Tuesday, August 22, 2006

Support the troops, bitches.


OK, first, there's this (all emphasis added):

[The U.S.] Congress appears ready to slash funding for the research and treatment of brain injuries caused by bomb blasts, an injury that military scientists describe as a signature wound of the Iraq war.

House and Senate versions of the 2007 Defense appropriation bill contain $7 million for the Defense and Veterans Brain Injury Center — half of what the center received last fiscal year...

"Honestly, they would have loved to have funded it, but there were just so many priorities," says Jenny Manley, spokeswoman for the Senate Appropriations Committee. "They didn't have any flexibility in such a tight fiscal year."...

Zitnay asked for $19 million, and 34 Democratic and six Republican members of Congress signed a letter endorsing the budget request.

In other words, the Republican-controlled Congress somehow couldn't squeeze out another $12 million for brain-damaged Iraq war veterans 'cuz, you know, money's tight and all. So what is at the top of their agenda these days? Ah, here we go:

Republican senators have failed to secure enough votes to back a bill that would have permanently repealed estate taxes in the US...

Estate taxes are dubbed an unfair "death tax" by Republicans.

Democrats counter that the tax is fair and that a repeal would cost $1 trillion (£542bn) over 10 years.

The GOP: Because you can never be too rich. Or too fucking callous for words.

3 comments:

Miss Cellania said...

Those veterans are brain-damaged; they probably won't be voting.

Anonymous said...

true cc,

words are superfluous.

Anonymous said...

How will they squeeze out the $4B for softwood?