Expectations, Not Great

The 114th Congress is meeting and we can all be thankful that it is also the shortest one in history. No American works less than the US House of Representatives and, now that the Republicans are in control, we might want to celebrate this. The two sides just passed a non-binding federal budget (wasting more tax payer dollars for nothing), promising deep cuts in (guess what?) and increases in (guess where?). 

"The Republican-authored plan would eliminate deficits by 2024 through deep cuts to social programs while increasing military spending by nearly $40 billion next year."1

Nothing new here; Republicans love to take food from Grandma to give to the Pentagon, who has already agreed it needs reductions. Why do we spend 3-4 times as much as the nearest country? I can only conclude it's to feed the war machine (i.e., corporations selling to the Pentagon).

2

In the meantime, the Pentagon admitted it lost $500 million in US weaponry to Al-Queda. 3 If I worked at a company and lost $500 million, I'm pretty sure I wouldn't get more money to lose. I kind of think I'd be tossed out on my keester....I wonder if they're hiring at the Pentagon....

Sources
1. Reuters, April 30, 2015, http://www.reuters.com/article/2015/04/30/usa-budget-idUSL1N0XR40U20150430.  
2. Wikipedia, http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_military_expenditures.
3. DailyKos, March 19, 2015, http://www.dailykos.com/story/2015/03/19/1371828/-The-Pentagon-Admits-It-May-Have-Lost-500-Million-in-U-S-Weaponry-To-Al-Qaeda.