Monday, November 19, 2007

Mistakes Happen: USAID Aids Terrorists

Each year, USAID, an American government agency, hands out billions of dollars. The money is supposed to be used for
  • Humanitarian aid
  • Disaster relief
  • Pro-democracy programs
USAID is definitely not supposed to give money to
  • Terrorists
But a report, "Audit of the Adequacy of USAID's Antiterrorism Vetting Procedures," dated November 6, says that "policies, procedures, and controls are not adequate to reasonably ensure against providing assistance to terrorists."

In other words, American tax dollars are probably going to terrorists as I'm writing this.

If true, this is dumb, really dumb.

For example, "Palestinian police found several Iranian agents and an Iranian general teaching the students in the U.S.-funded chemistry lab how to make suicide bombs." The punch line is that the Iranian agents and general were using the basement of Gaza Islamic University, one of the institutions that my taxes have been supporting.

Again: dumb, really, really dumb.

I hope that USAID gets its act together.
Now, a minor item: I scrambled my schedule today, and don't have the post I was preparing ready. Eventually, I'll get that done.

Happily, my foul-ups don't have very serious consequences. Except, occasionally, to me and my family.

1 comment:

Brigid said...

Nothing like global consequences to put your personal problems in perspective, huh?

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Blogroll

Note! Although I believe that these websites and blogs are useful resources for understanding the War on Terror, I do not necessarily agree with their opinions. 1 1 Given a recent misunderstanding of the phrase "useful resources," a clarification: I do not limit my reading to resources which support my views, or even to those which appear to be accurate. Reading opinions contrary to what I believed has been very useful at times: sometimes verifying my previous assumptions, sometimes encouraging me to change them.

Even resources which, in my opinion, are simply inaccurate are sometimes useful: these can give valuable insights into why some people or groups believe what they do.

In short, It is my opinion that some of the resources in this blogroll are neither accurate, nor unbiased. I do, however, believe that they are useful in understanding the War on Terror, the many versions of Islam, terrorism, and related topics.