Bill Moyers Journal on PBS is a great show. It actually goes into issues in understandable terms and cuts right to the heart of the matter. This week's episode has two great segments.
In Earmark Reform?, Moyers explores the congressional process of adding funding to bills without debate. It used to be an exception (and even was anonymous) and in the last 10 years it's become common practice and costing us billions.
Seven members of Congress earmarked ten additional C-17s, the big cargo aircraft for $2.4 billion. It was not requested by the Pentagon. And the members of Congress who requested it all had a local vested interest in it. In 2005, "most earmarks went to defense spending ... tax payer's dollars delivered without competitive bidding".
'In 1996 there were 300 earmakrs attached to the Federal Budget...By 2006 there were 12,000. there are now - get this - 32,684 earmark requests up for approval in the House of Representatives."
"When Democrat Nancy Pelosi was elected Speaker of the House in January, she put earmark reform on the agenda. She's called for cutting the number in half. And the House has now approved new rules: Members must put their names on each earmark; they must disclose the beneficiary and purpose of the earmark; they must declare that they and their spouses have no financial stake in the project; and earmarks must be open for public inspection. But this transparency is still opaque." It's not posted on the internet, you can go to an office and read the paper and take notes but not make copies or take pictures. Sounds the same as a hearing without a transcript to me.
The next segement was on Al Qaeda and Iraq. "Who exactly is the enemy in Iraq and how does Al Qaeda fit in? Bill Moyers talks with West Point Instructor, Brian Fishman, and Middle Eastern and International Affairs Professor Fawaz Gerges, discussing the growing power of Al Qaeda and its connections to the war in Iraq."
FAWAZ A. GERGES: Bill, most of the insurgents and resistance fighters in Iraq have nothing to do with al Qaeda. In my interviews with the insurgents or resistance leaders in Iraq, basically they tell me al Qaeda is liability. al Qaeda-- al Qaeda represents a liability. Bill, there is civil war taking place today in Iraq-- Between some of the Sunni tribes, Iraqis, and al Qaeda. And we are arming some of the Sunni tribes. And the larger argument about Iraq, in fact, if we succeed in convincing Iraqi public opinion and the larger Muslim public opinion that we are genuine, I mean, about leaving Iraq, this is where the beginning of the end of al Qaeda. That is, in fact, Iraqis are the only competent agents who can defeat al Qaeda. We are telling the administration, "Mr. President, you have a larger problem on your hands. And the larger problem is that your strategy, your-- your-- by being in Iraq, you are fueling the insurgency in Iraq. You are providing al Qaeda with motivation. You are radicalizing mainstream Arab and Muslim public opinion. Convince them that we will be out in a year or two and begin the process of fighting al Qaeda."
BRIAN FISHMAN: I don't disagree. The only solution in Iraq is a political solution. [Agreement between the Sunnis and the Shiites and the other] And between different Shiite factors, between different Sunni factions. And it's absolutely true. I am more hopeful that however the United States leaves in Iraq, al Qaeda will not be able to build a base there precisely of what Fawaz was saying. That not-- the Sunni community in Iraq wants nothing to do with them. These are people coming in trying to tell them what to do. And they want to run their own affairs rather than have al Qaeda impose-- or al Qaeda inspired groups is probably a better way to say it-- try to impose their vision of religious law.
Honestly, the whole conversation is as good as the above. Watch it on PBS or the website has both the video and a transcript of each episode.
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