Official US government reports on soldiers under US command killed in Iraq are so fragmented that they account for less than half of the total number ...
What Over 40,000 Amputated, Disabled, Permanently ILL, Returning American Iraq War Vets Face at Home ....
The Republican budget drastically cuts nearly all domestic programs after 2005, an interesting date since the election was 2004, including cuts to critical education and training programs, health care and environmental programs, and veterans' medical programs.
Additionally, we are a country at war, yet in his budget the President provides no funding for the war in Iraq. This simply defies logic.
Two years after the invasion of Iraq, images of wounded troops arriving in the United States are almost as hard to find as pictures of caskets from Dover Air Force Base military mortuary in Delaware. That's because all the transport is done literally in the dark, and in most cases, photos are banned.
The Pentagon has tried to minimize public access to images and information that might drain Americans' tolerance for the war. The Pentagon is taking steps to minimize the exposure of the costs of war.
This Nation has gone from a projected $5.6 trillion surplus in 2001 to a projected $2.9 trillion deficit in 2011, as the gentleman so eloquently stated in his opening remarks.
This year's deficit is fast approaching $500 billion and will only continue to grow under the GOP budget.
What happens when a federal agency insists that its budget is in order and then less than two months later admits, well, that it's $1 billion in the hole?
Radical Republicans have treated the VA as if it were Social Security, Medicare, or welfare: an unnecessary program that ought to be cut out of the national budget.
The President's budget will force the VA to cut staff and services, and will limit access to care among the current and soon-to-be Veterans.
President Bush has already spent over $200 billion on the Iraq War.
The ongoing costs of the Iraq occupation costs roughly $1 billion a week (the same amount that Bush wants to cut from the yearly VA budget).
President Bush (if re-elected) will in all likelihood need another $200 billion to pay for the total reconstruction of Iraq since he just spent $200 destroying it. This may be a low estimate.
President Bush, to his evident glee, recently passed a $350 billion tax cut. (Just think, he could have proposed a $349 billion tax cut and left the Veterans Affairs budget alone).
President Bush and an array of Republican special interests, with much fanfare and pride, just passed what was to have been a $350 billion Medicare prescription drug program. Whoops!
It turns out someone who is in charge of the White House calculator must have pressed the wrong buttons and the Medicare program is now estimated that it will cost not $350 billion, but rather $550 billion. Oh well, what’s a $200 billion error?
(Did someone get fired for that minor mathematical boo-boo? Of course not. They just got threatened with firing if they told Congress about the mistake). Congressional leaders said they would not have voted for the bill if they knew it would be quite that pricey. Doesn’t matter anyway.
Nearly all of the $550 billion will end up in the coffers of the pharmaceutical industry and the health insurance industry, Bush’s most ardent campaign contributors.
Returning Iraq Veterans will be welcomed home and face an overwhelmed, understaffed, underfunded, and cut VA Hospital System. Senior citizens will see at the very best a paltry benefit that is confusing, complex and virtually impossible to understand. In the shadow of all this, President Bush will squeeze another $1 billion from the Veterans Affairs budget. Yes, that makes sense.
As of January 2005, the true casualty figures of Iraq was around 6,000 servicemen killed and 48,000 wounded. Totaling 54,000. If my figures are accurate then the pentagon is only reporting, making public 20% of the casualties.
Many people will state this cannot be possible. They cannot hide that amount. Vietnam was a good reflection initially 6,000 Kia were reported later that rose to 58,000 and later a further 40,000 were deemed missing in action . So if Vietnam is anything to judge, then most certainly casualty figures are manipulated for public consumption.
Where You Die Makes A Difference Bush does not count soldiers who die en route to hospital or in hospital in Germany as deaths. This means the true death count of American soldiers is over five times higher than Bush is reporting.
Name: EuroYank - Virginia Hoge Home: United States About Me: Euro Yank is an internationally famous blogger, an American born in Germany that left for the USA with family at age six and has lived in Luxembourg for the past ten years. He is a committed anti-fascist and a student of history who is politically progressive and believes in the ideals of the American Constitution and the Bill of Rights for all Americans. He is also an American war veteran. He was active on American Talk Radio, and has been prominent online with 26 blogs with over 25 million hits. His investigative journalism has exposed top international news stories no one else has reported on. He is also a well-known political commentator. He has been repeatedly censored and banned, but despite these setback continues nonstop. Virginia Olive Hoge is an artist and writer living in Pasadena, California. As a progressive whistle-blower, she conducts investigations into corrupt media and outs the harm it causes to the poor and important social services. She is has been conducting an 11-month investigation of Topix.com, she is the first one in the nation to do so. See my complete profile E-Mail
