http://www.mercurynews.com/mld/mercurynews/news/politics/12927303.htm
"WASHINGTON - (KRT) - The chief Pentagon agency in charge of investigating and reporting fraud and waste in Defense Department spending in Iraq quietly pulled out of the war zone a year ago - leaving what experts say are gaps in the oversight of how more than $140 billion is being spent.
The Defense Department's inspector general sent auditors into Iraq when the war started more than two years ago to ensure that taxpayers were getting their money's worth for everything from bullets to meals-ready-to-eat.
The auditors were withdrawn in the fall of 2004 because other agencies were watching spending, too. But experts say those other agencies don't have the expertise, access and broad mandate that the inspector general has - and don't make their reports public.
That means that the bulk of money being spent in Iraq doesn't get public scrutiny, leaving the door open for possible waste, fraud and abuse, experts say..."
This only adds evidence to the belief that we are just throwing our money into the pockets of Halliburton and other war profiteers. As taxpaying Americans, we have the right to know how our money was spent on Bush's war.
Also.........
This administration is turning its back on our veterans. They are willing to send our troops to die or lose a limb, but when the troops come back, they face a multitude of problems. http://www.csmonitor.com/2005/1018/dailyUpdate.html
See this link for info on how cuts are being made to veterans' benefits....http://www.iht.com/getina/files/283270.html
The Veterans Affairs Department is currently reviewing approximately one-third of the cases of U.S. veterans who are receiving disability benefits for post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD). After conducting an internal study, the VA believes that they were too lenient in deciding which soldiers were eligible for PTSD benefits.
Last year, the VA spent $4.3 billion on PTSD disability payments and the VA hopes to reduce these payments by revoking PTSD benefits for many veterans. This will be the final insult to soldiers who were asked to fight an unjust war in Iraq under false pretenses.
Owing to the war in Iraq and Afghanistan, the number of veterans receiving compensation for PTSD has increased by almost 80 percent in the past five years. By comparison, the number of veterans receiving compensation for all other types of disabilities increased by only 12 percent. Under the guidelines of the current review, soldiers who cannot prove that a specific incident, known as a "stressor," was sufficient to cause PTSD will have their benefits revoked. Given the nature of warfare in Iraq and Afghanistan, it's not surprising that many returning soldiers are suffering from mental illness.
In the July 2004 issue of the New England Journal of Medicine Colonel Charles W. Hoge, M.D., chief of psychiatry at Walter Reed Army Institute, published a preliminary study of the effects of the war in Iraq and Afghanistan on military personnel. The study concluded that close to 20 percent of soldiers who served in Iraq, and approximately 12 percent of those who served in Afghanistan returned home suffering from PTSD. The study found that there is a clear correlation between combat experience and the prevalence of PTSD. It determined that "rates of PTSD were significantly higher after combat duty in Iraq."
