The true cost of American military expenditures

The Obama administration recently released its proposed budgets for the federal government in fiscal year 2010. While most of the mass media coverage focused on the 1.75 trillion dollar deficit, there was little discussion of the 663 billion dollar defense budget. As I have discussed before, this is another concrete example as how the lobbyists, defense corporations, and all the other politically connected people making millions and sometimes billions of dollars are allowed to keep bankrupting America with literally no opposition from the American public. It is very disturbing to see more money spent on the Pentagon than all the other departments in the federal budget combined.

Echoing a posting I made back in January, most of the press reports I have read on the Obama budget proposals often quoted the lower 533 billion dollar figure as opposed to the actual 663 billions that will spent on the military industrial complex in FY 2010. The higher figure just shy of the 800 billion dollar stimulus bill recently passed by Congress includes supplementary budgets for the military industrial complex to spend in Iraq and Afghanistan.

Due to the help from my mentor, Mr. Chalmers Johnson, the author of the definitive best selling trilogy of books on the American military complex and the perilous consequences it will have on American democracy, even the figure for 663 billion dollars is not the actual amount of tax dollars being spent on the military. In addition to the 663 billion dollar figure, the budget for the Homeland security department, which is actually in charge of the nation’s defense and protection, should be included in the cost that Americans are spending on defense and the military. The proposed budget for this department comes in at 42 billion dollars. Closely related to the Homeland Defense bureaucracy is the Department of Justice with the paramilitary Federal Bureau of Investigation and its sibling the Department of Alcohol Tobacco and Firearms. According to the Reuters report on the Obama budget, it is estimated that 25 percent of the 23 billion dollars will go towards the FBI. Nevertheless, for the sack of argument for the people wary of including the FBI and the ATF into military expenditures, I will leave these budgets out of the total equation.

One department that should be included in the total amount of money spent on the military is the department of veterans affairs with a budget request in FY 2010 for 52 billion dollars. If it were not for the invasion and subsequent invasion of Afghanistan and then Iraq, not to mention the fools’ errand of The Vietnam War, this budget would not have to be so large. Excluding the blatant failure of duty by Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld and his negligence not to issue enough IBAS (Individual Body Armor Systems) for soldiers fighting in the early years of the Iraq War, due to advanced combat medical treatment and other life saving techniques, there are more permanent disabled veterans would otherwise been killed in duty. The long-term care these veterans require is one reason for the 10 percent budget increase. As a veteran myself, I do not think this budget increase is enough, and should be even greater.

Taking all these additional Federal Government bureaucracies into consideration, the total amount of US tax dollars spent on the military is 725 billion dollars. This figure is still not an accurate number, because I am not factoring in the interest Americans will have to pay on the money the US government is borrowing form other countries to finance these expenditures or the amount of money the Department of Energy which is responsible for the protection and storage of the nations nuclear weapons. If these additional figures were included, than total military expenditures in America would exceed the 800 billion Stimulus Bill.

This is alarming due to the importance of the US economy. As the top U.S. intelligence official, Director of National Intelligence Dennis Blair, recently said in testimony to the House Intelligence Committee, the US economy is the nation's foremost security concern. I suppose Mr. Blair knows a little about why previous world empires that collapsed due to another country surpassing them economically.

Historians in the 22nd century and beyond will correctly identify the huge military budgets as the main reason to the downfall of America due to the overstretch of the American Empire of Bases linked to the excessive military expenditures.

The connection between media control and political power

Many people often underestimate or are not aware of the huge impact the mass media and news broadcasts have on public opinion and how the reporting or non reporting of these stories can shape public opinion. I recently experienced this phenomenon when I attended an academic discussion moderated by an American journalist, Alexander Stille, on the current state of the Italian economy and country. While his presentation did not discuss in detail what he wrote in his latest book on Italy and Silvio Berlusconi, The Sack of Rome, the question and answer session afterwards provided me a real world case example of what Berlusconi once said. If it is not on Television, it does not exist.

In a similar fashion in how Italy is a country of contrasts with one of the largest economies in the world but also with one of the most corrupt governments in Europe, the country also offers an interesting case study in the evolving role of the media in politics and political power. From the negative selfish seeking use of the media by Silvio Berlusconi, to the political activism that a former comedian has used the internet to fight against, Italy is a fascinating area for political research on the connection between media control and political power.

As a fellow blogger, the Beppe Grillo impact here in Italy is incredible. Using only the Internet with the help of his blog and the web site meetup, Beppe Grillo a former comedian turned political activist was able to organize two mass protests against the members of government serving in Parliament who have criminal records. In Italy, a member of Parliament serving in the government has legal immunity against any crimes they are accused of committing.

During the First Republic, political corruption in Italy was very widespread but when a politician would get caught with his hand in the cookie jar, or be exposed for his involvement in a corruption scandal, he would have the sense of honor to resign from his post in the government. During the reign of Silvio Berlusconi the moral bar that was already at a low standard for political ethics, was lowered even further when Silvio Berlusconi got into power. During his time in power, Silvio B. allowed several of his closet friends who were facing criminal charges, to be given seats in the Parliament to protect them from the courts. Unlike the United States, in Italy, Italians do not direct elect the members of Parliament and are only allowed to select candidates from a list of names created by the political parties. This is how political party leaders have so much power and allows them to give seats to Parliament to anyone they want.

While Silvio Berlusconi has a virtual monopoly on the private media and a de facto control of the media on the public television stations, Beppe Grillo through the internet has done a remarkable job at starting a grass roots campaign. Although he has done a great job at organizing a grass roots campaign with the creation of his Civic Lists political party, the movement is not being given any attention in the mass media here in Italy. This was evident in the ignorance many people in the question and answer session displayed.

This lack of coverage of the Civic Star lists Beppe Grille has created is a real world example of what Silvio Berlusconi said about if it is not on TV, it is does not exist.

The Internet does exist and no one man, political ideology, or government can stop the free movement of information and free speech.

An Empire of Bases

While most of the mass media is talking about the President’s State of the Union Address, I want to discuss another story that offers a more accurate representation of the condition of the United States and the consequences of it that will affect more Americans in the future. This analysis was inspired after reading a story about US troops being withdrawn from Iraq and the collaborating role the American mass media plays. This story truly exemplifies the accurate state of the United States and the corrosive nature the military industrial complex (MIC) and a conservative corporate controlled press is having on American democracy. If not acknowledged and acted upon in the very near future, these factors along with a bankrupt American economy will eventual cause the downfall of America.

While some readers of this blog feel I spend too much time discussing the power of the military industrial complex in American government and society, it just kind of thinking that the people profiting from the MIC and employed by the MIC want you to believe. Many opponents of a smaller defense budget proclaim that the current US defense budget is only a small fraction of America’s GDP. While this may have been true in the 1970s, 1980s and 1990s to a certain extent, trillion dollar deficits, a 600 billion dollar defense budget and never ending wars are directly contributing to a decline in the American standard of living. There is perhaps no better opportunity for proponents of a smaller defense budget to try to reign in the runaway monster the Department of Defense has become.

In the opening paragraph of the story released by the Associated Press who then distributes the same story to hundreds of regional and local newspapers, the reporters write that:

“President Barack Obama is expected to order all U.S. combat troops to leave Iraq by August of next year, closing the door on a war that has led to the deaths of at least 4,250 members of the U.S. military.”

The reporters fail to mention that there will still be about 60,000 military personal in Iraq and over 100,000 civilian military contractors. One of the most under reported stories in the Occupation of Iraq are the 120,000 military contractors working in Iraq and the Department of Defense.

That is why the story on the troops withdrawing from Iraq was so interesting. The stories released by all the major news organizations, fail to report on the estimated 500 billion dollars already spent in Iraq and how there is nothing to show for in American society for that money spent. These stories highlight how a conservative corporate controlled press can omit information and report on a story in a general way. There are no new hospitals, schools, day care facilities, or mass transit infrastructure projects that 500 billion dollars of American tax money could have bought and American citizens benefited from. If history has shown us anything from our experience in Germany, Korea, and now the Iraq, is that once a military base gets created, it will never be closed. The 500 billion dollars is just a down payment for another outpost in the American military Empire of Bases.

With over 730 military bases around the world and over two million Americans living and working on these military outposts, Mr. Obama is not addressing all Americans and acknowledging the true scope and size of the Union in his latest speech to Congress. If Mr. Obama and other Presidents in the future want to give an accurate condition of the State of the Union, then I suggest that the President give a report on the State of the American Empire and how that Empire directly impacts their standard of living in The Homeland.

The CIA, FBI and corporations altering wikipedia

Some savvy internet users may remember the news story about wikipedia. In 2007 a story was released how American government agencies like the CIA and FBI in addition to multinational corporations like Wal-Mart and Dow Chemical altering web pages on wikipedia. This story highlights the danger of relying on wikipedia for accurate information. Thankfully, though a California Institute of Technology grad student created a database called the Wikipedia Scanner, which exposed the web address location of the people editing wikipedia web pages.

While the Internet is an extremely powerful tool in terms of research and information gathering, more people need to be aware that wikipedia is not an academic resource that can be trusted. Wikipedia calls itself “the free encyclopedia that anyone can edit," this is another way of saying the information on wikipedia is not fact-checked. Or spin-checked, for that matter

Some examples of altered wikipedia entries altered from computers with IP addresses linked to wikipedia entries critical of them include the wikipedia page on Wal-Mart from the original posting on wikipedia, which states: Wages at Wal-Mart are about 20% less than at other retail stores. Founder Sam Walton once argued that his company should be exempt from the minimum wage. A computer with a Wal-Mart IP address was found to have changed it to, The average wage at Wal-Mart is almost double the federal minimum wage (Wal-Mart). However, founder Sam Walton once argued that his company should be exempt from the minimum wage.

Other examples include Dow Chemical eliminating negative passages about environmental disasters involving the company and the company Diebold apparently deleting long paragraphs detailing concerns over the integrity of the company's voting machines.

In an age where information is easily obtained, be wary of where you get your information from.

The hypocritical and morally bankrupt actions of Republican governors in America

In serious economic times like today, more Americans should be paying more attention to the serious news stories related to the financial crisis, instead of spending time watching the Academy Awards and other forms of distraction offered up by the corporate mass media. The political leaders in America rely on this inattentive behavior by Americans in order for them to put the interests of themselves and the lobbyists who influence them before the interests of hard working Americans. Insulated from the mesmerizing spell the corporate media spews, I remain focused and attentive on the morally bankrupt actions of political leaders in America who are playing politics with the Stimulus Bill passed by Congress.

While most Americans were distracted by the glitz and glamour of the Academy Awards, I was following the less glamorous story of republican governors in America discussing their desire not to use funds available in the recent stimulus for unemployment benefits for people living in their states. In addition to this unethical political action that will impact the lives of hundreds of thousands of Americans out of work, some republican leaders are also demanding that all the stimulus money be accounted for. It seems that republicans are more concerned with the amount of money the US government spends on average hard working Americans, than the billions of dollars wasted and unaccounted for in Iraq and the associated 500 billion dollars already spent there. It is estimated by the Nobel Prize winning economist, Joseph Stiglitz that that by the time US involvement in Iraq ends, the total cost will be over 2 trillion dollars.

This blog has repeatedly discussed and highlighted the billions of dollars wasted on the military occupation in Iraq that the republican governors playing politics with the lives of hard working American lives fail to remember or are too embarrassed to mention. If more voters in conservative states like Mississippi, South Carolina, and Louisiana paid more attention to the amount of money republican leaders throw at corporations operating in Iraq than to their own states and communities, maybe these voters would begin to hold these republican leaders more accountable in the next election. I find it very hypocritical and morally bankrupt to refuse millions of dollars of unemployment benefits to American citizens while authorizing millions of dollars to corporations under investigation for criminal negligence for electrical work on military bases outside the United States.

As readers of this blog will recall, I was not in favor of the 700 billion dollar bailout of the financial institutions back in October. I discussed this in detail in my my posting Toxic Debt should remain with the banks and not be passed off to the American taxpayer. One of the reasons why the initial legislation proposed by the Bush administration did not pass the first time, was due to the event occurring so close to a general election where members of congress were up for re-election. I discussed this in my posting entitled, I have regained (a little) faith in the American political process.

In a similar fashion in how President Bush asked Americans to go to the mall and not to make any sacrifices in the aftermath of the September 11, terrorist attacks, the corporate mass media is again failing in its responsibility to devote more time to the economic crisis. Each minute dedicated to the Oscars, professional sports, and other frivolous news stories on the large corporate media outlets like Fox, CNN, NBC, ABC, and CBS news, is less time these news organizations can dedicate to the stories related to the economic crisis. These news organizations should devote all of their time on discussing important economic and political stories and leave the entertainment, sports, and weather reporting to the stations dedicated to those topics.

Introduction to Italian politics and media Part II

Silvio Berlusconi the current prime minister in Italy, controls of over 70 percent of public television, a publishing house, 20 newspapers in Italy, and controls who is appointed to be in charge of the three public television stations.

One man however, Beppe Grillo, has begun a grass roots campaign to challenge the vested interests of this media mogul and political figure.

Introduction to Italian politics and media- Part 1

The Internet is a wonderful tool and can have as much impact as the main stream media has. Due to the Internet, I have been able to gain a much more in depth understanding of Italian politics and learn things that are not covered by the main stream media here in Italy.

As part of a way to share some of this information with you, I hope you take a few minutes away from time in front of your television set and watch a video I thought you would find interesting.

The Empire of Production becomes an Empire of Consumers

There was a tipping point in American history that historians will identify as the apex of American power. That tipping point occurred when America stop being an Empire of Production and became an Empire of Consumption. This occured around the time of the Eisenhower and Kennedy administrations.

In the posted video below,Andrew Bacevich discusses how America has ended up in the position it is today with massive 800 billion dollar trade deficits and trillion dollar federal deficits.

Mr. Bacevich is a West Point Graduate who served in Vietnam and then later Germany and the Persian Gulf. He has a Ph. D. in American history from Princeton. He later taught at West Point and Johns Hopkins University prior to joining Boston University in 1998.

Reining in the Imperial Presidency

Like most people, the first time I heard the term, Imperial Presidency, I was skeptical and reluctant to believe the concept. However, as I learned more about the subject and began to research the concept in more detail, I now agree with most political science scholars that an Imperial Presidency does exist in American politics.

Most political science scholars agree that an Imperial Presidency began to emerge during the time of the John F. Kennedy administration and has steadily grown more powerful over the years. Learning from the mistakes made by his fellow republicans during his time in the Nixon administration and his time in the executive branch, Dick Cheney made it his mission during the Bush years to strengthen the Imperial Presidency even more. Some of the more easily identified examples of a more powerful executive branch and an imperial presidency include the massive amounts of signing statements George W. Bush applied during his time in office and the behind closed door meetings Cheney held while working on America’s new energy policy in 2001.

In the story; Democrats May Be Headed to Showdown with Obama Over Bush Probes,
the news report is a good example how the imperial presidency is allowed to grow due to the inaction of Congressional leaders and the failure of the press to report on the concept and issues surrounding it.

In analyzing the article, it showed how some members of congress who want to exercise the power the framers of the US Constitution gave then to check an imperial presidency, are thwarted by their own colleagues in the legislative branch. A clear example of how the imperial presidency grows unchecked is the statement by the Senate Judiciary chair, Charles Schumer from New York, who does not support further investigations when he said that “supports congressional restraint”. This congressional restraint he is not in favor of is in stark contrast to the duties and responsibilities the US Congress has by the power given to it by the fore founders of the American Republic.

The story by the reporter of Bloomberg.com also reveals how public opinion can be swayed by how a news story is released. Case in point is how the reporter fails to mention the 487 report issued back in January by the House Judiciary Committee, on an imperial presidency. This exclusion by the reporter and the lack of press coverage of the report by the mass media in America highlights how the press in America is not doing its job at informing the American people of all the issues. This exclusion by the mass media also helps to explain how an Imperial Presidency is allowed to exist in the American political system.

In addition to these interesting aspects of the story, the reporter also included a statement that Obama has not endorsed the probes. The last time I checked, it was up to the President and the executive branch to endorse the actions of the Congress.

The US should reconsider its embrace of unscrupulous leaders

It is no secret that American Foreign Policy (AFP) is driven by the need to secure oil resources around the world due to the fact that the American economy is run on oil. Therefore, the securing and protection of oil resources, is one of the highest national interests in American foreign policy.

It appears however, that American foreign policy is not consistent in its application of promoting democracy and human rights for people living in oil exporting countries like Saudi Arabia. In addition to turning a blind eye to authoritarian regimes, the United States also tends to act hostile towards any country that does not follow a lassiez faire based economy in its sphere of influence. Some examples of this include Cuba, Bolivia, and the South American country of Venezuela. With the United States enacting recent socialist policies such as nationalizing banks under the Bush administration, I find the continued hostile approach to socialist countries like Bolivia and Venezuela to be hypocritical.

United States political leaders along with a press controlled in large part by profit driven corporations, have allowed the American public to be fooled into believing that countries like Bolivia and Venezuela are being controlled by radical left wing dictators. A close examination of press reports in the American media further drives home this point. In several news stories ranging from the Associated Press, ABC News to Reuters, some references to the danger of a socialist president like Hugo Chavez, is evident in the reporting.

In a Reuters story, the news agency ended with the paragraph:

"This victory solidifies President Chavez's already solid grip on power and all the key institutions in the country. It could also embolden the regime to deepen the distinctly interventionist and state-centric economic and political model," said Alberto Ramos, an economist at Goldman Sachs.

With the recent passage of a 790 billion dollar tax cut and government spending legislation in the United States, that last paragraph could explain the United States.

To highlight the extent that “left wing” leaders are demonized in the American press and allows American Foreign policy to undermine socialist governments, a recent article by a reporter from the New York Times, the paper said that the recent referendum victory by Hugo Chavez “creates a new foreign policy challenge for the Obama administration”.

Another example includes the closing paragraph of an Associated Press story, which tends to portray Chavez in a negative light, the reporter and the news agency ended the story with the following:

"Effectively this will become a dictatorship," opposition leader Omar Barboza told The Associated Press. "It's control of all the powers, lack of separation of powers, unscrupulous use of state resources, persecution of adversaries."

After reading that story, I could not help but to think of Italy and the control of the media by Silvio Berlusconi who is also the leader of the country. Berlusconi has control of the power of the state, lacks a separation of powers, and has recently passed legislation that places him above the law.


In a news story that will not get the light of day in the mass media in America, over the weekend the King of Saudi Arabia, replaced the head of the religious police, Sheik Ibrahim al-Ghaith, with a more moderate figure, Abdel Aziz bin Humain.

Sheik Saleh al-Luhaidan, was a religious cleric who issued a fatwa about killing television executives, declared last autumn that it was permissible to kill the owners of television stations that broadcast immoral content.

Instead of the United States having an adversarial approach to Socialist leaders who only want to help the poor in their societies while also enjoying power, the US should reconsider its embrace of unscrupulous leaders like Silvio Berlusconi and authoritarian regimes like Saudi Arabia.

The memory hole and the danger it poses to a democracy

In the classic novel 1984, Winston Smith, the protagonist of George Orwell's ''Nineteen Eighty-Four,'' was a rewrite man. His job was to destroy documents that could destroy the government’s perception as being infallible using a device known as The Memory Hole. In the book, the memory hole was so efficient that not even the ashes remained. While the United States government has used similar tactics such as the memory hole to try to rewrite history and cover up embarrassing events in its history, this Orwellian tool is being used all over the world by the rich and powerful to remove embarrassing and compromising information from history.

In what will sure be considered by historians in the future as to the influence his father had in the US government, the Bush campaign in the late 1990s went so far as to destroy the military records of George W. Bush to hide his dereliction from duty and other performance reviews while he served in the military. It should be noted that his father was a former head of the Central Intelligence Agency, which gave him great power to get the inside job of destroying the military records of his son destroyed. In a scheme that Winston Smith in the book 1984 would have been proud of, the Bush campaign inner circle devised the not so clever excuse of claiming that microfilmed payroll records of George Bush and numerous other service members had been inadvertently ruined in 1996 and 1997 by the Defense Finance and Accounting Service project to salvage deteriorating microfilm. As time passes and historians continue to put the Bush administration into context, the timing of this accident and the Orwellian tactic is becoming more and more clear.

In what should have derailed his Presidential campaign in the very early stages, George W. Bush instead was allowed to continue his campaign for the highest public office in America. With the help from his unethical campaign manager Karl Rove, a man who never even finished college, George W. Bush was later able to defeat the Vietnam prisoner of war candidate John McCain in the Presidential republican primaries.

At the time, in addition to the millions of other Americans who did not vote for him, I knew that George W. Bush and the people who were advising and helping him to become president were not fit to run the government. History and the actions by these men have vindicated the millions of Americans who did not vote for him.

In a similar fashion as to how George W. Bush used the Orwellian tactic of the memory hole, my research into the financial and political rise to power of Silvio Berlusconi has shown a similar use of the memory hole concept. One of the most glaring and memorable examples of Berlusconi’s attack on information and democracy in general occurred in 1994 shortly after Berlusconi became Prime Minister for the first time.

Under the title of “image consultant”, a lawyer for Silvio Berlusconi, Mity Simonetto, appeared at the photo achieves at The Corriere delle Sera in 1994 to view all the photographs of her client, the Prime Minister of Italy. In what not even occurred during the dictatorial regime of Benito Mussolini, a head of a political party was allowed to erase the memory banks of a large and independent newspaper.

Later in 2003 shortly after Silvio Berlusconi gained power for a second time in less than a decade, he continued the attack on the free and independent press in Italy by getting Ferruccio De Bortoli fired from his position as editor at the Corriere delle Sera. The reason that instigated Berlusconi to have an editor of one of the largest newspapers in Italy removed from his position was centered on an editorial about Berlusconi. In the editorial, De Bortoli wrote that the country would be better served if Berlusconi and his lawyers wrote laws to benefit the country instead of serving the Prime Minister’s interests.

Due to the owner of the newspaper also owning the car company Fiat, Silvio Berlusconi implied to the owned of the Corriere delle Sera, Umberto Agnelli, that unless the editor (De Bortoli) at the newspaper who was writing bad opinion pieces of Berlusconi was not fired, the government may not be able to help Fiat with help it was seeking from the government. This form of intimidation of the press by Berlusconi, is one of the reasons why Italy has declined in the world rankings for press and media freedom.

Transparency, freedom of information, and a free and vibrant press are essential elements of a democracy. All citizens are responsible to take an interest in government and politics. The wealthy and powerful people are relying on people to be timid and inattentive in order for them to get into power and manipulate the system to their favor. Living in a democracy has rights and responsibilities.

While George Bush appears to have his family connections to purge the memory of the United States, Silvio Berlusconi relies on his own connections to erase the memory of the Italian people. It is becoming more clear why these two men are such close friends.

Mom and pop are the answer to America's economic troubles

The latest stimulus bill being considered in the US Congress does not appear to be addressing the structural problems affecting the US economy and the overall standard of living for the average American. The stimulus bill only appears to have the intention of getting the American economy back to the condition it was before this economic crisis hit. This approach is doomed to failure because the condition of the US economy before the sub-prime bubble burst was in a precarious condition, which relied too much on the financial and service oriented industries to sustain the US economy.

The latest “economic crisis” in America is showing the dangers of a laissez-faire based economy and the decade’s long process of the extraction of wealth upwards in America. One of the easiest and most recognizable examples of this extraction of wealth upwards in American society are the big retailers of Wal-Mart, Home Depot, Sam’s Club, Target, and the service industry corporations like Starbucks, Dunkin Donuts, and many others. While more and more Americans are feeling the negative effects of these big box retailers and service providers, a majority of highly industrialized (OECD) countries in the world are not suffering as much as Americans due to the increased amount of involvement of the state in the economy and the larger amount of small mom and pop businesses.

Congressional leaders and the Obama administration which currently has the bully pulpit in American politics, needs to speak with the American public about the benefits of locally owned businesses and the small business. The Obama administration and its allies should stress to Americans the importance of changing the American economy from a consuming economy, to an economy based on producing things at a local and national level. I see the benefits of the small mom and pop shop on a daily basis. From the local mom and pop coffee bar instead of a Starbucks or a Dunkin Donuts, to a local grocery store, instead of a large Super center Wal-Mart, the answer to the latest economic crisis lies in the individual and the small business. Obama needs to reverse the flow of wealth upwards in American society and make efforts to keep the wealth among the middle and lower classes in America.

Italy for example, has more than five million small businesses out of a total population of 58 million people. More than a third of the working population is composed of the self-employed and Italy has the highest per capita concentration of small businesses in the world. In Italy, this high concentration of small businesses means that there is one small business for every ten citizens.

If Obama and the democrats were smart, they would pass legislation to empower average Americans and help them to start and own their own business. One of the easiest ways to start this process would be to pass legislation for people to be given grant money to start their own businesses, instead of giving billions of dollars to large corporations, who often have tax-free tax havens in the Cayman Islands and other areas outside of America. With minimal effort, the government could receive applications from individuals in need who have lost a job and after reviewing their business plan, a grant could be given to the citizen.

The Obama administration and the Democratic Party need to change their relationship with Corporate America and the army of lobbyists they employ to influence and corrupt the politicians in Washington DC to their advantage. Over time, the American people will reward this change with more support and the continued decline of the pro capitalist Republican Party will help it fade into obscurity and irrelevance in American politics.

The failure of the US press and a free pass for KBR

Larraine McGee with a photo of her son, Staff Sgt. Christopher Everett, who was electrocuted on a base in Iraq from work performed by KBR.

While the corporate mass media in America churns out story after story of the struggle by the democrats in Washington to pass the latest 800 billion dollar stimulus bill, the real news of defense corporations under criminal investigation getting multi million dollar contracts for work outside of America is once again being over looked. When are more Americans going to see the link between the tens of billions of dollars being spent in foreign countries on the military industrial complex and their own deteriorating life styles and standard of living?

Instead of the corporate mass media trying to distract people with frivolous stories like the Alex Rodriquez steroids story, the press in America should be discussing and grilling the corporate leaders of the defense corporation KBR, which is responsible for the criminal negligent deaths of over 16 service members in Iraq. The case that I am referring to involves military service members who were electrocuted at a military base in Iraq due to the improperly installed or maintained electrical devices by a sub contractor for the firm KBR. In what is common practice in Iraq , many of the multi-million dollar contracts awarded to US corporations and then sub contracted and in some cases that sub contractor sub contracts the contract further. With the historical lack of oversight at the Pentagon, tens of billions of dollars have been literally stolen from the US taxpayer in Iraq.

I find it inexcusable that the press in America is focusing more attention on the recalled peanut butter story and not discussing and taking the defense corporation KBR to task for these criminal negligent electrocutions. The failure by the US press to dedicate more time and exposure to the KBR story, is probably the reason why the corporation was just warded a new 35 million dollar contract to perform even more electrical work in Iraq.

While this 35 million dollar contract may sound small to some people who are becoming numb to the sound of billions of dollars for “bank bailouts” and now a “stimulus package” that 35 million dollars could have been spent on Americans who need it more than some billion-dollar defense corporation. I am sure there are dozens of communities in America that could use an infusion of 35 million dollars more than the military bases in Iraq need them. Moreover, why is the Pentagon continuing to award multi million dollar contracts to these corporations when the US is preparing to leave or at least downsize its forces there?

Perhaps former Presidential candidate John McCain summed it up best when he spoke of the amount of tax dollars being spent in Washington DC.

"We are robbing future generations of Americans of their hard-earned dollars because we are laying on them a debt of incredible proportions," said Republican Senator John McCain.

Too bad he was referring to the latest stimulus package, and not to the military industrial complex and the hundreds of billions of dollars spent outside of America.

Militarism increasing its fatal grip on American democracy

Recent news of two former military generals being nominated and confirmed to be US Ambassadors to Saudi Arabia and Afghanistan, is an alarming indication that militarilism is increasing its fatal grip on democracy in America.

While all global empires in world history have established different military and diplomatic systems to maintain order and ensure the interests of the Empire were secure, the United States is increasingly relying on a military foundation to manage its global possessions and occupied countries. It has accomplished this by dividing the world into five regional areas under the command of a Pentagon appointed Commander in Chief (CINC). These CINCs report directly to the President and the Secretary of Defense, avoiding the Joint Chiefs of Staff and the normal chain of command.

The recent nomination of former CENTCOM CINC General Anthony Zinni to be the new Ambassador to Saudi Arabia and Lieutenant General Karl Eikenberry for Afghanistan highlights the continued downward spiral America is taking in its embrace of militarism and the erosion of civilian oversight in American government.

It should be noted that General Zinni in 1999 was the first person contacted by General Pervez Musharraf of Pakistan after he overthrew the civilian elected government in that country with a coup d’etat. Ignoring a United States congressional ban on giving aid to a country that has undergone a military takeover, General Zinni became one of General Musharraf’s strongest supporters before 9/11. General Zinni was also the man who approved the decision to allow US warships to refuel in Aden, Yemen, which resulted in the October 12, 2000 suicide bombing on the USS Cole, killing seventeen sailors.

To be fair though, Mr. Zinni was one of the most vocal critics of the Iraq War and the following occupation by the Pentagon. He publicly chastised the invasion and subsequent occupation of Iraq. Mr. Zinni knew that the 150,000 strong force that Donald Rumsfeld and General Tommy Franks had assembled was a skeleton of the 350,000 strong force he knew was required to occupy a country the size of Iraq. General Zinni understood Iraq from his involvement with Operation Dessert Fox in 1998. During his time as CENTCOM CINC, he had drawn up plans to invade Iraq, known as Operation Dessert Crossing.

It should also be noted however that General Zinni after his retirement, like most career officers in the military, took a position with the defense industry corporation DynCorp.

DynCorp is one of the top twenty defense firms in the military industrial complex and provides a wide array of services to the military. Some of these services include maintaining pre –positioned garrisons of military equipment in Qatar to training of police forces in foreign countries. In addition to training of police forces, DynCorp also provides for the personal protection of the Afghanistan President Hamid Karzai.

Although not well known, DynCorp employees in the 1990s was involved in a sex slave scandal in Bosnia where under-aged women were kept as sex slaves and then sold them later in Europe. The collection of human rights violations the military industrial complex can inflict on the people of the world is wide and varied. The recent nomination of two former military members by the Obama administration as high-level state department diplomats, is demonstrating how deep the military industrial complex has penetrated the US government and American Foreign Policy.

Unlike the Roman Proconsul who had gained the trust of the public while in the highest public office, the American CINC or retired General has never held any position in the civilian government or been elected to any office.

Regularly walking through the ruins of a former republic turned Empire, I understand very clearly the danger a strong military and its associated influence poses to a democracy. I wish more Americans were aware of this also before it is too late for them.

Cheney terrorized Americans more than the terrorists ever did

A democracy deficit in the American Republic

The recent withdrawal by Tom Daschle and Nancy Killefer for two high-level positions in the new Obama administration, highlight the challenge many unemployed and well-qualified individuals encounter when looking for a job or start a career in government. It is not what you know, but whom you know. It appears however, that this age-old practice in finding a job has not been one of the items Mr. Obama and his inner circle of advisors is attempting to change.

Even with the advantage of being politically connected, Tom Daschle and Nancy Killefer were forced to resign their applications due to questions of tax evasion and problems with servants working in the country illegally. These problems not only highlight the unethical practice of favoritism and nepotism in getting a job in the Obama administration, but also highlight the class and social-economic differences these people have with everyday Americans who they are supposedly trying to help.

Instead of offering these Executive level jobs to the thousands of highly qualified and educated professionals that applied for them on Change.gov, the Obama administration is still practicing the same old Washington DC policies of employing party establishment names and politically connected people. It appears that Obama and his inner circle of advisors and confidants is unwilling to change this long-standing behavior inside Washington DC.

This long practiced tradition in Washington is another barrier disenfranchised people with no political connections have to overcome when they want to work in the government. If Obama wants to implement real change in America and begin to honestly help the people who believed in him and voted for him, than he has to stop this practice at all levels of government immediately. Not only will this change in the hiring process help more qualified people get work, the change in policy would also allow a re-distribution of wealth in American society. In addition to the re-distribution of wealth a change in this policy would help change the status quo of political dynasties in Washington and America.

The challenges and obstacles qualified and patriotic Americans wanting to work for their country is immense to begin with. The recent stories of favoritism shown to politically connected people in Washington have made a mockery of the change.gov website launched by the Obama campaign shortly after the election. It is disheartening and disappointing to learn that highly educated people with degrees in government and public administration, who are also decorated military veterans and have long established records of civic service are being excluded from the selection process in favor of politically connected individuals.

It appears the true power does not lie with the tens of thousands of qualified applications who filled out applications on Change.gov, but with the handful of politically connected lobbyists and career Washington DC politicians and their family members.

In addition to increasing the federal budget deficit, the decision makers in Washington are also contributing to a democracy deficit in the American Republic.

The deafening silence of the press in America

One of the reasons President Bush and his boss Dick Cheney were able to launch the war in Iraq in 2003, was due to the relative silence of the American press and the lack of investigative journalism into the conflict of interest of two former oil industry executives desire to go to war in Iraq.

This failure of the free and independent press allowed the Bush administration to mount a massive propaganda campaign, which allowed politically connected individuals and corporations to profit for a war some say was conceived immediately after the Supreme Court appointed George Bush the winner of the 2000 election. This failure of the press to question the conflict of interest of former oil industry executives campaigning for a war on a country with the second largest oil reserves in the world, has resulted in over 4,237 American deaths in Iraq. While the US press has recently begin to find itself once again and act as a counter weight to the executive branch that the framers of the US Constitution had envisioned, there is still a tremendous amount of deafening silence by the American press on several important issues.

One issue that does not get ignored by this political analyst is the amount of waste, fraud, and corruption being carried out by the politically connected corporations working in Iraq. On Tuesday, another story briefly appeared on the wire services of soldiers in Iraq being killed and injured by the inferior and negligent work of military contractors in Iraq. This latest story was about military members being electrocuted at a military base in Iraq due to the improperly installed or maintained electrical devices by a sub contractor for the firm KBR and its parent company, Halliburton. The latest electrocution in Iraq brings the total to 16 military personal killed by faulty and improperly installed wiring by a Pentagon approved contractor.

In addition to the 16 military members killed by faulty electrical wiring by KBR and its parent company Halliburton, KBR is also accused of running an open-air burn pit at the Balad Air Force Base where over 30,000 military personal are stationed. In one of the more grisly stories of the corruption and vending out of million dollar contracts to sub-sub contractors is the story of a wild dog running around base with a human arm in its mouth. The human arm had been dumped in the open-air burn pit, because KBR had failed to maintain a medical incinerator at the base where medical waste, such as needles, amputated body parts and bloody bandages should have been burned. In a lawsuit filed by a former worker on the base, it is stated in the lawsuit that KBR prevented their employees from speaking with government auditors and hid employees from auditors by moving them from bases when an audit was scheduled. Any employees who spoke with auditors were sent to more dangerous locations in Iraq as punishment.

The relative silence of the US press to make an issue of the recent nomination and approval of former defense company lobbyists William Lynn and Michele Flournoy for high-level Department of Defense positions is another example of the diminishing power of the press in America. Similar to the conflict of interest that Dick Cheney had in granting a non competitive defense contract to a company he had been the president of, the recent Congressional approval of former lobbyists in the Pentagon also presents a conflict of interest for the Pentagon and the new Obama administration.

The appointment of these two former defense lobbyists to the third and second most senior positions in the Department of Defense, the Obama administration and the Democratic Congress are preventing these people from making the tough and critical choices required of them, with the best interests of the country and the US taxpayer in mind.

Stop supporting Fascism in Italy with US tax dollars

Just as Americans are bombarded with hundreds of advertisements a day on television, living in Rome, I am bombarded with the constant eyesore of graffiti.

The graffiti here in Rome and Italy is an indication of the different social values the Italians have but also an indication of the paralyzed and corrupt nature of the Italian political and government institutions responsible for maintaining public order.

Walking down a cobblestone street in the historic center of the city just a few blocks from the Parliament and the national seat of government, or through a neighborhood where the average apartment costs $ 500,000, it is not uncommon to see a black right wing Celtic cross, a red left wing hammer and sickle, or a black Nazi swastika spray painted on a wall. As an American political analyst, one of the more interesting and disturbing political signs to see is the Celtic cross with the words, Il Duce, which was the nickname of the former fascist dictator Benito Mussolini scrawled next to it.

Due to the corrupt nature of the Italian government in the First Republic under the control of the Christian Democrats and then later of the Socialist Party led by Benito Craxi, the small neo-fascist party, The National Alliance, was able to gain political power from the implosion of the five main political parties of the Italian First Republic. This small neo-fascist party was then able to enter government under an alliance with Silvio Berlusconi in 1994.

Having a clear understanding of how Silvio Berlusconi obtained his financial and political power, it is no surprise that National Alliance supporters and Berlusconi supporters are nostalgic for the former fascist dictator, Benito Mussolini. The supporters of these modern political parties in Italy have been deceived into supporting policies and beliefs by Silvio Berlusconi, which allowed him to acquire his financial, and then later his political power. Some of the policies the neo-fascists and Berlusconi supporters endorse are corporatism, anti-communism , censorship of subversives and state propaganda.

During World War II, over 20,000 Americans sacrificed their lives so Italians did not have to live under the tyranny of the fascist dictator Benito Mussolini and an ally of Adolf Hitler. It is disturbing that American political leaders are still silent on the negative impact Silvio Berlusconi and the neo-fascist party, The National Alliance is having on Italian Democracy.

As more Americans are out of work and the news filled with the amount of tax dollars spent on trying to revive the American economy, more Americans should demand that some of the 730 US military bases around world be closed. Italy alone has over 45 military bases that do little for the national security of the United States. The military bases in Italy alone, directly employ over 5,000 Italians and contribute billions of dollars to the Italian economy.

Maybe it is time Americans demanded that the money spent on these useless military bases be spent on their own communities, helping to put Americans back to work, and investing in America’s future.

Let the neo-fascist supporters of Mussolini and the anti-free speech supporters of Berlusconi support themselves, and stop relying on the American taxpayer.