More insanity...............
30 billion here, 20 billion there and pretty soon we are talking about some real money. Why should we worry about improving our schools and making prescriptions meds more affordable? Why should we worry about making college more accessible to our children? We are setting in motion the solution to those problems now, we are creating the environment where we can continue to have war in the future so we can get as many of our citizens killed as possible.
Think of the money we will save as a nation by not having to provide retirement to all of the soldiers we get killed in the war of choice. We will not have to worry about getting them educated either because they will be too busy trying to survive the next big war that we could be working to avoid, but no, we are actually creating the need for future wars with our actions today. I say we because, we the people, own the responsibility for these wars we have allowed to take place. Oh, I know that it is easy to blame "them", but we have to accept our responsibility for it as well.
There are over 300 million Americans and there are 535 congressional people, 2 members of the executive branch of government, ( no matter what Dick says about the VP position) and 9 members of the supreme court. All of the people in our government are accountable to us. But in order for us to be an effective part of our government we have to become aware of what is happening. We are the fourth branch of government, not the press corps as they want you to believe, and we are going to have to become much more informed about what our hired help are up to. Actually we are the first branch of government because our constitution gives us the ultimate responsibility for ensuring our nation follows the ideals on which it was founded.
Eisenhower tried to warn us about the military-industrial complex but we did not heed his words very well. It is sad that we, the people of the United States, have sat back and let this combination of special arms interests and weak and complacent congressional representatives take our country down this path. As I look back at some of the things I have seen in my life I realize this is exactly what these people want; for us to blindly accept whatever they say as the gospel. We cannot lay all of the blame on those people though, we have to accept our share of the blame as we deserve because we have not ensured the checks and balances of power, as envisioned by the framers of the constitution, are being enforced.
I have been as guilty of accepting the politicians words as anyone else but now I can no longer not see what has been right in front of me all along. These people do not care about a constitutional form of government, they only use the words democracy and freedom to advance their agenda of increasing their wealth and their power over us. I have been studying the constitution very much recently and I realize the true authority over the American people isn't the people we hire to do the work of the government, no, it is not them at all, it is us.
Israel voices satisfaction over U.S. aid increase
JERUSALEM (Reuters) - Prime Minister Ehud Olmert voiced satisfaction on Sunday over Washington's intention to offset a package of arms sales to Saudi Arabia and other Gulf states with increased military aid for Israel.
He said he and U.S. President George W. Bush, in talks at the White House last month, agreed Israel would receive $30 billion in U.S. military aid over the next decade, averaging $3 billion a year.
"This is an increase of 25 percent for the military aid to Israel from the United States. I think this is a significant and important improvement of the defense aid to Israel," Olmert told reporters.
He spoke a day after a senior U.S. defense official said Washington was working on a military assistance deal for Israel expected to top $30 billion over the next 10 years.
The aid boost has been widely seen as a U.S. bid to help allay Israeli concerns over a package of arms sales, that could be worth some $20 billion over the next decade, which Washington is preparing for Saudi Arabia and other Gulf states.
"We understand the United States' need to assist the moderate Arab states, which are standing in one front with the United States and us in the struggle against Iran," Olmert said, referring to Tehran's nuclear program.
A U.S. defense official said on Saturday the Bush administration hoped to present the regional package to the U.S. Congress for approval later in the year.
Washington is striving to assure Gulf allies, worried by the growing strength of Iran and war in Iraq, that the United States is committed to the region and will stand by them, with arms sales part of that process, U.S. officials say.
The package for Saudi Arabia would upgrade its missile defenses and air force and increase its naval capabilities, the official said.
The United States also is preparing a package of military assistance worth some $13 billion in the next decade for Egypt, another U.S. ally in the Middle East, a senior State Department official said.
(Additional reporting by Andrew Grey in Washington and Avida Landau in Jerusalem)
