I can't stand much more of this.
Frowning takes 68 muscles.
Smiling takes 6.
Pulling this trigger takes 2.
I'm lazy.
Posted on 11/18/2010 11:20:53 AM PST by Jet Jaguar
ARLINGTON, Va. — The Obama administration is considering creating a unified national security budget that would combine elements of the State Department and U.S. Agency for International Development with the Pentagon, according to a draft copy of a long-awaited foreign policy strategy review shared with Congress this week.
Citing the joint planning required between U.S. military and civilian agencies in Iraq and Afghanistan, the proposal is one of several that would put the U.S. diplomatic corps and its lead global humanitarian agency on a stronger national security footing, according to a draft of the State Department’s first-ever Quadrennial Diplomacy and Development Review, or QDDR.
Secretary of State Hillary Clinton ordered the review last year to be modeled after the Pentagon’s four-year review, intended as a strategic guide for appropriators. It is part of an ongoing White House-led effort to link development and national security.
“To advance American interests and values and to lead other nations in solving shared problems in the 21st century, we must rely on our diplomats and development experts as the first face of American power,” Clinton said in the introduction of a “consultation draft” version leaked to The Washington Post this week. “We must lead through civilian power.”
Ultimately, USAID and the State Department should “embrace conflict prevention and response as a core mission,” the document says. It calls for the U.S. to build a “deployable civilian surge capability” and create an “Overseas Contingency Operations” spending account for State and USAID’s budgets, referring to the Pentagon account known under President George W. Bush as the “Global War on Terror.”
The idea of combining budgets has been floated for decades in foreign policy circles as an effort to give foreign aid and development spending, historically unpopular in Congress, all the political clout and cover fire of defense spending.
But in nearly a decade at war, in the absence of an army of civilian aid workers, U.S. combat troops increasingly performed development and humanitarian work, such as building schools and delivering food. Those tasks are considered vital to the counterinsurgency goal of winning local allegiances.
Seeking relief for troops, Defense Secretary Robert Gates has made more than dozen public appearances with Clinton in two years, calling on Congress to fully fund the civilian budget for transitioning from military to civilian control in Iraq and Afghanistan.
Instead, congressional committees have cut those budgets in spending bills still awaiting passage this year.
He needs cover to continue to give money to his friends like Hamas (already the recipient of $900M US taxpayer dollars given to Gaza).
This is a terrible idea that should be summarily rejected.
Well, if I were part of those tertiary “feel good” functions I would be all for it. The DoD has a big budget to tap into that can be used to buy tractors for African villages etc.......
Great way to funnel defense dollars into foreign aid to whoever is calling themselves a Palestinian today.
Seems to me this would establish purpose for “comprehensive spending bills” in the house that otherwise, and rightfully are targeted by the GOP to break habits.
National Security Strategy ping.
The list, ping
Let me know if you would like to be on or off the ping list
Yup, makes sense. Consolidate the two and place them at the discretion of one man Ibn Hussein Barrack, GWHJ (Grand White House Jihadist).
<walks away muttering>
So money needed to maintain our strong military will instead go into the pockets of the corrupt leaders of our enemies, in the name of “humanitarian aid”?
That can’t be good....
Then again, NOTHING this ass hat in DC does is any good. He SO needs to be stopped....God help us.
He cannot do this without the House... and we will burn the House down if they do it.
LLS
Ping
ding, ding, ding...
We have a winner.
I can't stand much more of this.
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