FEELING CHAINED BY THE BAD ECONOMY? WANTING A LITTLE REVENGE?
42% OF DEMOCRATIC VOTERS IN KENTUCKY YESTERDAY EXTRACTED SOME REVENGE AS THEY CHOSE "UNCOMMITTED" OVER CELEBRITY IN CHIEF BARRY O IN THEIR STATE'S DEMOCRATIC PARTY. IN ARKANSAS' DEMOCRATIC PARTY YESTERDAY, OVER 40% OF VOTERS CHOSE JOHN WOLFE OVER BARRY O.
41.5% OF VOTERS CHOSE WOLFE OVER BARRY O.
REACHED FOR COMMENT WHILE GETTING YET ANOTHER MANI-PEDI, BARRY O DECLARED, "NO BIG DEAL, IN NOVEMBER UNCOMMITTED AND JOHN WOLFE WON'T BE ON THE BALLOT! THEY'LL HAVE TO VOTE FOR ME! THEY'LL HAVE TO! I SAID FRENCH TIPS! FRENCH TIPS!"
FROM THE TCI WIRE:
We'll start with US Senate and then move
to violence in Iraq. In the US, Senator Patty Murray is the Chair of
the Senate Veterans Affairs Committe. Her office notes:
TOMORROW: Chairman Murray to Examine 400 Day Wait Times Plaguing VA and DoD's New Joint Disability Ratings System
Initial
findings on wait times and inconsistencies in diagnoses from GAO audit
and Veterans' Affairs Committee staff report to be unveiled at hearing,
Murray to question top DoD and VA officials on continued problems
(Washington,
D.C.) -- On Wednesday, May 23rd, U.S. Senator Patty Murray will hold a
hearing to examine the continued rise in wait times for our
servicemembers to receive their medical disability rating and
compensation decisions. The hearing will examine challenges facing the
Integrated Disability Evaluation System (IDES) established by the
Department of Defense and the Department of Veterans Affairs, which was
developed to improve the disability evaluation process for wounded, ill
or injured servicemembers.
The Government
Accountability Office (GAO) has found that, far from meeting established
goals for wait times, servicemembers and their families are having to
wait well over a year for answers. Many servicemembers have described
the waiting period as extremely stressful and the hearing will touch on
that period's uncertainty, which can contribute to self-medication, drug
abuse, and even suicide. The hearing will also allow Murray to
question the Department of Defense on the Army's upcoming system-wide
look at discrepancies in mental health diagnoses that arose from an
investigation Senator Murray spurred at Joint Base Lewis-McChord in
Washington state.
WHO: U.S. Senator Patty Murray, Chairman, Senate Veterans' Affairs Committee
Jon Ann Rooney, Acting Under Secretary of Defense, Personnel and Readiness,
Department of Defense
John Gingrich, Chief of Staff, Department of Veterans Affairs
Daniel Bertoni, Director of Education, Workforce, and Income Security Issues,
Government Accountability Office
WHAT: Hearing to Discuss Medical Benefit Wait Times and Inconsistencies in Mental
Health Diagnoses
WHEN: TOMORROW: Wednesday, May 23rd, 2012
10:00 AM ET
WHERE: Dirksen Senate Office Building
Room 562
Washington, D.C.
WEBCAST: http://veterans.senate.gov/
Matt McAlvanah
Communications Director
U.S. Senator Patty Murray
202-224-2834 - press office
202--224-0228 - direct
That's tomorrow. Today?
Senator
Patrick Leahy: The bill before you totals 52.1 billion dollars.
That's 2.6 billion below the President's budget request. That's 1.2
billion dollars below the Fiscal Year 2012 level. Let me repeat that,
you're not going to hear this often in committees these days. The bill
is 2.6 billion below the President's budget request, 1.2 billion below
the Fiscal Year 2012 level. Not only that, Senator [Lindsey] Graham and
I have not used 881 million dollars that the full Committee recommended
and allocated for this Subcommittee. So that's another 881 million
dollars we're saving the taxpayers.
Senate
Appropriations Subcommittee on Defense Chair Leahy was speaking at a
markup session this afternoon. Chair Leahy noted that the bill was
bi-partisan and that both he and Graham compromised to reach a budget
all could agree on.
Ranking Member
Lindsey Graham: I just want to repeat what you said about the funding.
That's 881 million below the initial Committee recommendation. 2.6
billion -- or 5% -- below the president's request. 2% below FY2012
enacted levels. And I would argue the world hasn't gotten that much
safer. But we are in debt so everything's got to be on the table. So in
a very volatile, changing world we've been able to spend less than we
did last year and decreased the budget. But having said that, I think
the money is pretty wisely spent.
How did they reduce it? A number of ways.
Ranking
Member Lindsey Graham: [. . .] and 77% below what we had last year
for Iraq. Why? Well the security situation in Iraq has deteriorated,
we don't have any military force there to speak of and the Chairman and I
both believe very strongly that it's hard to train police when you
can't get outside and do the work without being attacked so we have
dramatically reduced the amount of funds available in Iraq because it's
just throwing good money out for bad.
After the markup hearing, Senator Patrick Leahy's office released this statement from the Senator:
This
bill totals $52.1 billion, which is $2.6 billion below the President's
budget request, and $1.2 billion below the Fiscal Year 2012 level.
Because the Iraqi police training program has not progressed as hoped,
and our relations with Pakistan have been stalled for months, Senator
Graham and I have not used $881 million that the full Committee
initially recommended for the Subcomittee. That is money we are saving
the taxpayers.
At the same time, we address
many national security threats that are ongoing, from countering
extremism in the Sahel region of Africa to building democratic
institutions in Central America. We include a new Middle East and North
Africa Incentive Fund requested by the President, to respond to rapidly
changing events in that volatile region. We continue support for
critical humanitarian relief and global health programs, including for
the President's Emergency Plan for AIDS Relief.
This
is a bipartisan bill that address the priorities of Senators of both
parties. To get there, Ranking Member Lindsey Graham (R-SC) and I have
each made compromises. There are some things in the bill that he does
not like, and the same goes for me. But they are the exception.
Senator Graham is a well informed and passionate advocate for U.S.
global leadership, and I greatly appreciate his input and support, as I
know Secretary [of State Hillary] Clinton does.
If
the bill stands -- and it's going to be a battle on some issues when
its time to reconcile with the House (but not on the Iraq issue) -- the
Iraqi police program is over. As it should be. Tim Arango (New York Times) reported
last week that, since last October, the Iraqi police training program
had already cost US taxpayers $500 million. Peter Van Buren is the
author of We Meant Well: How I helped Lose the Battle for the Hearts and Minds of the Iraqi People. Earlier this month at Huffington Post, Van Buren noted "the U.S. government has spent $7.3 billion for Iraqi police training since 2003." Let's go back to the February 8, 2012 snapshot:
We covered the November 30th House Foreign Affairs Subcommittee on the MiddleEast and South Asia in the December 1st snapshot
and noted that Ranking Member Gary Ackerman had several questions. He
declared, "Number one, does the government of Iraq -- whose personnel we
intend to train -- support the [police training] program? Interviews
with senior Iaqi officials by the Special Inspector General show utter
didain for the program. When the Iraqis sugest that we take our money
and do things instead that are good for the United States. I think that
might be a clue." The State Dept's Brooke Darby faced that
Subcommittee. Ranking Member Gary Ackerman noted that the US had already
spent 8 years training the Iraq police force and wanted Darby to answer
as to whether it would take another 8 years before that training was
complete? Her reply was, "I'm not prepared to put a time limit on it."
She could and did talk up Deputy Minister of the Ministry of Interior
Adnan al-Asadi as a great friend to the US government. But Ackerman and
Subcommittee Chair Steve Chabot had already noted Adnan al-Asadi, but
not by name. That's the Iraqi official, for example, Ackerman was
referring to who made the suggestion "that we take our money and do
things instead that are good for the United States." He made that
remark to SIGIR Stuart Bowen.
Brooke Darby
noted that he didn't deny that comment or retract it; however, she had
spoken with him and he felt US trainers and training from the US was
needed. The big question was never asked in the hearing: If the US
government wants to know about this $500 million it is about to spend
covering the 2012 training of the Ministry of the Interior's police, why
are they talking to the Deputy Minister?
Why?
Because Nouri never nominated anyone to be the Minister of the Interior
-- all this time later. The US was funneling millions into training a
group of employees in a ministry that for two years has been without any
leadership. That's bad. Really bad. And the fact that this Deputy
Minister had publicly stated he didn't want the US training the Iraqi
police, had stated that last year, had repeated it when asked by Brooke
Darby, why was more money wasted? Hopefully, this is the end of the US
taxpayer footing the bill for the training of Iraqi police. (It should
be noted that the US pushed itself into this position. Iraqis were
training at other places, including Jordan, but the US insisted --
during Bush's second term -- that the Iraqi forces shouldn't be going to
other countries for training.) While that program currently appears
dead, the Subcommittee did not propose cutting all monies to Iraq. Donna Cassata (AP) points out,
"The bill would provide $1.1 billion for Iraq, including $582 million
in foreign assistance but no money for the police development program."
In
Iraq, a disturbing video -- disturbing for content, disturbing for the
story and details that supposedly surround it -- has emerged in Iraq. This gruesome YouTube video
shows a young man bruisded and battered on his knees, his legs, his
back, his shoulders, his buttocks, his arms his lips, his stomach . . .
The young man is said to be Ammar Hassan Acikr who is the nephew of
Ibrahim al-Jaafari who was prime minister of Iraq and now leads the
National Alliance. Also making the video news worthy is the claim that
his attackers were either relatives of or employees of current prime
minister Nouri al-Maliki, the current prime minister. Al Mada reports
the attack took place in Karbala and states the attackers were
relatives of Nouri. When bystanders attempted to intervene to help
Ammar who was being attacked by several men, the men fired guns into the
air warning no one to interfere.
Still on violence, AFP reports
that two Baquba bombings have claimed 6 lives (four were children)
today as the home of a Sahwa was bombed first and then the home of a
displaced Shi'ite family. Alsumaria reports
that 1 teacher was shot dead in the classroom, allegedly by a student
whom sources state had been expelled from the classroom for cheating.
The alleged shooter supposedly used a machine gun. Begging the question
of how he walked up to and into the school with a machine gun without
raising any alarms. In other violence today, Alsumaria notes that a Falluja roadside bombing has left two people injured after it exploded near a food market, a Baghdad roadside bombing injured on person, an
attack on a Kirkuk checkpoint resulted in the death of 1 Iraqi soldier
with two more left injured, a Mosul sticky bombing injured two people
and 1 security guard for a Mosul judge was killed. Among the violence noted in yesterday's snapshot was the bombing outside Mosul that claimed the life of Sheikh Rashid Zeidan (reported by AFP). Alsumaria notes
he was a leader with the National Dialogue Front and that he rushed to a
Mosul hospital but died while receiving treatment. The National
Dialogue Front is part of Iraqiya -- the political slate that came in
first in the 2010 elections. Deputy Prime Minister Saleh al-Mutlaq is
the head of the NDF. Sunnis, Kurds, Yezidis, Shabaks and Assyrians are
all part of the NDF. Iraq Body Counts
reports there were at least 11 killed in violence yesterday and notes
at least 147 violent deaths for the month of May thus far.
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