Participate
in the Holy Innocents Faith and Resistance Retreat/Witness starting on
Thurs., Dec. 27 at 1 PM through Fri., Dec. 28 at noon. People will
gather St. Stephen and the Incarnation Church, 1525 Newton St. NW, WDC
20010. Members of the Atlantic and Southern Life communities and
other peacemaking friends in a time of prayer, reflection and
nonviolent witness to commemorate the Massacre of
the Holy Innocents – past and present. Arrive by 1
PM in order to begin the gathering around 1:30 PM. On
Thursday, reflect on the scriptural passage of the slaughter on
the holy innocents and its meaning for us today. Joan and Don
Wages will share about their journey into nonviolence, how they have tried to
embody nonviolence in their life-style and family living, and the challenges
they have faced. Then plan our nonviolent witness for the next day. And,
as part of the liturgy, listen to and reflect together on Martin Luther King,
Jr.’s Christmas Sermon on Peace that he delivered on Dec. 24, 1967. This
was Dr. King’s final Christmas sermon. In the public witness
at the Pentagon, convey hope for a disarmed world–a
world free of war, nuclear weapons, killer drones, all weapons, racial
hatred, torture, systemic oppression, social inequality and climate
chaos.
Please
bring sleeping bags and bedding for sleeping in the church sanctuary. Also
please bring food for a pot-luck breakfast on December 28. During
this time remember in a special way the Kings Bay Plowshares as they prepare
for their upcoming trial (date still unknown). Liz McAlister, Steve Kelly and
Mark Colville are currently in Glynn County Detention Center in Brunswick,
Georgia. Martha Hennessy, Patrick O’Neill, Clare Grady and Carmen Trotta remain
out on bond and have court mandated electronic monitors, curfews and other
restrictions. Hold in your heart the children and people of Yemen who are
experiencing widespread famine, cholera and death as a result of the ruthless
U.S.-backed Saudi war being waged against them. On December 13, the U.S. Senate
passed a resolution calling for an end to U.S. military and financial support
for this criminal war. This represents the first time in U.S. history the
Senate has voted to withdraw military forces from an unauthorized war using the
War Powers Resolution. However the House narrowly voted to continue U.S.
support, and Mr. Trump has threatened a veto. Contact Art Laffin, Dorothy
Day Catholic Worker: artlaffin@hotmail.com.
Wednesday, December 26,
2018
A Point of Holiday
Agreement: Stop Wasting Money on the Pentagon
Military leaders literally don’t know what they’re doing with
our money, but they want more. People on the left and right have had enough.
commondreams.org/views/2018/12/26/point-holiday-agreement-stop-wasting-money-pentagon
In
this season of (hoped for) peace and goodwill, it’s worth looking for things
our divided country can agree on. And since all of us want to be able to trust
government to spend wisely, we might find common cause in a surprising place:
the Pentagon budget.
When
you think of politicians railing against the Pentagon (if you can think of any)
it might be someone on the left, like Senator Bernie Sanders. That’s why I was
gratified to see Iowa Senator Chuck Grassley take on the Pentagon budget in a
recent op-ed in The New York Times.
It’s a
relatively rare occurrence for a politician of any persuasion to criticize the
Pentagon — but especially for a conservative Republican like Grassley. (That
said, the late Senator John McCain, when he was in the right
mood, could do it with the best of them. And it’s not Grassley’s first rodeo, either.)
The
Pentagon deserves the criticism. Nearly 30 years ago, Congress asked the
Pentagon to complete an audit that could show military leaders knew where our
money was going. This year, the Pentagon finally delivered a result: After
waiting nearly 30 years, the Pentagon failed its first-ever audit.
Even
more disturbing is that Pentagon leaders aren’t the least bit disturbed about
this. Deputy Defense Secretary Patrick Shanahan, the number two official at the
Pentagon, told reporters, “We failed the audit, but we
never expected to pass it.”
If
there’s one thing that could get Pentagon leadership’s attention, it would be
requiring them to pass an audit before they get one more dollar from public
coffers.
There’s
every reason for Pentagon leaders from Secretary of Defense Jim Mattis on down
to be ashamed of this result.
Every
other major government agency has completed and passed an audit during that
time, often many times. If the Pentagon doesn’t know where its money is going,
how can they assure us it’s being put to good use? With a Pentagon budget
of $647 billion this year — not even
counting war costs — the potential for waste and fraud is sky-high.
We
know about a lot of examples of waste — Grassley cited a $14,000 toilet seat as a picture-perfect
example — but there are no doubt countless more that we don’t know about. This
is nobody’s idea of good management.
Grassley
suggests that Pentagon leaders need to step up and earn the trust we give them.
But if they haven’t done it in 30 years, what’s going to change now?
Pentagon
leaders haven’t seen any consequences from their disregard for our nation’s
budget. If there’s one thing that could get Pentagon leadership’s attention, it
would be requiring them to pass an audit before they get one more dollar from
public coffers.
Instead,
the opposite seems to be happening. Congress keeps rewarding the Pentagon with
ever-bigger budgets. The U.S. military budget is more than $200 billion higher
than it was 30 years ago.
And it
continues. Less than a week after calling our current Pentagon budget “crazy,”
President Trump agreed with military leaders that we need
an even larger military budget. And just one day before the failed audit was
announced, a committee tasked by Congress announced that the nation needs
an almost $1 trillion military budget by
2024.
If we
keep going this way, we’re going to waste precious resources that could be used
any number of other ways: creating jobs, fighting the opioid epidemic, building
a health care system that works for all of us, fixing our crumbling roads and
bridges, etc.
Until
they can show they know what they’re doing, the Pentagon should be cut off from
further increases so we can focus resources elsewhere.
So, if
most of the news seems too dicey to talk about over stale Christmas cookies,
try the Pentagon’s failed audit. You might be surprised who you’ll agree with.
This
work is licensed under a Creative Commons
Attribution-Share
Alike 3.0 License.
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of people like you, another world is possible. There are many battles to be
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Lindsay Koshgarian is Research Director at the National
Priorities Project.
Donations can be sent
to the Baltimore Nonviolence Center, 325 E. 25th St., Baltimore, MD
21218. Ph: 410-323-1607; Email: mobuszewski2001 [at] comcast.net. Go to http://baltimorenonviolencecenter.blogspot.com/
"The master class
has always declared the wars; the subject class has always fought the battles.
The master class has had all to gain and nothing to lose, while the subject
class has had nothing to gain and everything to lose--especially their lives."
Eugene Victor Debs
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