When It Comes to Wasteful Pentagon Spending, Congress Offers Little Oversight

Share

Radioactivity with Rob Lorei

Listen Here:

Or follow this link and select 01/23/20 from the drop down menu:

https://staging.wmnf.org/events/radioactivity/

Intro:

On Radioactivity today we’ll look at one area of government spending which gets little scrutiny.  For several years now President Trump has claimed that he “rebuilt” the US military- implying that it had been underfunded during the Obama years. In his first year in office President Trump claimed the US military had been “depleted” under President Obama. (Source: https://www.reuters.com/article/us-usa-trump-budget/trump-seeks-historic-u-s-military-spending-boost-domestic-cuts-idUSKBN1661R2

US military spending (in recent times) actually peaked in 2011 under President Obama when you use dollars adjusted for inflation.
Our guest is Mandy Smithberger, the director of the Center for Defense Information at the Project On Government Oversight. In a recent article written for the progressive website TomDispatch (http://www.tomdispatch.com/blog/176653/
She makes the case that millions in recent military spending has been wasted and that neither political party conducts enough oversight of wasteful spending. She points out  the Pentagon has close ties to private military manufacturing and contracting firms, creating a revolving door between companies that profit from war and the government agencies responsible for oversight of those companies.

Leave a Reply

  • (will not be published)

XHTML: You can use these tags: <a href="" title=""> <abbr title=""> <acronym title=""> <b> <blockquote cite=""> <cite> <code> <del datetime=""> <em> <i> <q cite=""> <s> <strike> <strong>

You may also like

student meal
Next school year Hillsborough public schools are offering free meals

Hillsborough Public Schools are offering students free meals for the...

Correspondence Through Poetry. A Mind-Numbing Week.

Father Verses Sons: A Correspondence in Poems by Herbert Gold...

The sound of change: Music’s influence on anti-war and human rights movements

Throughout history, music has served as a powerful catalyst for...

a man in a tye dye shirt talking on a radio microphone
Recreational pot for Florida is on the ballot this fall—let’s talk about it

In four months, Florida voters have the opportunity to vote...

Ways to listen

WMNF is listener-supported. That means we don't advertise like a commercial station, and we're not part of a university.

Ways to support

WMNF volunteers have fun providing a variety of needed services to keep your community radio station alive and kickin'.

Follow us on Instagram

The Skinny
Player position: