http://www.counterpunch.org/murtha07132006.html


NATIONAL SECURITY

$33.1 billion/yr Department of Homeland Security FY 07 budget (4 months in Iraq)

$10 billion (1-time) Equipping commercial airliners with defenses against shoulder fired missiles (5 weeks in Iraq)

$8.6 billion/7 years Shortage of international aid needed to rebuild Afghanistan (one month in Iraq)

$5.2 billion (1-time) estimated need for capital improvements to secure public transportation system (trains, subways, buses)

(3 weeks in Iraq)

$1.5 billion/year Radiation detectors needed at all US ports (rejected due to cost) (5 days in Iraq)

$1.4 billion/ year Double the COPS (community police grants) program (5 days in Iraq)

$800 million/year public transportation personnel training and technical support (72 hours in Iraq)

$700 million/year 100% screening of all air cargo - rejected because of (2 days in Iraq) cost (1/4 of domestic shipping and 1/2 of international shipping is done on passenger planes)

$350 million (1-time) Make emergency radio systems interoperable (1.2 days in Iraq) (recommended after 9/11 but hasn't happened yet)

$500 million/year Double the firefighters grant program (2 days in Iraq)

$94 million/year Restore cuts to cities hit on 9/11 in Homeland Security budget (8-1/2 hours in Iraq)

HEALTH CARE/VETERANS

$36 billion/5 years reduction for Medicare spending in President's FY 07 budget (4-1/2 months in Iraq)

$5 billion/5 years Cut in Medicaid in President's FY 2007 budget (2-1/2 weeks in Iraq)

$2.5 billion/5 years VA health care premium increases in this year's budget. Premiums will double and triple and drug co-payments will increase, costing our military retirees $2.4 billion over 5 years (9 days in Iraq)

$100 million Additional funding recommended for mental health research for Veterans (9 hours in Iraq)

$48 million Medical and prosthetic research for Veterans (half a day in Iraq)

$65 million/yr National Institutes of Health research funding cuts in this year's budget (scientists are leaving the field of health research because funding has been cut so severely) (6 hours in Iraq)

$15 billion/yr Provide health insurance to 9 million children with no health insurance (1-1/2 weeks in Iraq)

$118 million/yr The Commodity Supplemental Food Program, which provides nutritional food packages for less than $20 a month to more than 400,000 elderly people - eliminated in the President's budget (12 hours in Iraq)

EDUCATION

$3.4 billion/yr Cut in education budget in President's FY 07 budget from FY 06 funding level (over 40 programs including drug-free schools, federal support for the arts,technology and parent-resource centers). (13 days in Iraq)

$664 million/yr Perkins Loan program cut in President's FY 07 budget (would help 463,000 low-income students attend college) (2-1/2 days in Iraq)

$99 million/yr Even Start (eliminated in President's budget) (9 hours in Iraq)

ENVIRONMENT/INFRASTRUCTURE

$300 million President's cut to EPA budget in FY 2007 (1 day, 3 hours in Iraq)

$253 billion/30 years Clean up contaminated sites in US (Up to 350,000 contaminated sites will require cleanup over the next 30 years according to a report released by the EPA.) (2 years in Iraq)

$9.11 billion National Park Service maintenance backlog (1 month, 10 days in Iraq)

$6 billion Forest Service maintenance backlog (3 weeks in Iraq)

$2 billion Fish and Wildlife Service maintenance backlog (2 weeks in Iraq)

$47.2 billion/yr Miscellaneous user fees throughout government imposed by President's budget on taxpayers (6 months in Iraq)

$1.7 billion/yr Grants to states cut in 2007 budget (1 week in Iraq)

$15 million/yr Double the Save America's Treasures program (cut in half from last year's budget) (1.3 hours in Iraq)

DEFENSE

$6 billion Double the number of Navy ships we are buying in the 2007 bill from 6 ships to 12. (3 weeks in Iraq)

$8 billion Double the number of total Air Force aircraft we are buying in this bill. That's right ? we could double the number of F-22s, Joint Strike Fighters, C-130's, Global Hawks and Predators we are buying. Or, we could double the number of Navy and Marine Corps aircraft we are buying F-18s, V-22s, KC-130Js, and so on. (1 month in Iraq)

Rep. John P. Murtha is a member of Congress from Pennsylvania.

I just don't know what to say about things like that. It's just so sad. The same group of people who want their taxes cut and think uninsured children and malnourished elderly should pull themselves up by the bootstraps are the same ones who don't mind spending fortune after fortune in Iraq, bombing people, letting loose lunatics that massacre and murder, and insist that the goal is "to help people."

This is just the good ol' 'Guns or Butter' argument.

OK,

So what fills your belly then?

huh?

Yes it is the guns or butter argument. What fills your belly? Guns or butter. Meaning that money spent on guns doesn't fill anybody's belly. Murtha points this out very well. It is an argument of ethics.

Gotcha, i though you were trying to argue with me for a second!

Sorry, this is bullshit.

They have completed their mission? What was the mission? To destory infrastructure, bring the country to its knees, spark sectarian violence and allow mob rule?

If so, then yes, mission accomplished.

The US promised to bring democracy and stability to Iraq, and in that they have failed miserably.

Secondly, Iraqi's must "resolve their own internal issues?"

Who created the "internal issues?" The US did. You can't walk into a grocery store, flip over all of the shelves, and then tell the sales person, "Sorry bud, looks like you have one hell of a mess to clean." It doesn't work that way. The US has a moral obligation to these people now, and much in the same way the US had to stick in Japan and rebuild that country, the same must be done in Iraq.

It's a bitter pill to swallow, and it's going to be costly, in both lives and money, but "you broke it, you bought it."

Mission accomplish, my eye.