Wednesday, June 20, 2007
One hand giveth, the other hand giveth...a lot more
The other day, the U.S promised (chances of fulfilling the promise are well below certainty) to send $40 million to Palestine. Today the U.S. signed an agreement (note: not a "promise," a signed agreement) to increase its military aid to Israel from $2.4 billion a year to $2.9 billion a year (the increase to occur over a 10-year period). I'm sure I don't need to point out, even to the math-challenged, the extent to which that dwarfs any money the U.S. may or may not give to the Palestinians.
As an aside, it's also an interesting reflection of "democracy" in the United States. Not only has there been, as far as I can tell, no debate in Congress over this (the body which, last I checked, was actually responsible for voting for any money they government spends for any purpose whatsoever), but also the commitment extends over two complete terms of the next President or Presidents, no matter who that might be and how they might feel about military aid to Israel (not that I'm expecting any President elected in the next five years to offer any change in that area). Some "democracy," huh?
