Half the Members of an “Independent Panel” Appointed to Study the Quadrennial Defense Review Have Financial Ties to Defense Contractors
March 1st, 2010Via: USA Today:
More than half of the panel members appointed to review the Pentagon’s latest four-year strategy blueprint have financial ties to defense contractors with a stake in the planning process, a USA TODAY analysis shows.
Congress created the 20-member panel in 2006 to analyze the Defense Department’s four-year plan, known as the Quadrennial Defense Review. Lawmakers called for the committee to provide an independent “alternate view” of the Pentagon’s plan, which shapes future military policy and spending on weapons and other needs.
A dozen of the unpaid panelists were appointed by Defense Secretary Robert Gates and eight by the top Republican and Democrat members of the House and Senate Armed Services committees. Eleven work for defense contractors as employees, consultants or board directors, records show.
“The Pentagon often talks about its cooperation with industry, but this makes you wonder who’s wearing the pants in this relationship,” said Mandy Smithberger, national security investigator for the Project on Government Oversight.
According to the cool book “Voltaire’s Bastards”–that I learned about on Cryptogon– over half the U.S. economy is weapons manufacturing or dealing. You probably couldn’t find 20 people in the U.S. whose livelihoods weren’t principally derived from weapons–excuse me, “defense.” The Nobel “Peace” Prize is funded by interest on weapons manufacturing surplus income. Whatever M. L. King, Jr. did with his prize money, it is statistically certain that a majority of it cycled back into the defense industry. In the U.S.–and in most other countries, per “Voltaire’s Bastards–to live, to eat, is to participate in the defense industry.
It’s okay, because their experts. We must alway defer to experts. Experts should make all our important decisions, because they always know best. It’s okay, because their experts. We must alway defer to experts. Experts should…
Keep saying it until the pain goes away. LOL!
oops, brainfry: “their”s should be “they’re”s. Or so the experts tell me 😉