The Gadfly Likes Ike Cuz' Ike Was Right . . . . .

Infuriating to say the very least:

Head Start programs will eliminate services for 57,265 children in the coming school year thanks to sequestration’s automatic, across-the-board spending cuts, according to new government data collected from individual programs. California, Texas, and New York will cut the largest number of spots, at 5,611, 4,410, and 3,847, respectively. Nineteen states and Puerto Rico will cut off services to more than 1,000 children.

The cuts also mean the reduction of 1.3 million calendar days at centers across the country. About 18,000 hours will be cut by centers that are dealing with reduced funding by starting days later or ending earlier. Some programs are also eliminating bus services, and children whose parents don’t have reliable transportation may not be able to attend.

The cuts will also impact Head Start staff. More than 18,000 employees will experience lay offs or reduced pay.

http://thinkprogress.org/economy/2013/08/19/2487691/sequestration-57000-children-head-start/


All the more so because of this:

As the U.S. prepares to withdraw troops from Afghanistan, the government watchdog charged with overseeing nearly $100 billion in contracts to reconstruct the country has found almost $2 billion in potential waste, fraud and abuse in the last three months alone — some of which has likely led to the deaths of American servicemen and women, according to the agency’s reports.

The string of alleged violations includes phantom projects, improperly awarded contracts, aborted projects, deserted construction, a general lack of transparency to comprehensively oversee projects and, in one instance, building a $34 million military facility that will never be used.

http://www.wired.com/dangerroom/2013/07/afghanistan-audits-reveal-billions-in-u-s-taxpayer-waste/



We can't afford to help some poverty stricken kids get a foot up in life, but we can afford to piss a couple of $ billion down a black hole propping up our ever so wonderful war machine in Afghanistan over the past 3 months (which equates to around $8 billion a year in unaccounted taxpayer money)?  Really?

You know - The Gadfly truly, desperately wants to be proud of his country and is so in some respects.  But when you read stuff like this, and you know that it does not have to be this way, and that the political and corporate elites of this country could remedy this shit if they wanted to, it truly does, at times, test your faith as to whether you are on the right side and cheering for the right people.


----TFG