Reply #26: Yes, it would indeed mean that hundreds and hundreds of billions [View All]

[MadHound]

Of dollars are indeed "floating around in the ether". Hell, the following is from 2002, but it gives you a good idea of what's going on. The Pentagon doesn't just "lose" 2.3 trillion dollars, it gets diverted<http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2002/01/29/eveningnews/main325985.shtml>. Nor does the government actually buy $500 toilet seats or $50 hammers, at least not all the time. A lot of that money is also diverted. Where? Well sure, it can be going to line individual's pockets, and probably does. But a lot of it also goes into black budget operations, developing new high tech weapons, conducting secret covert wars and excursions, all under a black budget.

In addition, the intelligence community uses taxpayers' money in order to conduct operations that will garner them even more money. Iran Contra is just the tip of the iceberg on this one. For a real eye-opening read concerning CIA actions and how they both chew up taxpayer money and bring down foreign policy, pick up the Politics of Heroin, by Alfred McCoy. It is no accident that we're back in the Golden Triangle, and while natural gas pipelines figure into the mix, heroin plays a big role. After all, Afghanistan had another record poppy harvest this year, second in a row.

I would also reccomend reading Secret Empire by Philip Taubman. It details the rise of clandestine projects undertaken by the CIA and others during the 1950s. It also provides insight into the rise of the secret budgets that fuel these projects.

Yes, hundreds of billions of dollars disappear into the ether on an annual basis while the rest of this country slowly settles into the dust of history. Our domestic needs are sacrificed on the twin altars of war and greed. And it's been going on for fifty plus years now. However with the rapid escalation that we've seen under the Reagan and both Bush administration, we are dancing perilously close to the edge of that cliff that the Soviet Empire went over. It will be a hard landing.