The GOP wants to repeal social programs to pay for an ever-increasing military budget. They talk a lot about reducing the deficit, but want to add to it by giving the Pentagon more money to waste; that’s the only thing they’ve perfected. The bill for this year’s military funding asks for $612 billion.

If you follow the news, you are aware that the F-35 is the most expensive fighter ever developed. It was supposed to be the ‘ultimate’ fighting machine, but it lost in simulated battle to an F-16, developed in the 1970’s. Building the required number of aircraft would cost over $400 billion, adding operation costs and maintenance, the total could reach $1.5 trillion. The military brass wants more money.

Here’s one you most likely have heard nothing about. It’s one of the many failures of the military in Iraq and Afghanistan that they don’t want the American people to know about.

It’s about a natural gas filling station built in Sheberghan, Afghanistan. A government watchdog group claims that it should have cost $500,000 for construction. The United States government awarded a $3 million contract. It was built between 2011 and 2014. The eventual cost was $12 million for construction, and $30 million in ‘overhead costs.’ The total bill to taxpayers was a whopping $43 million. A similar station had been completed in Pakistan for $500,000. The Afghan people have virtually no use for a natural gas filling station.

How many other failed projects did our nation’s people finance? We know material left behind in Iraq and Afghanistan cost billions of dollars, and some of it is now being used by ISIS. We also know that a ‘no-bid’ contract was given to Halliburton, a company associated politically and financially with Dick Cheney. Reports from watchdog groups claim that Halliburton charged our military seven dollars for a can of soda.

The GOP cannot convince me that they are concerned about government spending when they approve of waste. If there is money to throw away, there should be money to aid our nation’s people living in poverty. The GOP only supports the interests of big business; they deny that the working class and poor exist.

Op-Ed

By James Turnage

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Photo Courtesy of David B. Gleason

Author’s Page http://www.amazon.com/By-James-turnage/e/B00LOCJ2Z2