Panel approves $128 billion for Iraq, Afghanistan

[Coventina]

Source: Associated Press

WASHINGTON — The total cost of the U.S. response to the Sept. 11 attacks and the ongoing wars in Iraq and Afghanistan would top $1 trillion under a Pentagon funding bill approved by a key House panel Wednesday.

The $636 billion defense spending bill unanimously approved by the Appropriations Committee contains $128 billion for Pentagon operations in Iraq and Afghanistan — and Rep. John Murtha, D-Pa., the House's top defense budget writer, says more will be needed next spring.

For now, the measure contains $369 million for the beleaguered F-22 program, which President Barack Obama and Defense Secretary Robert Gates are intent on killing after 187 planes are built. Cancellation of the F-22 program is at the top of Gates' efforts to reform the Pentagon's procurement system. On the heels of a 58-40 Senate vote Tuesday to kill the program, Murtha said it's clear the program is dead.

Gates wants to shift military spending to programs more suitable to today's unconventional wars. The F-22, designed for midair combat, has been irrelevant to the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan and therefore unused there.

Read more: http://www.google.com/hostednews/ap/article/ALeqM5gBPaHA8wyvhZsKWPW8Uxp30QpfqgD99JJHS82

[tekisui]

1. knr!~ A trillion for needless wars. None for health care.

Someone already negated my rec. Oh wells.

[ashling]

2. There's your healthcare money

gone to fight a war nobody needs.

[Autumn]

3. Thats the way it goes.

and more needed next spring. What utter bullshit.

[flvegan]

4. Are we still fighting them over there so we don't have to fight them over here?

Still the same excuse and all, right?

[MichiganVote]

5. And our homeless and foreclosed families are stuck, jobless, penniless, nada, nothing.

[Flaneur]

6. Fuck that. We could use that money here.

No more imperial wars.

[OwnedByFerrets]

7. I just love my hard earned tax dollars going towards killing

human beings. Just makes me so fucking happy.:mad:

[fascisthunter]

8. all for an oil pipeline

but in order for the pipeline to happen, the US will need to find a way to stablize that country with lot's of money and of course lot's of soldier's lives. I'm all for stability in that area of the World, I just can't believe we are there to do so since we have such a nasty track record.

[ConcernedCanuk]

9. Obama - think health-care and homeless in your own country

.
.
.

Stop this domination thing the USA has been doing for decades

TAKE CARE OF YOUR OWN CITIZENS FIRST??

just a thought . .

[Truth Talks]

10. Bummer

It's too bad Obama's record is marred with a few trivial problems - like instantly transforming into a war criminal a la Bush, selling out to corporate interests, etc., etc.