Pentagon Price Gouging | Responsible Statecraft

Follow us on social

Until 2010, Boeing charged an average of $300 for a trash container used in the E-3 Sentry, a surveillance and radar plane based on the 707 civilian airliner. When the 707 fell out of use in the United States, the trash can was no longer a “commercial” item, meaning that Boeing was not obligated to keep its price at previous levels, according to a weapons industry source who spoke to RS.

In 2020, the Pentagon paid Boeing over $200,000 for four of the trash cans, translating to roughly $51,606 per unit. In a 2021 contract, the company charged $36,640 each for 11 trash containers, resulting in a total cost of more than $400,000. The apparent overcharge cost taxpayers an extra $600,000 between the two contracts.

Pentagon Price Gouging youtu.be

Are you a terrorist?

www.youtube.com

- YouTube

Are you a terrorist?

What is terrorism? And who decides who is a terrorist and who isn’t? This vague, politically malleable concept has become the justification for a global American war against terrorism that spans 78 countries — more than a third of all nations. At home, it's handed local police departments $34 billion to buy military equipment, turning terrorism into a catch-all excuse for militarizing American communities.

In this episode of Always at War, we talk with national security law expert Elizabeth Beavers to unpack how terrorism designations work as political tools rather than security measures — keeping Nelson Mandela out of America until 2008, shutting down the biggest Muslim charity in the country, and now threatening Gaza protesters with prosecution.

keep readingShow less

First of its kind tracker cracks open DC's think tank funding

www.youtube.com

- YouTube

First of its kind tracker cracks open DC's think tank funding

Part of the so-called Washington swamp is the opacity of the funding going to powerful think tanks that provide policymaking expertise to Capitol Hill, to White House staff, and to agencies, including the Pentagon and State Department. It is no secret that the think tanks that have an outsized influence on foreign policy and national security affairs receive grants from the government to conduct studies and research to the tune of millions of dollars a year. Meanwhile, these organizations get tons of funding from the military contractors who stand to benefit from those reports and research in support of American war policy.

Foreign governments, too, are plowing millions into think tanks in hopes to influence the direction of policy their way.

keep readingShow less

LATEST

QIOSK