The Pentagon just failed its 6th financial audit in a row, and they can’t account for BILLIONS of dollars that they’ve spent. This comes as President Biden is prepared to ask for nearly $900 billion for the agency next year. Mike Papantonio & Farron Cousins discuss more.
Transcript:
*This transcript was generated by a third-party transcription software company, so please excuse any typos.
Mike Papantonio: The Pentagon just failed it’s sixth financial audit in a row, and they can’t account for billions that they’ve spent, they don’t even know where it is. This comes as President Biden is prepared to ask for nearly $900 billion for the Pentagon. You know what really chaps me about this is their attitude. Their attitude is so what? They call their last audit a success, even though they, it showed that it lost billions of dollars. That was a big success for us. I can’t even get my arms around it. Oh, here it is. I gotta read this. And I want you to take over. Sabrina Singh is with the Pentagon. She’s press secretary. She says, we keep getting better and better at it. Yeah. Better and better at losing money, at stealing money, at leaving money all over the world that we don’t even know. What about the taxpayer who has to pay for that? And they’re just unaccountable.
Farron Cousins: But they’re getting better and better at it.
Mike Papantonio: They’re getting better and better.
Farron Cousins: We lost less money this year, I guess, than we had the year before, but we don’t even know that because they didn’t exactly say. But this is becoming a yearly tradition at this point for this $900 billion organization, extension of the defense industry, that they just don’t know where their money’s going. Or it’s either they don’t know or they don’t want us to know. And that’s the part of it that we really need to be able to get answers to. And I’m afraid we’ll never get those answers. Is this, are we being run by these absolute buffoons?
Mike Papantonio: They’re total, they’re total.
Farron Cousins: Or is it intentional?
Mike Papantonio: No, it’s the weapons. There’s the weapons industry part of it. You know, they’re all making these lateral moves. I’m gonna leave the Pentagon and then I’m gonna go to work for Boeing. I’m gonna leave the Pentagon and go to work for Raytheon. That’s what this is all about. So they spread money out to the weapons folks because once you give them 900 billion frigging dollars, you lose control over it. As a taxpayer, we don’t have any say at that point. And they do whatever they want. Listen to this. The attitude is what absolutely kills me. Here’s a reporter asked the Pentagon spokesman, what the hell? And they say, Singh, her name is Singh, said that she can’t predict the future of when they’re gonna make a good audit or when there’s gonna be an audit that actually shows they haven’t lost billions of dollars. But she said, I’ll let you know when it happens. That’s their attitude. Now, can you imagine such disregard for American taxpayers and American voters to where you become such an institution that Eisenhower warned us about so long ago, and John F. Kennedy even warned us about it so long ago. And he says, it’s gotten so outta control that we just give them money for whatever they want, huh?
Farron Cousins: Yeah. I mean, if you had those kind of comments coming from the leader of the FDA, the leader of the Department of Education, or OSHA, any other government department, it’s gonna be all over the national news with this person treating reporters like crap. Acting like losing billions is no big deal.
Mike Papantonio: Like it’s a joke.
Farron Cousins: But because it’s the Pentagon, the only place you’re gonna find it, the Intercept, obviously, is where this came from. But you’re not seeing this all over MSNBC or CNN or Fox.
Mike Papantonio: Oh no. And tell ’em why. Tell tell ’em why.
Farron Cousins: Because the people taking this money are their advertisers.
Mike Papantonio: That’s right. And not only that, they’re not only the advertisers, but MSNBC understands that if we can give them access, if we can have all these Pentagon talking heads on our show and let them spout their propaganda, that access is gonna end up with advertising dollars. Clearly the Pentagon understands if we and the weapons industry understands if we spread that money out with MSNBC, CNN and Fox, then we’re gonna have every juggle head that wants to talk military propaganda is gonna be allowed on the show. And it’s just shameless, man. I mean, it’s absolutely shameless. But the attitude is like that because there is no consequence. What are the consequences? When’s the last time there’s been any consequence for saying, oh, by the way, we don’t know where almost a trillion dollars is, but we’ll let you know when we find out.
Farron Cousins: Yeah. Go ahead and write your check for $900 billion for us for next year too.
Mike Papantonio: And Biden says, yeah, that’s what I wanna do.
Farron Cousins: Well, and every member of Congress says.
Mike Papantonio: Says yeah.
Farron Cousins: Except Bernie. He’ll speak out about it. But listen, it’s not just about, by the way, getting the Pentagon officials onto the air. We’ve got active war zones around the world right now, and they get to send their reporters with that Pentagon protection. So they don’t wanna lose access to having that reporter on the ground in Ukraine.
Mike Papantonio: The embedded reporter as if they give.
Farron Cousins: Exactly.
Mike Papantonio: And right now, it’s the only thing keeping CNN alive.
Farron Cousins: It is.
Mike Papantonio: Zucker destroyed CNN to the point to where after a war’s over, they’re gonna go the way of CNN, which is a dismal future. But it’s a sad thing when the attitude is, well, you know, yeah, we lost $900 billion and we won’t pass an audit, but hey, we’ll let you know when we can pass one. What kind of freaking attitude is that, man?