Why Are The Troops Not Being Supplied With Basic Necesities?

[K8-EEE]

Last year I started sending stuff to a few people stationed in Iraq, who posted requests on Books For Soldiers.

Last year it was all books, magazines, DVDs, CDs and the like. Now I notice that the requests are becoming more and more for insect repellant, shower shoes (their showers sound gross, they have to stand in scummy standing water!!) headache and cold medicine etc.

What the hell?? Of course I will send what I can but aren't are tax $$ going to companies who are making a lot of money SUPPOSEDLY supplying the troops?

Personally I don't think Halliburton et al should be allowed to profit from all of this; I have a feeling if there wasn't so much money in it for them, we wouldn't BE there!

[TimMooring]

1. Thank You

The cheneybush doesn't give a damn about our soldiers or they wouldn't be there in the first place. Give il Duce the choice between caring and faking, and he'll choose faking it every time. Remember the fine turkey that nobody got to eat at bush international airport? Our soldiers are in a pre 9/11 scenario and bush is moving heaven and earth to protect them - just ask Condi.

[Old and In the Way]

2. We spend $400BB a year on the military. The fact that any of

our soldiers are doing without a reasonable level of support is beyond words. It's criminal.

[agincourt]

3. Irag is a corporate fief,

Bushco cares zero about the troops except for the photo-op and to make his cronies rich. Unfortunately a lot of americans don't care about the troops either as they wave their flag from their SUV.

[PA Democrat]

4. My daughter's school is collecting supplies for the troops

The list includes many things that should be supplied to them via that $87 billion appropriations bill. We are sending eye drops, which was one of the requested items on the list.

It absolutely infuriates me that these guys lack even basic first aid supplies. I guess the pigs at Halliburton were too busy counting their profits to think that troops might need basics such as eye drops and sunscreen in a desert environment. And dubya's too busy whoring for campaign cash, "clearing brush", and fishing, to give a damn.

[TimMooring]

9. That 87 billion is already spoken for

A lot of it will wind up in dick "wad" cheney's pocket when he cashes in his 300k plus halliburton options. He says he's going to donate it to a non-profit - something having to do with the Brooklyn Bridge. Their stock has risen over 1000% since the war started. From under 3 to over 30 last time I checked. The "bizness" opportunities are truly unique.

[Tinoire]

13. $37.5 Billion of that has already been ear-marked for mercenaries

for whom you should feel sorry when they eff up and get killed.

Go figure.

Mercenary? $1000/day

Poor dumb GI? $80/day

Yet the poor GI is expected to go haul that mercenary asshole's ass out of safety.

Honestly.

Waffen SS.

[charlie]

5. You mean like bullets?

I'm hearing complaints about shortage of ammo a lot in news accounts and in internet postings from Iraq. All the other stuff is bad enough, but to leave a soldier without bullets is beyond criminal, we'll have sent him/her to the other side of the world to be an easy kill.

[K8-EEE]

6. Cripes -- You're Kidding!!

This whole thing is such a freaking mess, UNBELIEVABLE!! We really need to do something...march on Halliburton? What to do?

This seriously BURNS ME UP. What can we do about it? Sometimes I think Kerry should just use the money he would use for ridiculous political ads and hold drives to send stuff to the troops. It would make people aware of this scam the "suppliers" are pulling and at least be money well spent.

When I think of BushCo spending 100 million plus on fucking stupid TV ads while these people in his damn fiasco are losing weight, getting bit to pieces, OH AND GETTING THEIR ASS SHOT AT EVERY DAY for his evil purposes....GRRRRRRRRRRR!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

[neverborn]

7. Just F*ing infuriating.

[charlie]

8. Here's a couple

of reports I have on hand, I've seen many others like them:

Cpl. Richard Stayskal, a 22-year-old Marine from San Jose, Calif., arrived in Landstuhl Tuesday after being wounded by automatic weapon fire in Ramadi, west of Baghdad.

“I just kind of froze, my body clenched in the fetal position. I fell to the ground," Stayskal said.

Stayskal, a sniper, had been deployed to Ramadi to hunt down a "mad bomber," the unit's name for a man who had been seen planting roadside bombs targeted at U.S. and coalition forces.

With little warning, a group of 15 armed Iraqis descended on the lightly armed unit. The bullet that hit Stayskal ricocheted off his shoulder, through his lung and exited from his back. It came within inches of his heart and major arteries.

Countering the insurgency, Stayskal said, has been difficult for Marines on the ground. In his case, his unit was chronically short of ammunition, and his support unit got pinned down at the same time across town. The two units couldn't help each other.

"They weren't giving us nearly enough ammunition for the situations out there. Everyone was running out. Everyone was grabbing each other's ammunition."

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/4701323/

And this first-person account of a siege shouldn't be missed. Read it in it's entirety if you have the time or save it for later. It's harrowing, stunning, and enraging:

http://www.j-bradford-delong.net/movable_type/2004_archives/000598.html

[strategery blunder]

11. And the same people who tell us to "support the troops"

won't do it themselves...

:grr::grr::grr::grr::grr:
:mad::mad::mad::mad::mad:
:grr::grr::grr::grr::grr:
:mad::mad::mad::mad::mad:
:grr::grr::grr::grr::grr:
:mad::mad::mad::mad::mad:

[rumguy]

10. Well said

and good ideas - Bush is going to spend 100 mill. on ads and there are soldiers without the basics...

Kerry should hold some kind of fund raising drive I like that idea...

[K8-EEE]

12. Yeah....

I really feel he would get more good publicity out of it that those stupid commercials. Every month they could ask for a different thing; tomorrow I am sending SHEETS to a lady soldier over there, WHY DON'T THEY HAVE SHEETS FOR GOD'S SAKE?

[RamboLiberal]

16. Charlie I too have heard of ammo shortages

Do you have some websites you could point me to? I want to send or phone in some info to local liberal talk hosts. Thanks.

[dbt]

14. Kick!

This needs to STAY on the front page, right under Rumsfeld's lizard nostrils.

:grr:
dbt

[rumguy]

15. kick

[Doctor_J]

17. Because it's been privatized

which means that the bottom line is profit, not service. Same reason 43M Americans don't have health care. Halliburton's main job is not to provide for the soldiers - it's to provide for the shareholders.

[Insider]

18. CEOs at Defense Contractors Earn 45% More

--snip--
CEOs at Defense Contractors Earn 45% More
Campaign Contributions Tied to Bigger Contracts

Median CEO pay at the 37 largest defense contractors rose 79 percent from 2001 to 2002, while overall CEO pay climbed only 6 percent, according to a new report from United for a Fair Economy, More Bucks for the Bang: CEO Pay at Top Defense Contractors, by Chris Hartman and David Martin.

Median pay was 45 percent higher in 2002 at defense contractors than at the 365 large companies surveyed by Business Week magazine. The typical U.S. CEO made $3.7 million in 2002, while the typical defense industry CEO got $5.4 million.
--snip--
Compared with an army private’s pay of $19,585, the average CEO at a major defense contractor made 577 times as much in 2002, or $11,297,548. This is also more than 28 times as much as the Commander in Chief’s salary of $400,000.
--snip--
The 37 companies included in the CEO pay study were all the publicly-traded corporations with at least $1 billion in total defense contracts from 2000 through 2002. The list includes well-known defense contractors like Lockheed Martin, Boeing, Raytheon, Northrop Grumman, and General Dynamics, as well as some companies not usually associated with military spending, such as FedEx and Dell Computer. Compensation was defined as salary, bonus, “other compensation,” restricted stock awards, long-term incentive payouts, and the value realized from the exercise of stock options.
--snip--
http://www.stw.org/press/2003/MoreBucksForBang_pr.html

[Insider]

19. War Millionaires

--snip--
In 1940, on the eve of America’s entry into World War II, President Roosevelt warned, “I don’t want to see a single war millionaire created in the United States as a result of this world disaster.”

Fast-forward 60 years. It is early April 2003, and American soldiers are fighting their way toward Baghdad. The New York Times asks retired general Jay Garner what he likes about his new job as CEO of defense contractor SyColeman. “Most of the guys are former military,” Garner replies. “And you make a lot of money.”

Well. It seems that times have changed since FDR. Garner’s remark went largely unnoticed, even as the retired general took temporary leave from his corporate job to become the Bush administration’s viceroy in Baghdad. We don’t hear phrases like “war millionaires” much anymore, certainly not from our presidents.

Of course, Jay Garner is hardly the only one who has cashed in on the U.S. government’s increasingly bellicose foreign policy. The defense biz is positively crawling with war millionaires, namely the CEOs who head up the corporations that build the planes, ships and tanks for the Pentagon.
--snip--
http://www.pww.org/article/articleprint/3528

it's not the defense department anymore. it is the war department again.

[KG]

20. the outsourcing of logistics.

used to be soldiers kept soldiers supplied, now its been handed over to halliburton and friends.

which group do you think would work harder to keep vital supplies flowing?