March, 2014 Political Class Insanity, Part 5: Redundant Government Agencies and So Much Wasteful Afghan Spending

This is our fifth and likely last post this month in our monthly series nonpolitical class insanity. Our previous four posts again illustrated that the American political class is inept, wasteful, and unable to provide even basic services and good value for our taxpayer dollars. Insanity is the best word to describe why we as voters keep putting up with such nonsense.

Today’s insanity examples will be a hodgepodge of waste and ineffectiveness from a wide variety of government entities that are operated and led by the worse set of politicians to ever sit in the White house and Congress:

1) According to the Spendopedia website, in July 2013 the U.S. State Department Inspector General (IG) issued a damning audit report of the Bureau of Information Resource Management (IRM) Office of Information Assurance. The overall conclusion is that the bureau, which is supposed to address information security, was wasteful, redundant and needed strict oversight. Specifically:

• The bureau failed to adequately track its $79 million in contracts. 
• The bureau failed to monitor its contracts and provide oversight on its purchases. 
• The bureau’s lacked a mission statement and overall purpose, as well as the fact that other offices within the State Department carried out similar functions. 
• But still, given the overlapping of its function and no defined purpose, it still spent $79 million a year for little added value.
• The agency's leadership and workforce includes 22 full-time employees and 36 contract employees. 
• The report said the agency was “not overseeing contracts effectively” and that “responsibilities…are assigned to individuals without the technical expertise to review the work." 
• The report and analysis offered 32 formal and four informal recommendations for how the agency could improve. 

$79 million wasted for an unneeded and ineffective government bureaucracy. Seems like that $79 million could feed, shelter, and clothe a lot of homeless or suffering Americans, far better uses than what the political class is using it for today.

2) Afghanistan has always been a rich area for government waste and incompetence. According to another Spendopedia report, the United States Agency for International Development (USAID) has financially worked with the Afghan Ministry of Public Health (MoPH) since 2008. The cost of this partnership is valued at $236 million USAID and MoPH which was budgeted under the "Partnership Contracts for Health" (PCH) contract. 

The objective of the contract was to deliver healthcare to local Afghan clinics and hospitals in Afghanistan's 18 provinces. This supports the Ministry's mission is to "improve the health and nutritional status of the people of Afghanistan in an equitable and sustainable manner through quality health services provision[s], advocating for the development of healthy environments and living conditions; and the promotion of healthy lifestyles." 

Nice mission and words, bad implementation. A report from the Special Inspector General for Afghanistan Reconstruction (SIGAR) has revealed rampant fraud and abuse within the program. Specifically:

• The $236 million figure was chosen based on a cost estimate developed by MoPH. The actual projected cost was never validated by USAID and documentation of the calculations were not provided by MoPH. 
• According to USAID internal control standards, a proper assessment should have been made to provide assurance that federal funds would be used as intended. 
• Although there were two assessments made in 2007 and 2008, a review by USAID's IG revealed in November 2010 that these two assessments were not adequate. 
• SIGAR also made the judgment that the two assessments did not meet the standards required by a formal assessment. 
• The report concludes USAID had not verified whether MoPH had taken any steps to remedy these problems or whether PCH was still a responsible program.
• SIGAR recommended the following: 1) USAID cut off funding until the cost estimates could be validated. 2) USAID work with MoPH to develop an action plan to address unaccounted funds. 3) USAID and MoPH return any excess funds to the U.S. Treasury. 

Just another typical government program. Suspicious cost estimates and budgeting, lousy follow up tracking and analysis, and another had scratching instance of why we are spending $236 million in a country that we will soon be leaving and which will revert back to Taliban control when there are tens of millions of Americans without health insurance that could have used the $236 million for their own medical needs.

3) Staying with Spendopedia and Afghanistan, on June 17, 2013, the Pentagon announced it planned to spend more than three-quarters of a billion dollars to buy helicopters and other aircraft for the Afghan Specials Mission Wing. Sounds like a sound military purchase on the surface until you find out that the Afghan aviation team and military had neither the skills nor the number of troops necessary to maintain the equipment. 

The Huffington Post commented on this idiotic use of taxpayer money: "These shortcomings mean the helicopters and fixed-wing aircraft destined for the Afghan Special Mission Wing 'could be left sitting on runways in Afghanistan, rather than supporting critical missions, resulting in waste of U.S. funds.'" The really sad part of the whole affair is that the Pentagon knew that the Afghan military was incapable of maintaining and using the aircraft but the Pentagon went forward with the purchase anyway. Insanity.

SIGAR also got involved in this Afghan spending disaster. Their findings conclude:

• SIGAR’s report concluded that the Afghanistan Special Mission Wing (SMW) lacked the capacity and skills to operate and maintain the existing and planned SMW fleets. 
• The SMW had less than one-fourth of the trained personnel needed to service the aircrafts. 
• SIGAR concluded that even if the Afghans were operating at full strength, NATO had no plan that identified how the SMV would achieve their goals and how they would address problems achieving those goals. 
• The purchases were made before the Afghan Ministry of Defense (MOD) and the Ministry of the Interior (MOI) had agreed on the way the SMW group should be controlled or structured. 
• The Inspector General determined the Pentagon had not developed a plan to transfer the maintenance instructions over to the Afghans and, still performed 50 percent of the maintenance of the helicopters.
• The report noted only seven of the group's 47 pilots were qualified to fly with night vision goggles, a skilled necessary to complete counterterrorism missions.

What a mess. Spending millions of dollars on stuff that could never be used by personnel that were not trained to use it. And knowing ahead of time that was the case makes it even worse.

But lets add insult to injury. The helicopters being bought that were never to be used did not come from an American manufacturer. At least if that was the case you could justify the spending to some degree in that it stayed in country and employed some American workers. But, alas, not true. The money was spent to buy RUSSIAN helicopters from a RUSSIAM manufacturer, Rosoboronexport. 

When the Congress found out about the Russian connection they passed a bill forbidding the purchase. However, the Pentagon went out of its way to do some accounting shenanigans to bypass the Congressional mandate to complete the Russian purchase anyway. Outrageous behavior that I would bet no one got fired over.

That's enough for today and for this month. We are sure to be back next month to continue our review of government insanity in all its forms. Today we found out that we spend tens of millions of dollars on a government agency that is unneeded and unprepared to do its redundant job, we found out how to waste medical resources in a country because the government has not accountability in assessing its own programs, and found that the Pentagon buys military equipment to be used in a foreign land by people untrained and incapable of using the equipment that we bought from Russian sources that will never be used.

Insane, wasteful, and plain stupid behavior by the American political class and the government it operates.

Our book, "Love My Country, Loathe My Government - Fifty First Steps To Restoring Our Freedom And Destroying The American Political Class" is now available at:

www.loathemygovernment.com

It is also available online at Amazon and Barnes and Noble. Please pass our message of freedom onward. Let your friends and family know about our websites and blogs, ask your library to carry the book, and respect freedom for both yourselves and others everyday.

Please visit the following sites for freedom:

Term Limits Now: http://www.howmuchworsecoulditget.com
http://www.reason.com
http://www.cato.org
http://www.robertringer.com/
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=08j0sYUOb5w

By The Numbers: Government and Political Class Incompetence, Part 3 - Unhappy Americans, Happy IRS Party Goers, Retirement Insolvency, and More

This is a third in a series of posts we are doing that look at the state of our country “by the numbers.” Using only the most recent and trustworthy statistics and numbers, we are examining how badly the American class has managed our country’s finances, spending, freedom, and future. Only by understanding the underlying statistics, numbers and realities of the issues facing Americans, can we have any hope of efficiently and effectively resolving those problems.

Unfortunately, as we review the latest numbers and statistics, you will see that our politicians have dug such a hole for this country that it will be very difficult to get out of it in order to save our economy, our democracy, and our future. That is why the overarching theme and proposed solution in all of these post is the need to impose term limits on all Federal politicians. The long term, career politicians in Washington have created this mess and the associated depressing numbers that go with it, they no longer deserve the right to fix what the monster they themselves created.

The first two “by the numbers” posts can be accessed at:

http://www.loathemygovernment.blogspot.com/2013/06/by-numbers-government-and-political_26.html

http://www.loathemygovernment.blogspot.com/2013/06/by-numbers-govenrment-and-political.html

The following continues the “by the numbers ”analysis of our plight:

1) The Harris polling organization recently completed their regular “Happiness Index” poll and it turns out that Americans are not too happy these days, as reported by a June 1, 2013 UPI article:

• The survey of 2,345 U.S. adults surveyed April 10-15, 2013 by Harris Interactive found certain groups, such as minorities, recent graduates and the disabled, trended downward in the last couple of years in their happiness level.
• "Our happiness index offers insight into what's on the minds of Americans today and is a reflection of the state of affairs in our country," Regina Corso, senior vice president of the Harris Poll, said in a statement. "While the attitudes on the economy may be improving, we're seeing that this is not translating into an improvement in overall happiness."
• Relative to the last happiness index poll that was taken in 2011, the latest happiness levels were especially low among the Hispanic-Americans.
• Americans whose incomes were under $50,000 per year were less likely to qualify as very happy relative to 2011, dropping down from 33% to 29% among those earning less than $35,000, and from 35% to 32% among those earning between $35,000-$49,999.
• Those 50 and older were more likely to be very happy than younger people.
• Thirty-two percent of independents voters were less likely to be very happy than members of either the Democratic or Republican parties at 35% each.

Thus, we have both low happiness levels and happiness numbers that are trending downward, not a good sign.

2) Let’s face it, the IRS has been in the news a lot lately on how the organization illegally and immorally targeted political opponents of President Obama when it came to tax matters. But besides shredding the Constitution, the organization has also been very busy wasting taxpayer wealth in a gluttonous, straightforward, old fashioned manner, according to a June 3, 2013 online website article of the Wall Street Journal:

• The IRS spent $50 million on conferences for employees just between 2010 and 2012.
• A single conference in August, 2010 cost the agency a whopping $4 million.
• The agency brought in $135,000 worth of speakers, including a “leadership through art” speaker for $17,000, and distributed baseball tickets and Presidential suites to employees which cost up to $3,500 per night per person.

Destruction of taxpayer wealth and citizens’ freedom, a double IRS whammy against America.

3) A recent report by the trustees that oversee the Social Security and Medicare programs had some very disturbing analyses of the future liabilities of the two organizations:

• Under the current program parameters, the total long term financial liability of the Social Security program is about $23 TRILLION.
• The long term financial liability of the Medicare program is about $43 TRILLION.
• Thus, the total future financial liabilities of just these two government programs is about $66 TRILLION, the equivalent of about four years of the nation’s total GDP.
• The per household share of the total liability is about $574,000 FOR EACH household.

Obviously, if you do a little bit of number crunching like we just did, you see that the future of these two programs is going to end badly. There is just not enough wealth to fund just these two government programs.

And by the way, as we have discussed many times before, taxing the wealthy in this country to cover this liability will not work. Even if you confiscated and liquidated the wealth of America’s wealthiest citizens, a true totalitarian move, it would not come anywhere close to paying off $66 TRILLION in liability.

And these government financial liabilities do not include the current liabilities of almost $17 TRILLION in our national debt today. And our politicians still have no solution or clue on how to resolve these dire numbers and trends.

4) Interesting number $1 billion, nice round number with lots of zeroes. $1 billion of taxpayer wealth could have been used to operate White House tours for over 1,000 years. $1 billion in taxpayer money could be used to give every American household about $9 dollars each, enough for a meal. $1 billion could have created a nice number of American jobs if invested domestically. Who knows how many more cancer research professionals or teachers, or social workers, etc. could be hired for $1 billion.

But we will never know since according to a Forbes article from April 4, 2013, the Obama administration is going to give a Russian helicopter manufacture, Rosoboronexport, $1 billion of American taxpayer money to provide helicopters to the Afghanistan armed forces once the U.S. pulls out most of its troops. The administration took this action on this number even though:

• The National Defense Authorization Act for 2013 expressly prohibits the use of funds to enter into any contracts or agreements with Rosoboronexport.
• During consideration of the Department of Defense Appropriations Act, 2013, the House of Representatives overwhelmingly approved an amendment prohibiting further contracts with Rosoboronexport by a vote of 407-5.
• A strongly worded letter to the administration from ten members of congress pointed the illegality od doing this deal.
• There are perfectly good helicopter manufacturers within the U.S. that should have been given the opportunity to win this contract and should have had the inside track to do so.
• However, this was a no bid contract so they never even got the chance.

$1 billion, a nice round number to flush down the toilet.

So let’s review. Americans are not happy because the numbers in their lives (high unemployment numbers, declining family wealth numbers, high national debt numbers that their family today and in the future will have to pay for, etc.) are not good.

IRS employees are happy because they get to spend millions of dollars on themselves on lavish conferences despite crushing the freedom of speech of Obama’s political opponents.

America’s retirees are not happy since the Federal government and political class have not planned to financially care for the retirement income and medical needs of older Americans.

At least one Russian helicopter manufacturer is happy, and $1 billion richer via the American taxpayer.

Seems like the wrong people are happy and the right people are unhappy. All the more reason to get term limits put in place for all Federal politicians and find people that can reverse the trend of unhappiness and negative numbers and statistics concerning ordinary American citizens that do not work for the IRS or a Russian helicopter company.

Our final “by the numbers” adventure will conclude tomorrow with a devastating look at 40 statistics that conclusively prove that the current members of the American political class have us on a statistical trend that is going to end badly for all of us unless we start doing things dramatically different within our political processes. And we start by dumping out all of the current incumbents in Washington that put us on this downward spiral.

Our book, "Love My Country, Loathe My Government - Fifty First Steps To Restoring Our Freedom And Destroying The American Political Class" is now available at:

www.loathemygovernment.com

It is also available online at Amazon and Barnes and Noble. Please pass our message of freedom onward. Let your friends and family know about our websites and blogs, ask your library to carry the book, and respect freedom for both yourselves and others everyday.

Please visit the following sites for freedom:

http://www.reason.com/
http://www.cato.org
http://www.robertringer.com/
http://realpolichick.blogspot.com
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=08j0sYUOb5w