President Obama Takes on Contracting Reform, Derides “Cable Chatter” (Again)

“Citing a recent study of 95 Pentagon projects with cost overruns totaling $295 billion”
I’m not sure where the numbers come from. The defense budget is 571 Billion total per year, how can you have 500 billion in contracts and 295 Billion in cost overruns? Thats nearly 2/3′rds of the defense budget. Something is amiss.

I would love to see my small business get a government contract, but I’m not holding my breath now that Obama has promised it. I’m sure he’ll be breaking this promise in the next day or two and we’ll find that one of his cronies is looking for a government contract and so is “the exception” to the general rule.

Bend over America. He didn’t “inherit” this fiscal mess. He voted for it!!!

Sen. Claire McCaskill, D-Mo is heading the defense contracting project. She was the Missouri State Auditor for many years. She was also the proseuting attorney in Kansas City. McCaskill is a great selection for the project.
Obama is correct about the cable chatter, which can be very damaging.
Everyone wants to complain about the deficit, but no one wants to pay more taxes. The special interest groups and lobbyist are continuing to control Congress.

I just pulled up the Defense Budget for 2008 from the Office of Secretary of Defense (OSD) and it shows a total budget of 606 Billion. Last I looked, defense contracts come out of OSD, and thus out of that budget.
Where’s this extra 500 Billion and 295 Billion in cost overruns coming from?

Well, how is it that the budget is still at a record high. We’re cutting but the numbers keep rising year after year after year. Washington = Fantasy Land. Not even Disney can compete.

“by any measure, my administration inherited a fiscal disaster; when we walked in the door, we found a budget deficit of $1.3 trillion, the largest in American history.
———–
Obama has managed to quadruple the deficit with wasteful, non-stimulative, earmarks, pork, special interest and patronage spending.
In spite of the Whitehouse assault on Jim Cramer, and others who dare to question him, every move he makes causes the market to dive further.
Obama is pouring gasoline on a fire, and claiming innocence when that fire turns into an inferno.
Obama in a few short weeks has spent more than was spent in the entire history of the US budget. The total would not be reached if we spent a million dollars a day starting in year one, through today in 2009.
He is corrupt and will cause more damage than we will ever recover from.
Debt quadrupled in a few weeks from an 8 year Bush debt, so don’t start screaming Bush, Bush Bush.
Spending that Obama’s own congressional budget office, hired by Nancy Pelosi tells us will make this financial crisis much worse before it can recover.
Flat out Obama lying claiming there are no earmarks or wasteful spending.
The proof is in the pudding.
He is a disaster and needs to go. An historic record has indeed been set.

I wonder, is there any mention of the contracts that go to subsidiaries of foreign companies (i.e., ltd’s)?

It is funny that he would pinpoint the Military for particular attention.
The greatest number of ‘overrun dollars” occurs with government construction budgets.
Those, however, are Union controlled, meaning democrat controlled.
One of the worst examples is and earmark by Teddy Kennedy for about 7 miles of underground tunnel construction.
By the time it was done, over almost 2 decades it ended up costing over 2 billion dollars a mile.
Now does anyone believe that money did not end up lining mainly union and democrat official projects? Daley and Blagojevich are naive compared to Kennedy’s ability to suck up dollars.
But of course, Obama singles out the military for criticism. Another attempt to demonize them indirectly.
Obama’s own party, prominent democrat senators such as Evan Bayh are beginning to speak out against all this.
This contract issue is small peanuts compared to the overt wasteful spending of this adminstration.

“Because the $571 billion is just operating costs for the military, like pay for soldiers/sailors, fuel, food, ammunition and any other operating costs.”
Actually that’s not completely true. The defense budget is the yearly authorization of funding for the whole of DoD. New appropriation bills (like the Iraq bill), has to be added by congress later. Most of the R&D for defense goes through DARPA budget, which isn’t only defense, it includes science etc.
So we are talking different pots of money here.

It appears some of you are unable to read and understand simple English.
Here is what it says:
“…. 95 Pentagon projects with cost overruns totaling $295 billion ….”
DOD Projects run an average of 3 – 7 years, so it is possible to see how these 95 projects could have overruns of $295.00 Billion on a 7 year pentagon budget of $4.20 Trillion.
Definitely many of you cut math classes.

Uhhh, Jim, people are complaining about paying more taxes because the government is wasteful. On a different note, it’s crazy to allow government bureaucrats to make laws about running a business when said bureaucrats have never employed a single person, met a budget or done anything other than collect a paycheck from someone who has done those things.

“reduces discretionary spending for non-Defense programs as a share of the economy…by more than 10 percent over the next decade, to the lowest level in nearly half a century. I want to repeat that.”
Repeat it ALL you want! It is a joke at best!
The simple stupidity that any President (Dem. or Rep.) shapes things in terms of 10 years is STUPID!!!!
You guys in the media should have been calling out Presidents on this since it started. The policies of a two-term president are not likely to be followed by his successor.
ALSO, if you have “define” reduce spending with this many caveats (for non-Defense programs as a share of the economy), in real terms…your not reducing anything!

More Koolaid please.

C’mon President Obama, FOCUS! It’s okay if people criticize you. Not everyone has to love and adore you. Focus!
“We found a budget deficit of $1.3 trillion…” And, we thought we can add trillions to that!!!

And so it continues….
Obama guts the only job of the federal government outlined in the constitution, defense.
Nice.
Did you get the part about it being the only job? As in single, uno, one. I hoped so. The framers would hang today’s govenment. And rightfully so. Someday we will return to the original intent of government of this nation. By force of course.

Kitty:” On a different note, it’s crazy to allow government bureaucrats to make laws about running a business when said bureaucrats have never employed a single person”
You know that’s not really true. Government bureaucrats employee a few million in the military alone. Bureaucrats also employee teachers, firemen, policemen, scientists (such as the ones who invented and implemented the internet in it’s infancy), and regulators (FAA, FDA, etc.). The government employees many people, and while inefficient things like the internet, safe (if delay prone) air traffic control, and a first world education system are not ‘nothing.’

Just a side note for everyone’s consumption. New defense technologies always get overruns. No new weapon system is developed without any hiccups. Take the F-22, its the latest and most advanced fighter in the world. As it comes online, unforeseen problems arise, be it corrosion issues, upgrades to radar or electronics etc.
The reason this happens is that the government require the military (and whatever contractor is developing the system) estimate how much the system will cost to develop over, say 7 years. Somehow, they are expecting to think of every possible unseen cost that can arise in developing a 21st century fighter aircraft, before the first prototype is even developed, at the same time asking for the cheapest possible price.
Impossible situation to be in. Inevitably they underestimate, knowing that the government at some point cannot abandon the project and it must be funded.
So, just automatically add 30% to a development project for unforeseen costs and there won’t be cost overruns.

I recently attended a gathering at our local library. It was a free seminar where county leaders and Navy representatives provided information to help and encourage small business to seek contracts with the military.
If you have a small business, it’s definitely worth looking into.
Meanwhile, some of you should stop your childish attacks on a President who just stepped into office weeks ago. If you aren’t offering a constructive solution the our economic crisis, then you are just part of the problem.

Obama had to do a little PR on fiscal responsibility after the budget reaction and the Dems omnibus.

I just googled to find out more about government contracts going to foreign subsidiaries one way, or another. I can see that defense people might think it a legitimate defense function, but given the history and current conditions, it looks reasonable for me to suspect that the tail has got hold of the dog.

KR: “Still my question stands, why take a 7 year approach to describe the cost overruns of the DoD and not everything else?”
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They DO it with everything else. Projects that last for several years, even several decades, always include projections. And when it costs more than projected or when funds dry up, you will read it everywhere, depending on the scale of cost overruns. Take Social Security for example. Or the Big Dig.
These actions are in response to a GAO report from almost a YEAR ago (April 2008). Google it.

With the government, there is no changing it.
Posted by: KR
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Yes there is, we just changed it. We threw out a lot of incompetent ones, both WH and the Congress. Where have you been?

Remember this one?………..
545 PEOPLE
Politicians are the only people in the world who create problems and then campaign against them. Have you ever wondered why, if both the Democrats and the Republicans are against deficits, we have deficits?
Have you ever wondered why, if all the politicians are against inflation and high taxes, we have inflation and high taxes?
You and I don’t propose a federal budget. The president does.
You and I don’t have the Constitutional authority to vote on appropriations. The House of Representatives does.
You and I don’t write the tax code, Congress does.
You and I don’t set fiscal policy, Congress does.
You and I don’t control monetary policy, the Federal Reserve Bank does.
One hundred senators, 435 congressmen, one president, and nine Supreme Court justices 545 human beings out of the 300 million are directly,legally, morally, and individually responsible for the domestic problems that plague this country.

“Yes there is, we just changed it. We threw out a lot of incompetent ones, both WH and the Congress. Where have you been?”
Haven’t been in the military have you? There is no choosing where you get your health care. It’s at the base and that’s it. Don’t like it? Tough, go pay for it. In some cases I did exactly that.
Once socialist health care is in place, the only choice is take what you get with the government system which you pay for with taxes, or go out and pay for private which you have to pay for… and pay taxes for the other. How many people are going to both pay taxes for government health care and pay a premium for health insurance? Not many. And once you get sick and get crappy government health care, you aren’t going to be able to change to private because you’re already sick.
So no, you won’t be able to change it once it’s in place.

“And KR, without your wife’s insurance, how many VIABLE options would you have? With pre existing conditions?”
Actually there was a period when I was transitioning to the reserves where my wife wasn’t working and I was no longer covered. I went to blue cross and blue shield, got a plan that only covered emergency care (60 bucks a month) and I paid for regular doctor visits. Full coverage was going to be around 500 a month for both of us. I knew I went to the doctor maybe twice a year, the clinic visit cost like 70 bucks with about 20 bucks for a prescription for an anti-biotic. It didn’t make sense to get full coverage with how little I went to the doctor.
Of course, that put me in the pool of 40 million uninsured Americans for basic health care, even though I was getting health care and was insured, at a much cheaper cost to me as well.
So no, I took care of myself.

“by any measure, my administration inherited a fiscal disaster; when we walked in the door, we found a budget deficit of $1.3 trillion, the largest in American history. And this fiscal burden has been compounded by the most severe economic crisis since the Great Depression.”
“We nherited this mess” has become a daily talking point from Team Obama. This is not leadership. At some point Obama and his team are going to need to step up to the plate.
The patience of Americans is beginning to run thin. We realize the economic situation into which he came into office were not ideal. But great leaders overcome, not blame others. We’ve also noticed the precipitous drops in the stock market since (a.) his nomination, (b.) his election, (c.) his inauguration. His policies (and fear-mongering) are having a direct impact on how investors view the potential future of the U.S. economy. It’s not good.

KR: “Full coverage was going to be around 500 a month for both of us.”
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You know how much it would be today? Almost triple of that? And how viable is that for a lot of people? You and your wife were taking enormous risks with not being fully covered. One accident and a few days of hospital care and you would have to file for personal bankruptcy.
And your old and outdated concepts of what “Socialist healthcare” is have become stale. For one, it does not exist. There are many universal coverage systems, based on either Beveridge or Bismarck, with huge differences. Stop using those silly bumpersticker slogans to keep a system in place that clearly does not work, for nobody. And not reforming it will only make it worse for more and more people.
If you want to know where the US is currently heading, search for “The Swiss and Dutch Health Insurance Systems: Universal Coverage and Regulated Competitive Insurance Markets”.

I give him some benefit of the doubt here. The economy was in a steady decline with some serious problems.
The argument I think people are trying to make is what will stop the slide? Government intervention only? I haven’t seen anything until yesterday when he tried to sell the stock market from the White House that pointed to anything but that.
Looking at the enormity of our economy, I think it’s a bit arrogant to think the government can control it with spending. There isn’t much basis in history to prove the theory either. I had always thought of stimulus bills as an influence tool on the mind of the consumer, which is the real economic force in the world.
I think it’s a mistake to sit around and say “just wait till the stimulus kicks in, things will get better”. It seems to ignore the fact that if consumers are not confident in spending their money, the economy will stay still. It’s why tax cuts have always been an effective influence tool in the economy. People feel like they’ll have more money to spend.

“And your old and outdated concepts of what “Socialist healthcare” is have become stale. For one, it does not exist. There are many universal coverage systems, based on either Beveridge or Bismarck, with huge differences. Stop using those silly bumpersticker slogans to keep a system in place that clearly does not work, for nobody. And not reforming it will only make it worse for more and more people.”
My wife lived in communist Poland till she was 10, and Germany till she was 20. So my impression of “universal coverage”, which is just a fancy name for government run insurance, comes from real life experiences of my wife and family. Whats yours?

And please, I am not saying what we have is perfect. It has it’s own set of problems no doubt. But that doesn’t trump my opinion of government ineptness to efficiently and effectively run health care, because I cannot find an example anywhere that makes me want it more than what I have now.
There is still the question of those who make so little money they cannot afford full coverage (which is notably expensive even at 500 a month, which was the same as my mortgage on my last house). In the past it has always been charities and free clinics who helped out. Not the most convenient form of receiving health care, but it is free as well. Are they not pulling the load? Maybe as President we should have a national campaign to give more to charities who provide free health care to those in need? Make them better that way?

Do you think it is odd that a former lobbyist for Raytheon is being put in charge of reforming procurement for DoD? That is having the wolf guard the sheep. This is not change I can believe in, it sounds more like business as usual.

“I — I want to make sure everybody catches this, because I think sometimes the — the chatter on the cable stations hasn’t been clear about this.”
Right, right. Yesterday, it was the markets that didn’t understand Der Leader.
If the “Obama” organization can seduce Senator McCaskill away from her twittering fixation, maybe they can manage shut down the media on a NATIONAL basis, on the “law enforcement” model they used during the Missouri primary.

KR: “There is no truth to that. VA benefits have been expanding under just about every administration since it came about.”
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Thanks to Democrats.
Willian Van…
Your kidding right???
Both Carter and Clinton shredded the VA and the active ranks.. Reagan almost doubled the VA budget and Bush 2 added over 30% to what congress requested. Clinton cut active duty forces, gave us pay raises half teh size fo Reagan’s and cut procurment deeply— He balanced an annual budget and when we went to Iraq ..Surprize.. No armored vests, no armored troop carriers, an active force that had to be supplemented by over 50% guard and reserve troops… I am a proud DAV who got his 20 in before I had to go.. PLEASE DON”T EVEN try to convince ANYONE that Democrats are friends of teh military because they are NOT… Thats why the military routinely votes over 80% republican in every national election…

KR: the Netherlands and the Swiss have the same kind of statistics where a portion of the population is paying taxes for the rest.
Yet they pay half of what we pay on healthcare.

“Yet they pay half of what we pay on healthcare.”
And a marginal tax rate that’s nearly 20% more than ours on middle class families. Is it really cheaper?

arkie: You can choose to believe what Republicans tell you, or you can choose to believe what Disabled American Veterans tell you.
Go to their website, check their scorecard for Republican and Democratic Congressmen and women and check how DAV rates them.
You’d be surprised. Really surprised.

In the beginning: “Things were really messed up”
Then came FUBAR: “Fouled Up Beyond Any Recognition”
Later: “Governmental Oversight” – (same as FUBAR, but we continue to throw money at the problem, hoping to blame the responsibility on someone else)
NOW: Obamanation – “Never worked, Never will work, can’t be salvaged – So lets add some more Government spending to make sure the truth never comes out!”
What a dismal failure! I want my vote back!

KR: “They also have very little in medical R&D, relying on places like, oh, the US for medical research. ”
Uhm, no they don’t.
Medical Research and Development in the Netherlands has a very high standard and output: in universities like Leiden, Amsterdam, Nijmegen, Wageningen (some of their Tropical Disease Units are world renowned) and in private business like AkzoNobel, Organon, Philips Medical Systems.

“Uhm, no they don’t.
Medical Research and Development in the Netherlands has a very high standard and output: in universities like Leiden, Amsterdam, Nijmegen, Wageningen (some of their Tropical Disease Units are world renowned) and in private business like AkzoNobel, Organon, Philips Medical Systems.”
Fractional compared to the US, especially in Pharmaceutical development. Not that I’m complaining, but it is true that the medical research industry of the United States is the largest in the world. It’s no coincidence that World leaders come to the Mayo Clinic for treatment. Many of the Crown Princes of Saudi Arabia have sought treatment at Mayo Clinic.
Not to diminish the Netherlands, but our research has to contribute part of its vastness to profit margins. I guess it would be up for debate that, with price controls set by the government, if that area of the US medical industry would take a hit or not.

And a marginal tax rate that’s nearly 20% more than ours on middle class families. Is it really cheaper?
Posted by: KR
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Pulling numbers out of your hat now?
The total tax burden? Before or after what they and we get in benefits? What their National Budget is and how much of it is burdened by Deficits and Debt?
Remember that Debt? Our tax rate might be lower but we managed to keep that rate low by pulling out an enormous creditcard at the same time and let our grandchildren deal with it later. Plus we single handedly plunged the world in a deep recession/depression with our irresponsible behaviour.
Your simplistic use of “marginal tax rates” is not helping anybody.

KR:
Healthcare as we now know it would be over with nationalized healthcare.
Just look at England, Canada or socialized healthcare programs. When people with means get sick in those counties, they come to the U.S.A because the quality of healthcare here is better than anywhere.
Do we really want to regress to the point where england, where a dental appointment is 1 year away?

“Pulling numbers out of your hat now?
The total tax burden? Before or after what they and we get in benefits? What their National Budget is and how much of it is burdened by Deficits and Debt?”
My in-laws in Germany, who are definitely middle class, if not lower middle class, pay 42% income tax rate. They have government care. When my income was roughly the same as theirs, my income tax rate was like 25% or 28%, forget the exact percentage, but it was significantly lower, and 160 bucks a month comes out of my paycheck now for health insurance (just switched from my wifes, to my new jobs a couple months ago). Company picks up the rest.
So your advocating their model is great. Ok, does that mean that you are asking me to pay more taxes for a government provided health insurance, and would of course have to tax me a bit more to pay for those who don’t pay any taxes at all. This would put my tax rate closer to the Germany’s 42% tax rate for my income, to have a government run system that is chronically inefficient and over budget?
It might be manageable on a small scale like the Netherlands, bring it to the U.S and put it under 300 million people and you have problems, and massive tax increases.

“WE pay for R&D so the Dutch and other patients and their countries don’t have to pay as much and that’s why we can’t give fellow Americans access to that same health care.
Does it even make sense to you?”
The Netherlands, et world, do benefit from US R&D that we pay for yes. This is clearly expressed in Canada government refusing to pay market price for new drugs researched and produced in the US. Those companies recover those costs of R&D in the price of new products.
So what I’m saying is, if that goes away, do we all sacrifice an expanding pace of medical R&D in the long term? I’m not choosing a position here, I’m just throwing stuff out for debate on it.

And I fail to see why other countries manage to run excellent government functions and Americans can’t.
Are we that incompetent?

“The opposite is true: the bigger a system is, the more efficient you can make it. Especially cost wise. Why do you think private companies in the same industry want to merge? They make their businesses bigger so they can minimize overhead costs and maximize profit.”
Opposite is true with government. Department of education is gigantic and ranks near last in industrialized countries. Also corporations can cut costs and overhead dynamically, it doesn’t have to go through congress.

“I want to repeat that. I — I want to make sure everybody catches this, because I think sometimes the — the chatter on the cable stations hasn’t been clear about this. My budget reduces discretionary spending for non-Defense programs as a share of the economy by more than 10 percent over the next decade…”
Next decade? Isn’t he elected for four years? Next decade? Nuh uh…

“This “inherited” talk is getting old.”
I agree the matter is largely settled.
Over 80% of Americans think Obama has inherited the dire economic situation.
What he does from here will be his responsibility.