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Anyone who has been following my rants about the Pentagon knows that I am suspicious about where the money is going. Congress has never failed to come up with the money requested by the Pentagon, but that money is not being spent for body armor, or up-armoring vehicles as assumed by Congress. If it were there wouldn’t be any complaints.

Jillian of skippy the bush kangaroo and The Snarky Cat sent me a note about this Defense Tech article which is pushing me towards X Files territory.

If Air Combat Command is cutting its training flight schedule by 60% during a time of “war” for budgetary reasons, given the increased Defense Budget, and the special appropriations for the operations in Iraq and Afghanistan, somebody is lying like hell. In excess of a quarter-billion dollars is real money even in the Defense Department. This isn’t a misplaced decimal point.

What is going on in the Pentagon? Where is the Congressional oversight? WHERE IS THE MONEY?

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It doesn’t get any easier in a military town:

The local Memorial Day service was dedicated to the memory of two young local men who were killed in Iraq while serving with the Marine Corps during the week before the service.

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The Special Operations Command will hold a memorial at Hurlburt Field Friday for the four airmen who died when an Iraqi Air Force plane crashed this week North of Baghdad.

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Liz at Blonde Sense presents the 1969 Steppenwolf classic:

Monster

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James Wolcott via One-Man Wrecking Crew points to Wreck It and Run by William S. Lind.

Lind notices the similarity between corporate raiders who take over a company, loot its assets, and then leave as it collapses with what Rumsfeld is doing at the Pentagon.

Enlistments are well down, damaged equipment is not being repaired, and needed equipment is not being purchased. Rumsfeld is pursuing his vision of a “new, more cost efficient military” and couldn’t be bothered with reality. Remember: Rumsfeld didn’t even bother to interrupt his meeting when an airliner slammed into the Pentagon on 9/11/01. If it isn’t part of his plan it doesn’t exist.

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One of the major problems for the environment in the state of Florida is the number of invasive species that get introduced by idiots who think something “would look cute”.

We have plants that don’t belong crowding out the native species, insects that don’t belong eating everything in sight, and animals that don’t belong wandering free.

I fought a battle with Muscovy ducks a couple of years ago that showed the basic weakness in the state and Federal system.

The ducks were breeding like crazy and “eliminating” on everything in sight. I called Animal Control and was told they were “migratory waterfowl” and the problem of the Federal Fish and Wildlife Commission. The Feds said that the ducks were imported [Brazil] domesticated animals and not their problem. Animal Control bounced back with the claim that since they had been determined to be domesticated animals and on my property, I probably needed licenses for them.

In the end, I located and destroyed nests wherever I could find them and trapped adults and gave them to a sanctuary after the local Oriental restaurant refused to put them on the menu. [I can’t serve those ducks. Those ducks are dirty. Those ducks eat cat food. No one will pay for a duck that eats cat food.]

So I appreciate the dilemma of these people: Peacocks Swarm Couple’s Florida Home. No one will help them, even though the birds don’t belong in Florida.

Deport the birds! It’s not like they came from Cuba and vote Republican. Let’s close our borders to these aliens.[/rant]

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