The Pentagon is a lethal sieve for taxpayer dollars

The U.S. government just sent one trillion dollars to the Pentagon--an agency that recently failed its 7th audit and has misaccounted for over $21 trillion dollars in taxpayer funds, 

Are we seriously OK with this?  

The $21 trillion dollar figure was discovered in a 2017 study by Michigan State University researchers for the period 1998-2015 and supported by government documents. It became controversial when some references insinuated that it was lost spending--it actually measures the total adjustments that were not properly documented or explained and not funds spent, although a significant percentage of that is quite likely to be funds spent without proper authorization and monitoring.

Even so, that is a stratospheric number to be chalked up to poor accounting practices. Not only that, what would happen to me or you if we failed seven audits in a row? Would the government reward us with millions more? Only if we were the Pentagon or maybe one of its giant defense contractors.

Today Mira published a new piece on the Trump administration's new "AI Action Plan", a hugely expensive plan that serves the Trump's two major priorities as president--funneling as much public money as possible to the Broligarchy and dominating the world and its resources. Written by one of our longtime contributors, Tony Phillips, the article looks at the implications of the giant giveaway to tech companies and the race against China for AI dominance. In addition to the sci-fi scenarios of AI gone awry, the article points out the extreme danger of environmental destruction. The mega data centers the plan supports require huge amounts of electrictiy to run the computers and millions of gallons of water to cool them. Data center expansion will also effect land as they look to locate them on public lands. 

The article mentions the controversy surrounding Elon Musk's Grok 4 x-AI large language model. Built near Boxtown, a predominantly Black community in Memphis, Tennessee the center has sparked a growing communitiy movement against the severe health and environmental impacts of the neighboring business. A study  found that peak nitrogen dioxide concentration levels have increased by 79% from pre-xAI levels in areas immediately surrounding the data center,

The new super centers have clear ties to military use. AI warfare could be vastly more effective in killing civilians and wiping out whole populations, while protecting the aggressors. As the US government rushes to fund and develop the technology, the implications and impacts for humanity are not even being widely discussed. We're opening up this can of worms and welcome your comments, tips and questions.