion for military operations, base security, reconstruction, foreign aid, embassy costs, and veterans’ health care for the three operations initiated since the 9/11 attacks: Operation Enduring Freedom (OEF) Afghanistan and other counter terror operations; Operation Noble Eagle (ONE), providing enhanced security at military bases; and Operation Iraqi Freedom (OIF). This estimate assumes that the current CR level continues through the rest of the year and that agencies allocate reductions proportionately.

Of this $1.283 trillion total, CRS estimates that Iraq will receive about $806 billion (63%), OEF $444 billion (35%) and enhanced base security about $29 billion (2%), with about $5 billion that CRS cannot allocate (1/2%). About 94% of the funds are for DOD, 5% for foreign aid programs and diplomatic operations, and 1% for medical care for veterans.

The Vietnam debacle will look brilliant compared to Bush's War on Terror.

Well, you limp-wristed Libbies should know all about Vietnam. Your boys Kennedy and Johnson ran that massive atrocity.

Let’s see, Vietnam was the one where we lost 58,220 souls and had 303,644 wounded.

Now, in Iraq and Afghanistan we have lost 6,532 souls and had 48,503 wounded to date (as of May 2012).

BTW, the Vietnam in real 2010 dollars cost us $4.25 trillion.

Isn’t this the war where you Liberals all showed your respect by spitting on our returning troops?

How's that for brilliant Spanky.

We know you limp-wristed Libbies will never wear an American flag lapel pin.

How about a Hopey Changey pin instead?

Spend the money here in the US?

It'll never happen.

Why?

Because the companies performing this wasteful work, in a country that will simply wreck it all down once we're gone, are too powerful and make too much money THERE to allow it.

Their shareholders demand 10% returns, and they're going to get it, on the backs of the 99% in the US.

More legacy left for us from Dubya and Old Man Potter.

There was ONE thing that the ordinary Iraqi wanted, and that was for the electricity system to work. And that was one thing that you would think would be a real snap for a raft of US construction companies to tackle and excel. Sadly the ordinary Iraqi didn't get it.

Let's just call it $51 billion wasted. If we hadn't invaded Iraq for no apparent reason, then Iraq wouldn't have needed to be rebuilt.

10tacle

Can you say, problems with math!

Trillions of dollars spent when Bush invaded Iraq, billions and billions to rebuild Iraq, and republicans want to repeal healthcare reform to insure low income Americans in America?

Michelle-1583970: It has been proven Iraq had nothing to do with 911. It was proven that they never had WMD. So tell me how is this NOT BUSH's FAULT????????

You should also be pissed off at these people...

“I ended up voting for the resolution (to go to war with Iraq) after carefully reviewing the information, intelligence that I had available, talking with people whose opinions I trusted, and trying to discount the political or other factors that I didn’t believe should be in any way a part of this decision.” –Hillary Clinton, March 7, 2003

"One way or the other, we are determined to deny Iraq the capacity to
develop weapons of mass destruction and the missiles to deliver them. That is
our bottom line."
--President Bill Clinton, Feb.
4, 1998

"If Saddam
rejects peace and we have to use force, our purpose is clear. We want to
seriously diminish the threat posed by Iraq's weapons of mass destruction
program."
--President Bill Clinton, Feb.
17, 1998

"Iraq is a long
way from [here], but what happens there matters a great deal here. For the risks
that the leaders of a rogue state will use nuclear, chemical or biological
weapons against us or our allies is the greatest security threat we
face."
--Madeline Albright, Feb 18,
1998

"He will use
those weapons of mass destruction again, as he has ten times since
1983."
--Sandy Berger, Clinton National
Security Adviser, Feb, 18, 1998

"[W]e urge you,
after consulting with Congress, and consistent with the U.S. Constitution and
laws, to take necessary actions (including, if appropriate, air and missile
strikes on suspect Iraqi sites) to respond effectively to the threat posed by
Iraq's refusal to end its weapons of mass destruction programs."
Letter to
President Clinton, signed by:
-- Democratic Senators Carl
Levin, Tom Daschle, John Kerry, and others, Oct. 9, 1998

"Saddam Hussein has been engaged in the development
of weapons of mass destruction technology which is a threat to countries in the
region and he has made a mockery of the weapons inspection process."
-Rep. Nancy Pelosi (D, CA), Dec.
16, 1998

"Hussein has ...
chosen to spend his money on building weapons of mass destruction and palaces
for his cronies."
-- Madeline Albright, Clinton
Secretary of State, Nov. 10, 1999

"There is no
doubt that ... Saddam Hussein has reinvigorated his weapons programs. Reports
indicate that biological, chemical and nuclear programs continue apace and may
be back to pre-Gulf War status. In addition, Saddam continues to redefine
delivery systems and is doubtless using the cover of a licit missile program to
develop longer-range missiles that will threaten the United States and our
allies."
Letter to President Bush, Signed by:
-- Sen. Bob Graham (D, FL), and
others, Dec 5, 2001

"We begin with
the common belief that Saddam Hussein is a tyrant and a threat to the peace and
stability of the region. He has ignored the mandate of the United Nations and is
building weapons of mass destruction and th! e means of delivering
them."
-- Sen. Carl Levin (D, MI),
Sept. 19, 2002

"We know that he
has stored secret supplies of biological and chemical weapons throughout his
country."
-- Al Gore, Sept. 23,
2002

"Iraq's search
for weapons of mass destruction has proven impossible to deter and we should
assume that it will continue for as long as Saddam is in power."
-- Al Gore, Sept. 23,
2002

"We have known
for many years that Saddam Hussein is seeking and developing weapons of mass
destruction."
-- Sen. Ted Kennedy (D, MA),
Sept. 27, 2002

"The last UN
weapons inspectors left Iraq in October of 1998. We are confident that Saddam
Hussein retains some stockpiles of chemical and biological weapons, and that he
has since embarked on a crash course to build up his chemical and biological
warfare capabilities. Intelligence reports indicate that he is seeking nuclear
weapons..."
-- Sen. Robert Byrd (D, WV),
Oct. 3, 2002

"I will be
voting to give the President of the United States the authority to use force --
if necessary -- to disarm Saddam Hussein because I believe that a deadly arsenal
of weapons of mass destruction in his hands is a real and grave threat to our
security."
-- Sen. John F. Kerry (D, MA),
Oct. 9, 2002

"There is
unmistakable evidence that Saddam Hussein is working aggressively to develop
nuclear weapons and will likely have nuclear weapons within the next five years
... We also should remember we have always underestimated the progress Saddam
has made in development of weapons of mass destruction."
-- Sen. Jay Rockefeller (D, WV),
Oct 10, 2002

"He has
systematically violated, over the course of the past 11 years, every significant
UN resolution that has demanded that he disarm and destroy his chemical and
biological weapons, and any nuclear capacity. This he has refused to
do"
-- Rep. Henry Waxman (D, CA),
Oct. 10, 2002

"In the four
years since the inspectors left, intelligence reports show that Saddam Hussein
has worked to rebuild his chemical and biological weapons stock, his missile
delivery capability, and his nuclear program. He has also given aid, comfort,
and sanctuary to terrorists, including al Qaeda members ... It is clear,
however, that if left unchecked, Saddam Hussein will continue to increase his
capacity to wage biological and chemical warfare, and will keep trying to
develop nuclear weapons."
-- Sen. Hillary Clinton (D, NY),
Oct 10, 2002

"We are in
possession of what I think to be compelling evidence that Saddam Hussein has,
and has had for a number of years, a developing capacity for the production and
storage of weapons of mass destruction."
-- Sen. Bob Graham (D, FL), Dec.
8, 2002

"Without
question, we need to disarm Saddam Hussein. He is a brutal, murderous dictator,
leading an oppressive regime ... He presents a particularly grievous threat
because he is so consistently prone to miscalculation ... And now he is
miscalculating America's response to his continued deceit and his consistent
grasp for weapons of mass destruction ... So the threat of Saddam Hussein with
weapons of mass destruction is real..."
-- Sen. John F. Kerry (D, MA),
Jan. 23. 2003

Devil's Son Comment collapsed by the community

2004-2007? Let's see who was the president then? What political party? Who says they are the fiscally responsible ones?

Doesnt matter who was in office, who was president, or what party.. BOTH sides are part of the problem. The entire Government system is beyond control, growing in size, and spending. Our government was never intended for this type of power and use. My god guys when are we going to get a clue and do something about our Government being out of control. What can we do

so what is new her 6 to 8 billion to Halibuton, Lockheed Martin and friends. Dicky boy

Start with Iraq, 51 billion for reconstruction, that is what we are told. most likely it will bemore.

And the was suppused to be paid from the restarted oil production once that war was ocer. Is it over.

Next Afghanistan, never will now how much that will, The government and friends have learned by now how to fiddle the number to hide their pilfering.

And now the are chomping at the bit the start war 3, Iran, And the US is broke, Boy you guys are stuoid and fall that patriotic crack every time. Die for king and country. That has been spewed by the leaders trough the ages and the suckers, the people, fall for it every time.

Get it trough your heads you 2 party system does not work. Haven't you heard before that there is no honor among thieves. And the whole kitten kaboodle in washington are thieves, run by the anks and corporations.

OK Iran here we come, tell me how much that will be.

You think that 3 battle fleets that are there now on the door step of Iran go for peanuts? 3 aircraft carriers and support and protection fleet for each one, destroyers, agis, submarines cruisers and so on and so on

Im amazed that puppet bush the idiot and evil puppet master a$$hole chaney were never assasinated. If anyone deserved to be,it was those two LOW LIFE SCUMBAG A$$HOLES!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! It wasn't just 8 billion dollars that was wasted,it was the whole 51 billion that was wasted!!

Michelle-1583970

It was proven that they never had WMD. So tell me how is this NOT BUSH's FAULT????????

I see Cannonballer beat me to the punch, thankfully, it’s a long list of typical Liberal blatherings of “I was for it before I was against it”, as usual.

Not to mention the biggest eff up, he deregulated the banks which allowed them give out bad loans such as mortgage to those they knew wouldn't or couldn't pay back. Allowing them to make such risky investiments that we had to bail them out.

Yeah, deregulated.

Now, you wouldn’t happen to have any proof of those deregulations that were passed under Bush or specifically a majority of Republicans, would you? Just the House or Senate Bill number will do, I can look it up from there.

Of course you don’t. Because you’re just another talking bobble-head from the Barrack Hussein indoctrination camps.

But here, I’ll give you a little homework so you can learn how to do some research on your own.

Look up:

Community Reinvestment Act,

The National Homeownership Strategy: Partners in the American Dream 1994,

Taxpayer Relief Act of 1997,

Brooksley Born CFTC 1998,

Gramm-Leach-Bliley Act of 1999,

THE OFHEO REPORT: ALLEGATIONS OF ACCOUNTING AND MANAGEMENT FAILURE AT FANNIE MAE. (The OFHEO report is about 238 pages long but you really need to read it).

Good luck Darla!

These are peanuts compared to the wasted trillions of dollars in Iraqi wars hara-kiri.

Net results of Saudi, Kuwait, UAE, oil companies and their lobbyists directed 1991 and 2003 Iraqi wars are

WINNERS

1. Saudi Arabia, Kuwait, UAE and other rich ME sharks became richer by manipulating oil prices too high.

2. Oil companies and their lobbyists also benefitted. Oil prices, which were hardly $30 a barrel before 1991, shot up to $140 a barrel.

3. Since 2003, future traders, rating agencies, Wall Street and oil companies and their lobbyists transferred five trillion dollars from oil importing countries to oil exporting nations.

4. Rich Sunni ME sharks (Saudi Arabia in particular) funded Salaffi and Wahhabi mosques and Islamic radicals and terrorists all over the world. These Sunni Islamic radicals and terrorists are rampaging all over the world. World’s 80 percent of problems are due to them.

LOSERS

1. General US and European nations’ public. There have been high unemployment, cut in welfare measures, housing market collapse and more miseries. Since 2001, US spent three trillion dollars on Iraq and Afghan wars. Did the Saudis and co foot the bill?

2. Poor soldiers killed and injured and their families. In Iraq and Afghan wars 6300 soldiers were killed and 40000 injured.

3. High budget deficits and heavier borrowing. Many nations (PIIGS) and people are on line to bankruptcy!

4. Iraq will plunge into bloody sectarian civil wars leading to the creation of Shiastan, Sunnistan and Kurdistan. Here the losses are of Iraqis.

a right wing sphincter wrote:

"How's that for brilliant Spanky.

We know you limp-wristed Libbies will never wear an American flag lapel pin.

How about a Hopey Changey pin instead?:"

you a punk, dude. A chicken hawk like the morons who lied us into the war, the winner of which is Iran.

Remember New Orleans? Cheney and Bush did the same thing there with no bid contracts awarded to Haliburton and lets not forget when Bush opened up the strategic oil reserve to his Texas buddies which BTW never did return the "borrowed" oil.......... That oil belonged to the American people and Bush just gave it away to his friends.

People have to understand that from the very beginning the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan were set up as profit centers for Republican political supporters and personal friends of Cheney and Bush. Maybe one day people will wake up and realize that the Republican Party is a criminal organization. Now with the help of millions of very stupid people and unlimited amounts of money given to them by a handful of traitorous billionaires they might just get back into power again. If they do they WILL continue their rape of the country and this time they will change the voting laws so we will never be able to vote them out of office again........ It's called dictatorship! Anyone voting for these criminals is voting for the end of America.

"I don't see why the Iraq operation should cost us one red cent."

Think back to shock and awe. Write the check and be glad they don't want you in jail.

MisterWonderful #1.51,

What we really need to do, is convene a Constitutional Convention to severely limit the power of our Federal Government. It has assumed too much authority. It is bloated beyond belief and necessity. It's no longer functional.

Sooooooo,

Due to poor record keeping, they have no way of knowing where the $ went huh?

Poor record keeping by the people in charge of the money! "DING!"

They should check their bank accounts along with an audit and "then" they'll be able to know where it went. WTF man!

It's like letting a pot head hold onto my stash while I'm away...............

OBama is involve in four wars. Georgy Soros Obama's big suporter purchased 60 millions in stock from Halliburton; Halliburton still doing busines with this administration

Here's an important fact you haven't heard much about in the presidential campaign: The armed forces of the United States are at war in at least four countries, and that number could increase any day.

About 87,000 Americans are still fighting in Afghanistan, and some are likely to stay past 2014. We're at war in neighboring Pakistan too, mostly using unmanned drones but with a handful of people on the ground.

U.S. drone and special operations forces are also waging attacks in Yemen and Somalia, operations big enough that President Obama felt compelled to acknowledge them publicly last month in a letter to Congress.

In addition, the U.S. Navy is hunting pirates in the Indian Ocean and patrolling off Iran's coast in the Persian Gulf, and in both missions shots have been fired.

American troops are training and advising counter-terrorism forces in West Africa and the Philippines. More troops are on the ground in central Africa, helping local troops root out the brutal Lord's Resistance Army.

And those are just the missions we know about. U.S. special operations forces are engaged in "more than 100 countries worldwide," Adm. William H. McRaven of the Special Operations Command told the Senate last month. Most of those engagements don't involve actual combat, but because what McRaven's units do is secret, it's impossible to say exactly how many places U.S. forces are fighting in at any given time.

So why, when American troops are engaged in so many places, are the operations receiving so little public attention?

Some of the reasons for our national inattention are obvious. Americans, and the presidential candidates, are preoccupied with the travails of the domestic economy. And now that we have a professional, all-volunteer military, a narrower cross section of Americans has a family member in the armed forces.

But another reason we're hearing so little about U.S. combat operations is that we have two presidential candidates who don't seem all that comfortable with their own positions on war and peace.

In 2008, Obama could run as an antiwar candidate, but that's hard to do as commander in chief of a military engaged in combat -- and one who dramatically increased drone strikes. The president has made a commitment to keep troops in Afghanistan through 2014, and he plans to keep advisors and trainers there even longer. But he has never seemed all that enthusiastic about putting American lives and money into defending Hamid Karzai's regime.

Moreover, he knows the Democratic voters he's relying on for reelection grew sick of the war long ago. A nationwide poll released by the Chicago Council on Global Affairs this week found that 67% of Americans think the war in Afghanistan is not worth fighting, and that number rises to 79% among Democrats. It's no wonder the president doesn't talk about it much, beyond noting that he's set a date for pulling out most of the troops.

Jim Spence:

The Vietnam war was over in 1968. There was an agreement with the north. Then Nixon sent Kissenger in to talk to the south Vietnamese leader. He convinced him that once Nixon was elected a better deal for the south could be had. Once Nixon was in office negociations were over and the bombs rained down, leading to most of the casualties in the conflict. Most of the money spent as well.

If anyone had bothered to read the constitution of the north Vietnamese they might have noticed that it was based upon the US constitution.

Stop pumping all this money into other countries. Our government's responsibility is to the American people, ya know the ones are struggling getting jobs in a country that is economically screwed at this point. Put the money into the United States where it belongs. Stop giving aid to Pakistan and Egypt and Iraq, worry about the people here who need help. What the hell are these people thinking?

DyanCorp was bought by Cerberus (deal brokered by Goldman Sachs) which seems to have ties to Pegasus which has ties to Halliburton and British Petroleum. Small world isn't it? Take each of these companies and google (or use other search engine) them to see the extent of corruption. Prostitution, sex slave selling, young dancing boys and of course...drugs. Wonder if we are going to hear the entire story or just the cost in dollars and cents. Disgusting....absolutely disgusting!

Cerberus: Center of Pentagon & CIA Scams
by DAILY KOS

A large global hedge fund, Cerberus Capital Management (dba, Cerberus-Gabriel), is at the center of an emerging Pentagon and CIA contracting scandal that has the attention of three Congressional Committees.

In each case, the companies under investigation have links to prominent GOP figures, including Vice President Dick Cheney, former Vice President Dan Quayle, former Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld, and several Republican Congressmen indicted for corruption involving kickbacks from defense contractors.

The Republican Congressional Campaign Commitee (RCCC) has also received substantial contributions from conservative fund managers running Cerberus, a virually unregulated $30 billion hedge fund, which owns the second largest bank in Israel.

They should all be in jail, including Bush II for lying to start this invasion and conquer - which didn't work. We have created a monster that will grow on its own or be maintained by us for billions a year forever.

Hmmmmm, that’s not actually too bad.

Faux conservative.

Y’all are so funny. You want to blame the Republicans for everything because they make a great scapegoat but that doesn’t make it true. The federal government (chock full of Republicans AND Democrats) wastes a ton of funding every year. You can dream that somehow Obama and the Dems are better than the rest but you’re just lying to yourselves. When was the last time you saw any of them vote down a raise for themselves? When was the last time you saw them put us, the idiots that elected them, ahead of their own agendas? When was the last time you heard about waste, fraud and abuse in a federal agency? (GSA comes to mind)

As the saying goes “what you allow, you encourage.” We’ve allowed congress, the president and all the federal agencies to behave in an immoral, dishonest manner for years and years and years without interference from any of us. Now we’re just getting what we encouraged.

Cannonballer,

See, there you go with facts again. You people that present opposition to the hypocritical selectable liberal/Tyrannical's really know how to stymie them when you go presenting all those thruths and such. Do not expect any logical rebuttal from the libs on that one. But that goes for most topics...anyway silence speaks volumes and liberal silence is one of the most beautiful (non)sounds in the world. Good job.

If you want to learn how to lie, cheat and steal....you must get involved with the Republican Party. There you will learn corruption in it's purest form.

How about we ALL stop paying taxes. How about we put executive heads on the block. How about we change our government. How about we take back our representation. How about we put dick and bush in jail and any and all other politician criminal in jail. It is time We say 'NO MORE' cr@p. This is nothing less than redistribution of public wealth into private hands.

You hit the nail on the head Peter with your last sentence. I think many of us share your sentiments but are still trying to be civil and work within legal channels. At the very least small glimpses are being given and maybe President Obama is allowing that to happen...maybe not. I don't know. The bottom line is it's the average America paying for this corruption either by their life or by taxes. And my gut feeling is that it isn't just the Republicans although they are probably the biggest offenders. We need to remain outraged and offended and most of all...vocal.

The Fosz

Or, you could just hang out in Chicago for a while with all the barack wanna-be's considering he was masterfully puppeted and positioned to perfect how to lie, cheat and steal. He's done it pretty well ever since.

I know, I know, you'll come back with some news article from the daily Kos or moveon.org stating that an "official" study has determined liberals don't lie but all republicans do. So I guess it's not your fault...you're just a product of ignorance because your weak minded nature has allowed you to be suckered...just like barack. He was groomed for anti-American corruption and dismantling from the day he was born. It's how he's been brainwashed so it's not his fault. Putting him in the presidency however is the fault of the ignorant sheep that blindly voted for some HUGE LIE of a thought instead of for who someone was.

Okay, just wanted to help you clarify where to go to learn to cheat, lie, and steal.

Hell... I would argue that more than $8 Billion was stolen by government contractors. These companies were like Great White Sharks in a swimming pool waiting for feeding time... talk about "Crony Capitalism".

We wasted $8 BILLION rebuilding Detroit too....Poster City for Progressive Corrupt Democrat Governance.....Going Bankrupt any minute now.....

ED-2874315

Actually it ended in 1973.

Between 1960 and 1969, Kennedy and Johnsons terms, there were over 47,000 deaths.

It is the 4^th deadliest war, after the Civil War, WW I and WW II.

Dont_carry_it_all

Faux conservative.

ROTFLMAO!!!!

Typical Liberal. Avoidance is a shallow defense mechanism.

Actually, anything less than 50% loss is excellent for a federal agency! Trouble is that most likely the waste is 4 or 5 times what this article states.

I do not understand why one cent was put into the country. We should have taken over all oil production and taken back reparations for what we spent during the time there and then taken more to help with the rebuilding process. It never made sense that we were borrowing money to help rebuild a country and then turning around and spending hundred of billions on buying their oil.

Cannonball....and all these people you quoted were given false intel........They made statements based on intel that was proven to be false........You left that out deliberately. That is why everyone is so pissed at being lied into war. All that intel was false and known to be false by Bush/Cheney team. Read Colin Powells book and see how pissed he was for being given rehashed false intel.

Wagging the dog???

The only presidents to become assasinated are those who tried to restructure the central banks. Those who continue to support the structure and spend are elected for second terms. One side starts the wars and the other ends them and the cycle continues. Only the tax payers and soldiers get screwed.

We spend $millions every year rebuilding their schools, roads and hospitals while OURS crumble. Wake up America!!

Vernon - are you mad?

Who got us into the Iraq war in 2003? Obama?

Dick Cheney doesn't own a bunch of Haliburton stock for nothing - he's their former CEO.

@Vernon Jobson

jesus christ there is no way you can possibly be so ignorant as to think this can be blamed on Democrats

Vernon Jobson,

I hope you're being simple-mindedly sarcastic. Because there's no way anyone can take your comment seriously!!!

Can the U.S.A tolerate a tax increase in 2013.??

GuyLittle: we have to pay for the missing billions some how.

Tolerate !!?? What do think will pay for everything !? We must raise taxes for gods sake where do you think money comes from to pay for these wars and these 33 attempts at getting rid of Obamacare !!! Either just stop the gaddamned wars bring the troops home stop giving away OUR tax money to other countries !! @!$%# Iraq, @!$%# Afganistan ,@!$%# N.Korea. keep the money at home with our troops and fix this country first damn it !!!

Guy Little----

in Answer the wealthy 2% can afford to pay hire taxes; and bypassing the excuse that such would prohibit hiring employees------

If taxes on the wealthy are raised, it won't prohibit them frm hiring, they just have to take a littleless in their annual bonuses. How much money do these people really need to survive. Say they make 10M in bonus, they contribute 1M toward hiring new employees and training them for developments----and both sides win.

They will ultimately pay less in taxes for the lower bonus and will be able to hire some new employees.

It does work, but they gotta give; something that has been long forgotten in the Corporate World---with the exception of golf tee times, expensive bottle of wine or meals or both, or the comped trip for 8 to Hawaii! IF they don't want to give then tax their butt!

Middle Class on the other hand should be left as is---currently we don't make enough to pay higher taxes!

Sillyshrinks our tax system is not fair. Too complicated.

If this administration is going to pay to rebuild a country that doesn't even like us, what is the incentive in paying a higher tax rate.??

guy little---small news item not getting much attention is china making waves regarding buying u.s. debt. seems china is letting washington know they have financial problems of their own and won't be underwriting our trillions of debt in the near future. hold onto your hats--we ain't seen nothing yet.

And the U.S. Debt Clock tics, Granny22. Your post # 2.11 is scary and true.

Q)- Who's the best @ cooking the books??

A)- Governments.

Hey Real

your boy barack just sent 30 million to prop up the schools in Yemen. He didn't end the war in his first year like he said he would, he still hasn't ended Afghanistan like he said he would, he pledged oil allegiance to Brazil for as much as they could drill. He won't let anyone drill here (the private permits were in place long before him). He hates you man, the only reason he'd give you the time of day is because you'll vote for him, he's done nothing but lie to his own peeps and you guys should be pissed.

It absolutely ludicrous that the left is bashing the Bush admin for going into Iraq.....Their officials voted over whelmingly voted to go in there

... so Iraq wasted about 20% ... Obama spent $860,000,000,000.00 of porkuluis tax and wasted it all. Maybe Obama should hire Iraq to manage our money ...

Seig Hiel Der Furher Obama Der Great Ghettonator

Beelzbubb, You seem t think that all this $ was wasted since Jan. 20, 2009. Bush/Cheney were the architects of this waste of 4,000 lives, and surely have some responsibility for the fiscal debacle; doncha think?

Granny,

You got that right, and NOBODY is talking about it. It may get really interesting really soon.

Talk about someone "inheriting" a big bag of @!$%#e! Romney's got his work cut out for him...oh yeah, I'm assuming baracks out on his azz. barack will go down in history for sure, but just not for what most people think.

15 Trillion we owe! People need to wake the FUC* up and think about that instead of just saying it or hearing it. 15 TRILLION!! $15,000,000,000,000 Thats 59,880 square miles blanketed with $1 bills or to put it into perspective. You could cover every inch of land in Michigan with $1 bills!

Seriously, why is anyone even considering re-electing this ass-hole? The liberals should have booted his arse to the curb for desecrating the party name even more than it already was. We owe 15 Trillion! come on, somebody argue that it's no big deal, because that's sure how everyone seems to be acting. We're screwed if this Jack-ass doesn't get evicted from the White house.

over the last ten years the US has spent $4,000,000,000,000.00 trillion on law enforcement with over 50,000 live lost ... is this a fiscal debacle.

Oh by the way Iraq seem to be doing pretty good now that they're a young democracy. How is Obamie doing in Afghanistan ... not so well I hear ... Oh that's right his Generals told him to surge in the Kandahar area with 80,000 additional troops ... being the great General Obamie went with 32,000 and not in Kandahar. Now we find are selves negotiating with Alkaida and the Taliban ...

Hey, Did you hear about the HIV/AIDS vaccine. First of all, the Company is a for Profit Company (that's gotta hurt Commi Obamie) it's publicly traded company (ouch Obamie) and guess who is on the broad of directors ... GW ... Cheney and Donald Rumsfield ... I'll bet Halibertin owns them ...

It was on his watch that 9/11took place: it was Bush who failed to kill or capture bin Laden:

What does the Idiot do he invades Iraq based on a pack of lies (let’s face it folks it was all for oil) a country that wasn’t a threat, runs up trillions of dollars in debt, doesn’t pay for the war but cuts taxes for the rich not once but twice. Than the idiot takes one of the biggest government surpluses in history and turns it into a deficit, runs the economy into a ditch and than gets out of dodge. And here we are years later still in Afghanistan because of the Conservative’s faliuries.

Witchking: Your propaganda is showing itself and you are mislead. You have spewed every liberal talking point into making it seem like it was all Bush's fault. Whatever Bush did, does not compare to the billions of dollars Obama has sent to the Middle East ; one BILLION was to the Muslim Brotherhood. We all know what kind of Islamic militants they are; so if anything now you know who your supporting.

$8 Billion spent on rebuilding Iraq is WAY UNDERESTIMATED, and ten years from now, don't be surprised to read about the real numbers (try low trillions). To think there are tax payers here in this Country that were: forced out of work from corporations "Too Big To Fail", became homeless with very young children living in the streets, and could have used some financial support in the way of shelter and food. It was Big Businesses along with the Government turning their backs on their own American citizens that are totally responsible for the corruption, greed, and finally a Recession that still exists for many American citizens. But to help anyone here in this Country, according to the Republicans, is called, "Social Welfare for the no good lazy persons, who don't want to work, and want to live off the Government instead. What was done for these people? Nothing, except to give trillions away to other Countries. Give big "Bail Outs" to the corporate elite. Callous, Malicious, Corruption, Self-Serving, and Greediness ???? Are these the traits that will be be the downfall of our Country???

Instead of creating new jobs here, the only thing Congress has accomplished, is spending their time arguing/whining about healthcare (esp. the Republicans). The first thing on their agenda should have been jobs for OUR Country. But after the previous election , the first thing on the Republican agenda was to get rid of the Democrats, esp. the Pres., who is to blame for everything on this planet according to the Republicans). Next in line, would be no money goes to other countries until that critical task of creating new jobs was accomplished first. Isn't it amazing at how many billions of dollars the big corps have to contribute to the politicians campaigns; but they don't have the money to help put people back to work with decent wages to survive in our economy??? Do you think that just maybe the corporate elite don't want the economy improving until they can get rid of the President, who is trying: to get Congress to regulate the Banksters, to make the elite start pulling their fair share of taxes without the loopholes, to make off-shore accounts accountable with taxes to the U.S.?? Isn't it odd how the gas prices started going down this summer and will remain low until the election is over?? Didn't it do the exact same thing (starting about 6 months before the voting) during the last Presidential election?? Watch, wait , and see if it doesn't happen again. Could the lower gas prices be because the wealthy and big businesses don't want the attention on them over greed with this Country's financial mess, and definitely don't want Regulations place on them, etc., etc??? It's safe to say that the politicians care more about themselves. They could care less about people living on the streets (as the result of corruption among the Banksters/Finance Street), have little food to eat (and let's not forget dear "ole" Orlando passing city ordinances not to feed the homeless with many of them being Veterans). Now the Republicans don't want some legit people voting, and obliviously don't want the Americans to have healthcare unless willing to gamble it away in the corrupt stock markets/hedge-funds, etc. It's a sure bet that caring about their constituents needs will never be a priority with them, except to see that we keep paying taxes for them to throw away to other countries, who we knew beforehand would never appreciate our contributions at the start. We're just last on their list, except to serve them when it comes to "Corporate Slavery" with low wages. It's obvious , too, that is more then just one Judicial System: One for populace, and one for the elite (many of whom just get a small slap on their wrists, or a fine they will never miss).

Do your own research on the candidates and stop listening to the elite funded ads. There has to be somebody out there in the middle class, who is capable of serving in public office. They are the ones, who have a better knowledge of what life is really like. Take the Government back from the hands from the wealthy (born with gold and silver spoons in their mouths) and place it back into the hands of the majority. We should pressure Congress to act more maturely, to get their work done before going home on Recess, place pressure for limiting campaigns with fund raising, for more transparency and accountability with expenses, esp., to place limits on the amount allowed for spending. What is happening is a complete lack of fiscal responsibility among politicians and the wealthy elite during a time of global economical distress. Try getting rid of the lobbyists, too.

Beware "poor record keeping" - it's the best way to hide fraud. Is this a case for "smaller government"? I don't think so. I think smaller government spawns more contractors and more contractors spawns more corruption and fraud. Fire them all and start hiring competent people to run our government agencies.

All this happened and will continue to happen because we are not a nation. We quit being a nation a long time ago. We gave control of the country to the politicians and the people that fund tyheir campaigns and don't care a bit about what they do because if we did we would arrive iat Washington in massed and do some tarring to a President, to ex presidents and to the generals in the Pentagon and don't forget our infamous legislators. Those people are traitors, nothing else.

Don't tell me it's not Obama's fault, he's being President for close to 4 years already and closed his eyes to the issues. He is as guilty as Bush. Don't tell me Romney will do better, he is probably worse than Obama. Tar them and maybe we will find a decent citizen to take their positions.

If you want the best schooling .... for corruption and fraud...get a job with the Republican Party.

Fosz,

If you want schooling on avoiding responsibility and how to make bold face lies, and how to spend a country into bankruptcy, and just be inept at everything you do; join the Socialist Democratic Party.

I'd say about $88 Billion worth, plus or minus about $6-$8billion.

The Cheney / Bush legacy.

8 Billion dollars? The way barack handles money? Shoot that would've paid for a couple of his vacations to Europe because we all know he hates taking vacations here in the US where we need some money.

In the real world 8 billion is a whole lot of money, in baracks world it's about a day and a half of business as usual. And those numbers are not exaggerations.

This is why Cheney is all over DC and the GOP about defense cuts. They are not talking about anything real, they don't want their pork belly projects to stop. That's Romney, Cheney and the defense industry, even our biggest enemy (China) spends only 20% of what we spend. China has it right you say you are going to design and sell the government a fighter jet, it better work and not be 10 years late and billions over budget (paid by the taxpayers, even though it is supposedly a fixed-price contract) or they kill everyone behind the project. China or even Russia would have slaughtered Cheney, Halliburton, Lockheed-Martin and the rest for fraud. Here it is business as usual.

I recall that when the estimate for Universal Healthcare was estimated to cost $100 billion over 10 years ($10 billion per year), the right wing screamed in murderous fits that it would bankrupt the country. Funny isn't it, that spending several times that in wars is just business as usual.

American infrastructure & jobs is meaningless to the Republican Party. The only time the Republican Party will ever put importance on this .... is when they can see and feel it for them self. There has to be money in it for them or it will never happen.

The higher the unemployment figures are just means to the Republican Party is the fact they can now hire you to work for half the wages you once made.....and, they do NOT have to pay you any benefits.

This is the Republican Party's way of thinking.

Millions? Pfft. The government writes millions off as rounding errors. They don't even start looking into the waste until it hits the Billions.

The federal government costs about $41 billion a month just to run, no military, no improvements.

Be outraged at all fraud, waste, cronyism, and murder your sociopaths in both Parties commit...even your beloved Presidents.

Enough of the BOTH parties baloney. BOTH parties are not doing what was just recently DONE by Republicans at the helm. Even the Solyndra loan started under Bush.

Our country is becoming pitifully weak by our constituents being lulled by lies, misinformation, and laziness. No one wants to learn about facts and fails to question the rumor mill MEDIA during a presidential election.

OUR CHILDREN DESERVE A BETTER LEGACY FROM US.

Nite
You're full of crap. Low income housing was started under CLINTON who further loosened the laws and de-regulated banks further to loan the money. Which crashed the economy starting in 2007. Bush warned a DEMOCRATIC congress about it twice, but was laughed at. Who's laughing now?

The Solyndra Loan WAS NOT paid by Bush, not one red cent. He wanted more company financial information which they didn't provide. I see they provided it to Obama because they went bust on the moron shortly thereafter getting MILLIONS.

And the Libs voted for all the wars too. Quit blaming one party thinking we're all going to believe your lies.

Laker Steve - I don't know where it all started but I remember l low income housing funded by Tricky Dick back in the 60's.

OUR CHILDREN DESERVE A BETTER LEGACY FROM US.

Yeah, too bad most Americans are stupid and vote against their own economic interests to support unproven, undemonstrated theories.

The "main one responsible" left office in 2009.

Your pick as to whether it was Bush or Cheney (former CEO of Haliburton).

Jack, the current president Did Not Get Us Into the Middle East - George W did

Bush = Obama = Romney

All 3 are sociopathic warmongers, clearly.

Uh Kate...the question here is the waste and corruption of the money spent on Iraq's rebuilding and infrastructure, sorry to tell you but this has occured in the last three years...I do believe that would rest at the feet of the current incompetent administration...sorry....

Hey Jack---you forget so conveniently BUSH GOT US INTO THE IRAQ WAR AND KEPT US THERE UNTIL THE END OF HIS TERM AND LEFT OBAMA WITH HIS MESS TO CLEAN UP.

8 years of disaster will take at least 10 before we begin to recover from his damage!

Jack Sorry but if you actually read the article the two cases they point out were before Obama.

Bush's war, He owns it. He even said it was his responsibility.

DEC 14, 2005 Bush said:

"It is true that much of the intelligence turned out to be wrong," Bush said during his fourth and final speech before Thursday's vote for Iraq's parliament. "As president I am responsible for the decision to go into Iraq."

@ Jack

Does this mean your not going to vote to re-elect Obama ? Yes, I am trying to be funny Jack !

If you want to blame someone, blame Bush ! Also, get your facts right before you come on here and sound like a naive little girl ! Opps, I am so sorry.. you already sound like one !

JACK YOU ARE AN ABSOLUTE MORON. LEARN HOW TO COUNT BUD.

Obama wasn't in the white house moron. fuxing moron.

jack the fact that people like you are not only a complete waste of perfectly good air space is just the beginning and doesn't come close to the problems related to you actually being part of the political process. please go play in the street. please.

Jack is right, misplacing the $8 billion is far more important than the roughly $1.5 trillion or so that Bush spent on the war.

Bush got us into the war?

I thought his democratic congress had a vote in on it too?

I am just amazed at the deflecting going on with these Right Wing, Obama blaming, so-called fiscal conservative posts right now. All of you venomous neocon, racist bulies now back pedaling on this waste of war and shameful pork barelling, start changing the dates, blaming it all on the Democrats in Congress, and of course blaming it ALL on Obama. What a load of crock. I still remember old Robert Byrd trying to talk the Senate into an expensive invasion and John Warner and the rest of the old fart Republicans maligning him. I remember the intimidation aimed at those who did not want the Iraq war or slow it down for more WMD evidence (not) when so much pointed at bin Laden in Afghanistan. I even remember Toby Keith taking aim at the Dixie Chicks for voicing an opinion. Mainly I remember Sean Hannity calling anyone who did not support the Iraq invasion not fit to live in America. Well guess what? This was just one more handicap in this huge mess of deficits and debts that any succesor had to inherit, no matter if it was Obama or McCain.

Then some of you idiots, throw mud or "crawfish" at other govt. expenses with your little "tit for tat' examples. Don't even say that it really isn't much...it's little snippets of these Haliburton payolas that got us here. And I will just bet that the likes of all of you Obama hating, Fox watching, Neocon, Liberal eptheting, sanctimonious, quasi-penny pinching s.o.b.s were absolutely frothing at the mouth raring to watch those first "shock and awe" bombings going down in Baghdad. Just watching those mortars while our first undersupplied boys had make body plate armour. It's kind of hard when you get the check on this big sideshow of the Project for the New American Century's little experiment at world domination isn't it?

Man up and own it, you pathetic little right wing @!$%#heads.

Big correction here. Sen. Robert Byrd, piobably one of the biggest earmarkers of the Democratic Senate from West Virginia, was actually trying to talk the Senate OUT of invading Iraq. That is when John Warner pounced on him, said he was misinformed and the sooner we got in there, the sooner we would get out!

Can you believe this? One of the biggest West Virginia feeders was actually trying to keep us from making a huge mistake? And even wilder, one of Virginia's pretty old boys acting like he was having an old man boner just to teach the world a lesson. Unbelievable. After all the intimidation in the Republican Congress, if the Democrats did anything shameful...it was cave to the neocon pressure. The Republicans led the charge on this....pure and simple.

We all knew it would take years to recover from two wars and yet now every neocon blames the present administration for causing this?

You're all snivly little hypocritical wimpoids hiding behind every excuse you can. Anything on the right sickens me right now. Rot in hell, right wing, but I guess you are too stupid to understand that, aren't you?

Damn It PEOPLE....

This .. ShlT of BUSH did this or Bush did that... Ya all don't know much about Gov't if you think that ... There is NO WAY Bush could have went to war Anywheres if the Majority of DEMs and Reps did not vote for it...

It was a JOINT effort.....

Really? Again, nice try at deflection Proud2. This JOINt effort as you call it was intimidation by the Neocon Republicans (and their administration backers of Cheney, Pearl and Wolfowitz) to basically call out any member of Congress and say they were Un-American for NOT approving the Iraq invasion. I specifically remember several that were called out and villfied by Fox News.

So, of course, the Dems caved which still is the shame they will have to live with. The Dems did say that this "quick" invasion would have to be proven....so after years of hearings of no WMD's, and no expertise because only Republican henchmen that were barely out from school with hardly a passport were shipped over there to oversee our glorious "democratization", there was absolutely no accountancy. Also, during the Bush administration, his budget specifically left out war expenses because they were "actuals' and could not be budgeted.

You may try really hard to like W. Bush. In fact, here in Texas he's a nice guy. BUT, he hasn't opened his yap since he left office and for once, he knows why....it's because of this rattlesnake show.

Really? Again, nice try at deflection Proud2. This JOINt effort as you call it was intimidation by the Neocon Republicans (and their administration backers of Cheney, Pearl and Wolfowitz) to basically call out any member of Congress and say they were Un-American for NOT approving the Iraq invasion. I specifically remember several that were called out and villfied by Fox News.

exactly this.

"If you're not with us, you're against us," remember that?

The deflection from the right trying to pin the Iraq War on the Democrats is pitifully transparent. Democrats were crushed in the media if they didn't support the run up to the war, lambasted by the president, vice president, secretary of war defense, and whomever else could get their rocks off by doing so (not to mention they were relying on cherry-picked intelligence reports from Cheney's office).

So they voted for the war out of political expediency. No surprise.

But republican voters cheered this thing on in every way imaginable. Hoorah, git er done, yellow ribbons on your pickup, and all that nonsense. So as Texas Pam said, grow a pair, OWN THIS, embrace it! It was your calling card for much of the last decade, you can't weasel out of it now!

That's the Pentagon's figure, Doug. Do you really believe it's "only" $6-8 billion wasted?

Guess it depends on your definition of "waste". I'd say all of it was wasted.

And how many dead, how many permanently disabled ?

How many lives are worth one big lie ?

Not bad at all. Only 16%, its the Cost of doing business overseas.

Someone has get it. We sure do not need it here.

so 10-15% is insignificant unless you're talking about romney's taxes and then it's a 'big' number? really? get a fuking grip.

With government math counting $2000 hammers as legitimate costs the 6b to 8b is probably being kind. It was like a Boeing contract 15 to 20 years ago during an audit they questioned a charge of $70 each for personal handheld communication devices. Turned out they were pencils.

Bush was definately responsible for the first for years , But Obama is responsible for the last for years of it. Im tired of people like you who make excuses for Obama when he is not man enough to admit his own mistakes. He could have did something about it but never did. It was reported before of the problem with the money missing in IRAQ before Obama took over and he ignored the problem.

How many billions have we wasted in Afganistan since he took over. How many Billion's went to into the pockets of crooked AFGAN officials during the last 4 yrs.

Obama's been in office 3 years and 6 months.

It took Bush & Cheney almost double that to dig us into the hole we're in with Iraq and Afghanistan - and I don't think anyone would have called it wise to pull out all the troops immediately after Obama took office.

Bring 'em home as fast as possible - and learn from our mistakes. That's all we can do now.

Never forget that a whole lot of other "empires" fell because they thought they could rule the world with their military.

Rome comes to mind pretty quick, RAF !! We could be next ..take a look at "Zeitgeist" the movie on utube a real eyeopener !!!

and I don't think anyone would have called it wise to pull out all the troops immediately after Obama took office.

Why would you say something like that? Because you listen to the opinions of psychos who think killing innocent people who are no threat to us on their soil is somehow "necessary" or good for our "national security" (aka our oil supply and gas prices, so our economy doesn't have to exist in a free market in energy)?

Get a clue.

Johnm and RAF - I've been amazed at the parallels we have with the Roman Empire, only it's happening faster. It's a frighteningly slippery slope and a long way down from the top. Let's hope that our country's devisiveness and arrogance can be arrested before we slide too far.

@ David

Please cite the parallels from the Roman Empire and now. Huge difference if you ask me. There is not enough time or space on this forum to cite all the differences. Do not quote history if you do not know it !

Leftist Reporting

Sorry Bubb...The 51 Billion had been spent by the time Obama took office. Programs set up by Bush, Not Obama. Seems this mess was under Bush, and has been caught by the Obama administration. I a sure there is waste still. But that they refer to mostly was under Bush.

Furthermore:

As part of reconstruction, no-bid contracts have been awarded to large American corporations including Halliburton and Bechtel. Halliburton in particular has been singled out for receiving what is perceived to be government favoritism for doing a shoddy job of rebuilding Iraq's oil infrastructure. When the Pentagon's own auditors determined that about $263 million of a Halliburton subsidiary's costs were potentially excessive, the Army still paid the company all but $10.1 million of the disputed costs

Hmmm Halliburton...Hmmmm

No Bid Hmmmm

We all know who is Mr Halliburton....

As a disclaimer I own stock in Halliburton, but doesn't mean I respect the company.

Romney's in Israel today to assure them if they can get jews to vote for him if elected he'll invade Iran for them.

@Roger - There is not enough space in this forum to list the similarities either, but a few of the big ones:

Aside from the fact that our form of government is derived from the Roman system...

A (corrupted) government with significant influence from the wealthy

Wealthy families can send their children to prestigious private schools, giving them political legitimacy and an advantage in terms of working positions over people with less reputable sources of education. In Roman times, wealthy families used private tutors with a republic focus and direct lineage to the government

Overextension of military spending and campaigns

Unemployment (although this might be temporary for us in the short term)

Increasing divide between the rich and poor with a majority of the wealth in the hands of a few

Public health in decline and health care is mostly for the more well off

Careful about telling others about what they know (or don't). Some of us are educated and continue to expand our education.

Do not quote history if you do not know it !

I am laughing really. I was not trying to start a feud, I just asked for you to quote the similarities. In other words I was looking for an answer, not pretending to have any. You obviously are an argumentative person, perhaps you learned that from all that higher education. Did you ever stop to think that maybe I was looking to expand my view by asking you for yours. ROFLMYAZZOFF

You may want to take a class on reading comprehension !

Roger, if you didn't know history, why didn't you just admit that?

And you sign off with yet another insult...I think it's YOU who needs a self comprehension class.

that would buy kim k...a lot of nail polish...i'm sure NBC will run a story bout it...

Since Hillary is in charge? This has gone on for decades...

leftist reporting apparently means the brain left before the mouth reported..are you even aware iraq happened under bush?

Nice try with your Hilary deflection, Jim Johnson. How stupid are you? More than that, how stupid do you think we are with your b.s.?

Whoops! Not Jim Johnson, I mean the meathead that he was correcting. Again LEFTISTREPORTING is trying to deflect his little expensive dabble in world domination. It is just amazing at how they would blame the present administration for things almost 10 years back. Is it just fashionable to be right wing and stupid and then pass them blame with a little "tit for tat" bullying? Sean Hannity must hypnotise them. sorry, Jim Johnson. Go get these idiots! I'd like to throttle them all.

sounds like the plan...obama might think you stole his idea...the man who threw money at all the problems instead of solving them...

They ought to use the same plan that efficiently can dock some poor E-1 Private's pay to recover the $40.00 he was overpaid 2 months before. Truth is, they know where every penny went. All of this uncertainty is a load of horsesh/t.

jimjohnson - The CIC is in charge and certainly has the horsepower to put people in place to come up with an accounting system in less than 8 years.

America is a Joke - played on the American People by the American People for the American People.

I agree...it is a joke. It is not a proud time to be American, and that has been true through our last two presidents.

Ten years? heck one day with the bombs at our disposal.Close all those overseas bases,we have missles! and nuclear submarines with enough fire power to level the planet.Iran is a bad idea! The price of oil well jump and sink our fragile economy.

Every state, including our USA, is run by sociopaths. It's the predictable outcome of a compulsory institution of hierarchy. All large institutions suffer this fate, as psychos rise to the top of the hierarchy like balloons to a ceiling. All the nostalgia in the world for past tyrants won't make that go away.

Troy you are the joke.

You would have America fight battles using 70 year old technology. We don't need to be a "bad ass" we do not need to be bullies, We need to be leaders. Practice what we preach. We are citizens of the world, not world dominators. See freaks who were about dominating the world are what we fought against in WW2.

Troy: Clearly you're right. It was much better in the old days when we just stormed machine gun nests and took our lumps. I mean what fun was it invading Iraq the first time taking no losses except for a handful from friendly fire and 1 stray missle. I mean sure we'd have lost a few hundred thousand in that war but it was much more manly. People like Troy would be ideal fodder for clearing out the machine gun nests.

wow, Frankly, please read troy's comment again. Our government was kick ass after ww2. they took care of the vets coming home and invested in our country. now corporations run our gov't and the people are just pawns in the political arena.

Since troys criticizing using smart bombs, drones and elite forces instead of fighting as we did in ww2 I'd suggest you reread it. He never mentions taking care of vets or investing in our country strange you'd get that out of what he posted. I prefer smart bombs to carpet bombing as we did in ww2.

We should change the name back to the War Department...as there is nothing Defensive about what they do most of the time (90%+).

ProIndividual,

re: post 16.1

I agree 100% !

Don't count on it...sociopaths aren't known for taking responsibility very often, and often refuse to lose.

Gee another unrelated post by an 'idgit'

Yep. Just one more pathetic stupid-ass deflection. Bet you loved the "shock and awe" government side-show didn't you ron17571?

ron were you complaining when Bush was spending trillions, and trillions, and trillions of dollars after invading Iraq? Or does it really bother you that some Americans in America will qualify for low income health insurance?

Seems relevant to me. Obama has been in office four years. What has he done about any of this? I thought he was going to fix things those darned Republicans screwed up. Wasn't the deficit supposed to be cut in half by now? Wasn't Guantanamo supposed to be shut down by now? Yes we can? Yes we can what? Skirt the Constitution? Lie to Americans even after taking office? Spend over a billion dollars gambling that a bill will be passed that injects 30 million people into an already ailing health care system? Yes we did.

Because we don't have enough oil to run our economy, and they hate the idea of a free market in energy. REad up on chaos theory if you want to know what happens to their precious state if they stop forcing cheap energy into the system at the point of a gun as it gets more complex (hint: it collapses).

They will not stop this Empire of death until it collapses...which it predictably will.

And your god, Obama, is a sociopath who continued a psychopath's (Bush) POLIcies when he could of stopped. He has intervened in MORE countries in his time in office than Bush did in 8 years! And Romney, another sociopath, will do no different. If you people would educate yourselves and stop electing sociopaths and habitual liars, we'd be better off. Hell, we'd be better off if the state they lead was abolished!

But I can't expect you to educate yourself...you can't even spell "legacy" for God's Sake, let alone figure our "leaders" are psychopaths ALWAYS.

ProIndividual,

Your comparison isn't fair. What has been the level of intervention under Obama in new involvements? Extremely low compared to Bush's huge invasions.

ProIndividual, are you in a class or something?

At least Cheneys back in the picture raising money for Romney. I'm sure he'll share his expertise with him.

First of all, "sense" is spelled with an "s". Second of all, hang no one...but if you do, start with the sociopaths who run this murderous state...the politicians.

HEH, HEH...He said POLITICIANS!

CHONG: "OH MAN! We overspent by like...6 or 8 BILLION DOLLARS! We are in DEEP S---!!"
CHEECH: "RELAX...EVERYBODY over here pockets a few hundred million on this job, or a few hundred million on that job. Nobody really cares, man."
CHONG: "Really!? So, like...you think that it's okay and all?"
CHEECH: "Oh man! NO PROBLEM MAN! Just chill out, man... sit down, and roll another one of those really big joints, OK!"
CHONG: "Oh, OK man! ...OH! and I got this like REALLY BIG kilo of coke, man."
CHEECH: "Really man? How'd you get that man?"
CHONG: "Well, I like borrowed some money from that million dollar stack of money that you left on the back of the toilet man."
CHEECH: "OH MAN! Did you take all of it?!"
CHONG: "No man! I only took like what I was able to fit in my pockets man. ...OH! WAIT A MINUTE! I remember now...It wasn't from the money on the back of the toilet, it was like, the money that you had in the freezer, man."
CHEECH: "Heh, heh! That's not my money, that's YOUR money!"
CHONG: "OH! Well far out man! I still got lots more! With that kind of money, we can stay messed up for like, 50 years man!"
CHEECH: "Hey, we should like, join the military next year too man!"
CHONG: "Oh Yeah, man...that'd be like, really far out!"

Cheech & Chong... Too funny! One mans war another's treasure is all. Dave's not here man!