Two days after the United States withdrew from Afghanistan, the House Armed Services Committee voted to set the Pentagon’s 2022 budget. Given that U.S. officials claim to be winding down decades-long wars, even maintaining current levels of military spending would seem a mystifying choice. But the committee didn’t just vote to maintain current spending levels. It voted to increase them by a whopping $24 billion.
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Which begs the question: Are we spending this money because we need to, even though our military budget is already higher than those of the next 11 largest countries combined? Or are there other incentives at play?
Ties between the government and the private sector — what President Dwight D. Eisenhower famously called the “military-industrial complex” — form the foundations of our national defense. Since 9/11, between one-third and half of the nearly $14 trillion the Pentagon has spent went to for-profit defense contractors. Dozens of members of Congress and their spouses own millions of dollars’ worth of stock in those companies.
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Opinion | It’s time to break up the military-industrial complex - The Washington Post
Showing posts with label Approved. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Approved. Show all posts
12/8/21
9/23/21
The Netherlands: Dutch Court Rules Border Police Can Use Ethnicity as One of the Gauges for Searches
A Dutch court ruled Wednesday that border police can use ethnicity as one of the gauges for selecting people for checks at the border, although it cannot be the only one.
Read more at: Dutch Court Rules Border Police Can Use Ethnicity as One of the Gauges for Searches
Read more at: Dutch Court Rules Border Police Can Use Ethnicity as One of the Gauges for Searches
1/21/21
The Netherlands: MP's approve 9 p.m. curfew in the Netherland starting Saturday
A majority of the members of parliament in the Netherlands voted in favor of a curfew from 9 p.m. through 4:30 a.m. The curfew will begin at 9 p.m on Saturday a half-hour later than what was proposed by the outgoing prime minister, Mark Rutte.
The issue was up for debate on Thursday in Parliament as it was considered a controversial policy that should not be enacted by a caretaker Cabinet two months before the general election. The vote took place just after 6:30 p.m., over eight hours after hearings on the curfew started. Exiting coalition party D66 submitted a motion several hours into the debate to shift the start of the curfew back from 8:30 p.m., as Rutte proposed. That won the support from the outgoing prime minister's VVD party, and the other coalition parties of CDA and Christen Unie. Additionally, Labour (PvdA), the Socialist Party (SP) and 50Plus voted in favor, representing a combined total of 101 seats in the Tweede Kamer, the lower house of Parliament.
Read more at: MP's approve 9 p.m. curfew in the Netherland starting Saturday | NL Times
The issue was up for debate on Thursday in Parliament as it was considered a controversial policy that should not be enacted by a caretaker Cabinet two months before the general election. The vote took place just after 6:30 p.m., over eight hours after hearings on the curfew started. Exiting coalition party D66 submitted a motion several hours into the debate to shift the start of the curfew back from 8:30 p.m., as Rutte proposed. That won the support from the outgoing prime minister's VVD party, and the other coalition parties of CDA and Christen Unie. Additionally, Labour (PvdA), the Socialist Party (SP) and 50Plus voted in favor, representing a combined total of 101 seats in the Tweede Kamer, the lower house of Parliament.
Read more at: MP's approve 9 p.m. curfew in the Netherland starting Saturday | NL Times
12/21/20
US Congress reaches deal on $900 bn Covid-19 stimulus package
The package would be the second-largest economic stimulus in U.S. history, following a $2.3 trillion aid bill passed in March. It comes as the pandemic accelerates, infecting more than 214,000 people in the country each day. More than 317,000 Americans have already died.
Read more at : US Congress reaches deal on $900 bn Covid-19 stimulus package
Read more at : US Congress reaches deal on $900 bn Covid-19 stimulus package
1/2/20
Turkey - Libya relations: Turkish parliament backs govt plan to send troops to Libya in emergency session
The Turkish parliament has voted to approve a plan to send
troops to support the UN-recognized government in Libya as it continues
to fight forces loyal to a rival government in the eastern part of the
country.
The plan was opposed by Turkey's main opposition party, the Republican Peoples’ Party (CHP), which said sending troops could aggravate the situation and embroil Ankara in another conflict.
Read more: Turkish parliament backs govt plan to send troops to Libya in emergency session — RT World News
5/21/19
Indonesia: The incumbent moderate President wins second term election Commission decides
Indonesia's incumbent president wins 2nd term, election commission says
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