This ain't Hell, but you can see it from here

Category: “Your Tax Dollars At Work”

  • $20 Million for Art? Pfft. Merely Peanuts.

    I suppose everyone’s heard the recent news about the VA spending $20M on art.  Well, as far as VA “management excellence” goes, it turns out that’s peanuts.

    During the period 2010-2013, the VA began implementation of 15 solar energy projects.  They were projected to take on average of 7 to 12 months, and to all be completed by now.

    I suppose you can guess what’s coming.  And if you guessed “another sterling example of the VA’s excellence in managing the use of its resources” – you’d be right.  (I trust the sarcasm in the previous sentence is obvious.)

    Instead, the projects are taking an average of 42 months to completion.  Further, most aren’t yet fully operational.

    In aggregate, the projects were projected to cost $95M.  So far, the VA has spent approximately $408M – which is “only” 329+% over budget.  And some of the projects haven’t even begun to produce electricity, let alone reach full operating capacity.  In fact, of the 15 projects investigated by the VA OIG only two were operating at design capacity by March of this year.

    The Washington Free Beacon has a good article giving more details.  It’s worth a read.  So is the VA OIG report on the subject (PDF format).  Be forewarned:  both just might p!ss you off.

    “Saving the environment”? Yeah, right.  IMO “political payback using tax dollars” sounds more like it.

  • About That Bomber in Germany . . . .

    Remember the low-life bastard in Germany that Jonn wrote about the other day?  The guy who bombed the Ansbach music festival? You know, the guy from Syria who’d been denied asylum in Germany, but was allowed to remain (presumably temporarily) due to ongoing hostilities in his home nation?

    Yeah, that guy – the guy who blew himself up with a suicide vest at the festival’s entrance.  He ended up killing himself and wounding 12 others in the process.

    Well, guess what. According to the Bavarian state’s top security official:

    Syrian who wounded 12, killed self in Germany
    bombing pledged allegiance to ISIS chief

    But don’t worry, folks.  Something like that can’t possibly happen here.  We oh-so-thoroughly check out Syrian and other “refugees” attempting to enter the US.

    Why, we vet them almost as well  as we vet foreign-born spouses of US citizens who are applying for a visa.

  • Oh, For Cryin’ Out Loud . . . .

    I will be so glad when this moron is finally consigned to the dustbin of history.

    Kerry: Air conditioners as big a threat as ISIS

    Freaking idiot.

  • So, We “Supported Democracy” In Turkey? Yeah. Right.

    Headline pretty much says it all:

    Turkey seizes more than 2,200 institutions
    as post-coup crackdown intensifies
     
    Many of the institutions seized were “social, educational or health-care institutions and facilities”.  The stated reason for seizing them?  “National security.”In a related matter, Turkey has announced it will hire 20,000 teachers to replace those fired in purge which followed the coup’s failure.  During that purge, a total of 13,000 have been jailed; more than 50,000 have been fired from all fields of employment because of being suspected “coup supporters”.

    Oh, and did I mention that 62 of those arrested for treason in Turkey are schoolchildren between the ages of 14 and 17? Or that they’ve issued arrest warrants for 42 journalists linked to a Turkish expatriate living in the US who opposes the current Turkish regime? Well, yeah – both of those are true too.

    But don’t worry.  According to the current      gang of feckeless, naive idiots running US foreign policy      Administration, that’s just the Turkish democratic process at work. Hell, it must be – the President publicly pledged to “support the democratically elected government of Turkey” after the coup failed.

    Meet the new boss
    Same as the old boss

    “Democractic process” my ass.  Here, the “old boss” referenced had the title “Sultan”.

  • Ever Wondered What This Administration Would Do If US Forces Were Attacked?

    Well, we now have an answer.  Apparently Russian aircraft bombed one of our facilities in the Middle East last month.

    Twice.

    So, what did we do?  Apparently, we sent Vladimir Putin et al another “strongly worded protest” concerning Russia’s behavior.

    Seriously.

    After this, I’m thinking that the current administration’s self-assessment of “Most xxxxxxxxxxxxx Administration in history” may well be close to correct.  But in my view, for it to be truly accurate you need to replace xxxxxxxxxxxxx with a different word than they used in describing themselves.

    After all:  “transparent” isn’t a synonym for either “incompetent” or “cowardly”.

  • How . . . Convenient

    Headline says it all.

    FBI didn’t record Clinton interview,
    did not administer sworn oath

    I don’t recommend reading the article if you have blood pressure issues and are having a bad day in that respect.

    “It’s beginning to look a lot like whitewash
    Done this regime’s way . . . .”

     

    (And yes – the omission of the “Government Incompetence” tag for this article was intentional.)

  • Even Stevie Wonder Saw This Coming

    Remember that Iranian Nuclear Deal?  You know, the one that would convince Iran to give up its nuclear ambitions via the “Kumbaya Principle”?  That agreement that was so good it had to remain classified so that the American public wouldn’t know what their leadership was signing up to do?

    Well, the German domestic Intelligence agency recently released a report concerning Iran.  Here’s the BLUF:

    . . . . Iran has a “clandestine” effort to seek illicit nuclear technology and equipment from German companies “at what is, even by international standards, a quantitatively high level.” The findings by the Federal Office for the Protection of the Constitution, Germany’s equivalent of the FBI, were issued in a 317-page report last week.

    So much for “give up its nuclear ambitions”.  I guess the        gang of rank, naïve amateurs and idiots in DC        current Administration never got the memo explaining that the “Kumbaya Principle” is a religious and/or fantasy concept not generally applicable to foreign relations.

    In other “good news”, the same German report indicated that over 1,000 associates of terrorist groups backed by Iran are also living in Germany.  It further goes on to opine that some may be “working on behalf of Iran and other terror-sponsoring states.”

    Gee – ya think?

    So how is Iran funding this effort, you ask?  Well, the nuclear agreement released $100 billion in financial assets that had been frozen after the Iranian Revolution to Iranian control.

    Money is fungible.  You can probably figure it out from there.

    At least Esau got dinner (the proverbial “mess of pottage”) when he sold out.  All the current Administration seems to have gotten when it sold out US security is an “agreement” that even Stevie Wonder could see was worthless and would soon be broken.

    And the American public still doesn’t know what else in in that agreement.

    Wonderful.  Just freaking wonderful.

  • Same Old Song and Dance, Part II

    Well, we have a new claim by our “illustrious regime” in DC.  They now claim that they know why their past attempts to support that mythical “moderate” Syrian opposition during the Syrian Civil War failed.

    They now claim that US support failed because it was sabotaged.

    Seriously.

    Specifically, the latest       attempt to grasp at straws         blatant propaganda designed to shift blame         claim is that CIA  aid to those mythical “moderate” Syrian rebels was diverted by “dirty Mideast intel”.   Allegedly, Jordanian intelligence redirected a substantial part of the aid intended for those mythical “moderate” rebels in Syria to Daesh.

    They also admit that corruption within the Syrian opposition was also partly to blame.  They had no choice but to do that; that’s already too well publicly documented.

    Why would Jordan do that, you ask?  Well, as the story goes:  because “Jordan’s biggest enemy is anything Shia” – and Daesh was opposing Iran.

    Gee.  A foreign nation looking out for its own interests.  Ya think that might happen on occasion?

    And corruption within the shadowy world of intel?  Oh, no! That implies that intel is sometimes a “dirty” endeavor!  This is big news!  Stop the presses!

    Hmm.  Ya think that maybe corruption might happen on occasion too?  Especially in the Middle East?  Or in the shadowy world of intel?

    At the risk of sounding “insensitive”:  both of those possibilities are so obvious that even Stevie Wonder can see them.

    These        inane tall tales        dubious claims by the Administration IMO show one of two things.  First, and IMO most likely:  they’re simply dissembling in an attempt to redirect blame for failure.

    And second:  if by some miracle that’s not the case and they’re telling the truth, then this fiasco shows a near-childlike level of incompetence and naïvety.  I mean really:  given how “steadfastly” we’ve supported our allies recently, did they really not expect Jordan to “look out for number one”?  Were they so foolish that they disregarded the possibility of corruption in pretty much ANY organization in the Middle East?

    And to add insult to injury:  either way,  they’re also throwing a valuable ally “under the bus” in the process.  We seem to have gotten quite good at that lately, too.

    GMAFB.  If they didn’t take measures to detect/correct diversion of support to support an ally’s agenda and limit corruption, then IMO they are literally incompetent fools.  But given what I’ve seen in the past from this Administration, I can easily believe that could well be the case.

    Hell, given this        ridiculously naïve and grossly incompetent clown krewe running the show        Administration I personally believe both deliberate mendacity and abysmally naïve incompetence played a part in creating this latest fairy tale.  No, I don’t have proof that’s the case.  But it simply fits.

    Once again, I think my leg’s wet.  And it hasn’t started raining yet.