The U.S. Agency for International Development, that arm of the federal government that (thanks to Barack Obama) is again distributing your tax dollars to abort babies of other countries, also dishes out a lot of your bread for bungling boondoggles sponsored by the United Nations like a military airstrip in southern Afghanistan (originally budgeted at $300,000, actual cost being $749,000) that cannot accommodate military aircraft!And there's more -- an unsafe bridge ($2 million in material was procured to build three bridges but only one was built...and it was built very badly); millions of dollars that have gone missing altogether; and the headquarters for Afghanistan's central bank which cost (for that area) an enormous $375,000 yet which lacked any electricity or plumbing. Also, the foundation was so shoddy that water seeped through and destroyed stacks of the money stored there.
And when the U.S. finally got around to checking where things went wrong, the United Nations officials went stone silent. We'll never get that money back. We'll never even know what happened to it.
And yet, we'll still be doing business with these crooks.
"Due to the refusal of the United Nations to cooperate with this investigation, questions remain unanswered," the report says.
Federal prosecutors in New York City were forced to drop criminal and civil cases because the U.N. officials have immunity, according to the report. USAID has scaled back its dealings with the U.N. and hired a collection agency to seek $7.6 million back, Deputy Administrator James Bever said. The aid agency hasn't heeded its inspector general's request to sever all ties.
"There are certain cases where working with the U.N. is the only option available," Bever said in an e-mail...
Here's Ken Dilanian's story in USA Today and here, if you can stomach it, is the actual report. It makes very grim, but highly relevant, reading for Tax Day.
