So Adam Schiff says no question Iran behind the attacks

[Celerity]

47. when it comes to interventionist foreign policy, both parties (albeit from completely different

angles at times) often dance to the same tune, even at the same moment in some cases. Libya and Syria were on us, not the Rethugs (although many of them played pure partisan games with that, pretending to be against them to score cheap political points, but then flipping as soon as the monster Rump became POTUS). Bush's murderous, spun-up, illegal Iraq war passed with vast Democratic support (granted based off clearly fake evidence, but the ones who were against it were screaming to be careful, the rationale is fake, cooked).

When you add in all of the war, security, and surveillance state, defence, etc etc etc budgets, we spend around 1.25 trillion USD on the war/surveillance state each year. That is more than what the entire rest of the world spent on defence/war budgets in 2016. When you subtract out our share, that means the rest of the world spent around $1.1 trillion.

War is the health of the state, to steal a line from the WWI-era progressive, Randolph Bourne.

Senate Passes $700 Billion Pentagon Bill, More Money Than Trump Sought

https://www.nytimes.com/2017/09/18/us/politics/senate-pentagon-spending-bill.html

WASHINGTON — In a rare act of bipartisanship on Capitol Hill, the Senate passed a $700 billion defense policy bill on Monday that sets forth a muscular vision of America as a global power, with a Pentagon budget that far exceeds what President Trump has asked for.

Senators voted 89-9 to approve the measure, known as the National Defense Authorization Act; the House has already adopted a similar version.

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US Sens. Bob Corker (R-Tenn.), Kirsten Gillibrand (D-NY), Patrick Leahy (D-VT), Mike Lee (R-Utah), Jeff Merkley (D-Ore.), Rand Paul (R-Ky.), Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.), and Ron Wyden (D-Ore.) bucked the partisan establishment and voted no on the bill.

Only 4 Democrats (plus Bernie) voted against it.



MSU scholars find $21 trillion in unauthorised government spending; Defense Department to conduct first-ever audit

https://msutoday.msu.edu/news/2017/msu-scholars-find-21-trillion-in-unauthorized-government-spending-defense-department-to-conduct/

Earlier this year, a Michigan State University economist, working with graduate students and a former government official, found $21 trillion in unauthorized spending in the departments of Defense and Housing and Urban Development for the years 1998-2015.

The work of Mark Skidmore and his team, which included digging into government websites and repeated queries to U.S. agencies that went unanswered, coincided with the Office of Inspector General, at one point, disabling the links to all key documents showing the unsupported spending. (Luckily, the researchers downloaded and stored the documents.)

Now, the Department of Defense has announced it will conduct the first department-wide, independent financial audit in its history (read the Dec. 7 announcement here).

The Defense Department did not say specifically what led to the audit. But the announcement came four days after Skidmore discussed his team’s findings on USAWatchdog, a news outlet run by former CNN and ABC News correspondent Greg Hunter.

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