That should be George W. Bush’s other name-only this guy works in reverse. He steals from the troops and helps the rich.
One of the little noticed news stories at the end of the calendar year was GWB’s pocket veto of the Defense Authorization bill. By execising the pocket veto, it meant that the scheduled 3.5% pay raise for service personnel died with the bill. It also meant that the DOD had no authority to pay bonuses after January 1.
Which created the interesting situation where Federal Civilian employees got a 3.5% raise, but serving military personnel did not. That is because civilian personnel raises were tied into an Omnibus spending bill that was signed by the President on 26 December.
Bush’s objection concerns a little known provision that would reshape Iraq’s immunity to lawsuits, exposing the new government to litigation in U.S. courts stemming from treatment of Americans in Iraq during Saddam’s reign. Even cases that had once been rejected could be refiled.
Funny, he has no objection to serving veterans getting hung with law suits from ex-wives stealing retirement pay-but he’s all up in arms about whether the Iraqis should have to fork over some of their money. Furthermore the way they explained away the lack of the full pay raise THAT BOTH HOUSES OF CONGRESS approved is simply pathetic:
White House spokesman Scott Stanzel said the administration will work with Congress to get the additional pay raise approved and retroactive to Jan. 1 under a reworked bill. He said the bulk of the raise for the troops — 3 percent — is slated to go into effect anyway.
Sounds like a reasonable explanation doesn’t it? Except its not true.
The President released an executive order that authorized a 3.0 % pay raise to be paid. He could have very well authorized the full 3.5% in the executive order and allowed Congress to call him on it-since the raise was in the bill that went to his desk. However, what that ignores is the fact that Bush never wanted a pay raise for service men and women anyway in this budget. His original budget draft had no pay raise in it and one was only added after it became clear that Congress wanted a pay raise for service personnel. After which the 3.0% pay raise was submitted. My favorite barking hound, Dr Chu repeatedly testified that the percentage was more than enough if not too much of a pay raise. Congress recognized that to be the lie it was and passed an additional 0.5% raise. ( Which is still about 3% short of what it really should be…..). In fact he made it clear from the start he and his boss opposed doing the right thing about pay and benefits from the start. “Bush budget officials said the administration ‘strongly opposes’ both the 3.5 percent raise for 2008 and the follow-on increases, calling extra pay increases ‘unnecessary.”
The White House’s policy statement opposed several other Congressional provisions as well, including a death gratuity for civilians who die in support of military operations and benefits for disabled retirees and their survivors.
Can’t afford it? When the country is spending 195 million a day on the war in Iraq? Hell that’s barely two days spending for the safety of Arabs. Trust me, the US can afford it.
However its typical of the way the administration approaches pay and benefit issues. They say all the right things and then when the rubber meets the road-they do exactly the opposite. I’ll bet somewhere, somehow there is an e-mail somewhere from one of Chu’s staffers recommending that the 0.5% be ignored by the President. Can’t prove that to be sure-but it is the kind of thing that they have had no problem doing before.
So tell me again-who supports the troops?
