Obama’s Afghanistan Experts Stumped on U.S. Death Toll, War Costs During Hearing

The Washington Times ^ | Thursday, December 12, 2103 | Rowan Scarborough

[kristinn]

President Obama’s brain trust on Afghanistan does not know much the U.S. spends on the war each year or the American cost in lost lives on the battlefield.

This embarrassing lack of basic knowledge from State Department and Pentagon experts on Afghanistan at a House hearing Wednesday prompted even a Democrat to say he was stunned.

The setting was the House Foreign Affairs Committee. The Issue: Afghanistan and the transition to fewer U.S. troops post-2014.

The witnesses: James F. Dobbins, State’s special representative to Afghanistan and Pakistan; Donald Sampler, assistant to the administrator, U.S. Agency for International Development, which provides civilian foreign aid; and Michael Dumont, deputy assistant secretary of defense for Afghanistan, Pakistan and Central Asia.

SNIP

According to the Pentagon’s fiscal 2013 budget, it is spending about $88 billion this year to wage the war in Afghanistan. The State Department budget allocates $4.6 billion in aide and operations.

The U.S. has lost the lives of 118 service members this year, according to the website icasualties.org.

[IbJensen]

[Salvavida]

We own this. We point the fingers alot, but it's on us. Except there come a day when conservatives will go to the polls like a religion and their lives depended upon it, this will get worse.

I wish I had the answer on how to change the culture among conservatives so that we move our feet with urgency.

[Nachum]

The list, Ping

Let me know if you would like to be on or off the ping list

http://www.nachumlist.com/

[Diana in Wisconsin]

And do what, FRiend? Our @sshat in Chief has managed to destroy any civilian jobs they COULD return to.

We lost a LOT of senior NCOs and Captains and above when Slick was CIC. (I served under Clinton, Reagan & Bush Sr.)

I’m certain people are not bailing this time around because there’s nothing out there for them, and at least you have three hots and a cot! (Or two hots and a cot and a sack lunch, per our lovely, caring FLOTUS. *SPIT*)

[B4Ranch]

Want a job? Take $2000 and go to any truck driving school. Get your Commercial License and your HAZMAT Card. Then head to the oilfields and tell the manager you’ll work where ever he can find an opening. In two years you’ll be working your tail off making $80K+ a year.

No, it doesn’t matter if you are 40 or 50 years old. The world is screaming for truck drivers. The first six months is tough because you need to learn a lot. If you basically live in the truck for five years, you can damn near retire. Just invest it wisely. That’s how much money there is waiting to be earned.

[Diana in Wisconsin]

I’m only 5’ 1”. I can’t reach the pedals, let alone see over the windshield, LOL!

I have a girlfriend who is an over-the-road trucker; mostly within the state. She loves her life. :)

And, I already had more than 10 years in when Slick showed up. I wasn’t going to quit. I’m no quitter! :)

[cpdiii]

These days, that feeling still exists because they have had to reenlist to stay under his command. I understand that someone might not want to give up a career but when an out and out Communist takes command it is time to get out.

I would rather have loyal Americans in the Army even under Obama. They will do what is right as opposed to unconstitutional orders. It is part of the oath when they are sworn into the service.

[B4Ranch]

Your definition of loyal Americans is probably the same as mine. The Muslim officer who shot up Fort Hood was also considered by many to be loyal. No thank you. I don’t want jihadists, queers of either sex, communists or any socialists protecting my country. I have a difficult enough time with democrats. A divided loyalty is not what I consider necessary for the position.

[Nowhere Man]

I’m working as holiday help in a major department store chain and one of my customers was buying a gift for her son-in-law who is recovering from an IED explosion that hit his Hummer in Afghanistan. He has brain damage and trying to work with it. She is upset we are still there and it is a meat grinder as well as what happened to her son-in-law. We should be out of there, it is turning into a low level, simmering, Vietnam. I keep thinking if Kipling’s “Letters to a Young British Soldier” where not even Queen Victoria’s finest could tame that place. The Russians, as ruthless as they were, could not either. If Victorian England and Soviet Russia could not do it, neither can we. It’s time to cut bait.

[Nowhere Man]

I said, when Zero was elected into the White Hut that I was having difficulty supporting the troops who chose to serve under his command. These days, that feeling still exists because they have had to reenlist to stay under his command. I understand that someone might not want to give up a career but when an out and out Communist takes command it is time to get out.

I'm much in the same boat as you but we need to support them although they are being used by a corrupted administration and now a corrupt country. Even so, I would not want any of my family or friends to join and I'm to the point where I would almost disown them (maybe not quite that far) if they do right now. One of my nieces (I have step-sisters and a step-brother) joined up and we (my father and I) are furious. My father was in the Army, just after Korea, and he tried to talk her out of it.

There are always the militias one can join.

[B4Ranch]

I can understand joining the state National Guard but not the military, in these times. When we get honest America First people back in the WH then we can build a plan to rebuild our military.