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Without Rule of Law: State Dept Resists Investigation into Afghanistan Collapse, Will ‘Choose own Auditors’
The lawless State Department has informed SIGAR, the office of the Special Inspector General for Afghanistan Reconstruction, that it will choose who gets to audit the State Department. There’s a lot that stinks here. SIGAR is not impressed:
Two SIGAR audits are also being hindered by a lack of cooperation from State and USAID. The first evaluates your agencies’ compliance with the laws and regulations prohibiting transfers of funds to members of the Taliban and the Haqqani Network. The second concerns ongoing emergency food assistance to Afghanistan.
SIGAR was also informed by State that the Department would not cooperate with future financial audits conducted by SIGAR, but would from now on choose its own auditors. It should go without saying, but neither SIGAR’s authorizing statute nor the Inspector General Act of 1978 contain a “choose your own auditor” provision.
The series of letters linked to below are full of things like this:
Your claim that these matters are not within SIGAR’s jurisdiction is astonishing. SIGAR has been reviewing, auditing, investigating, and reporting on these and related issues for more than 12 years, including USAID humanitarian assistance (for example, food assistance programs) and support to Afghan refugees. These audits and requests for information are squarely within areas in which we have conducted oversight in the past. Moreover, SIGAR has been issuing Congressionally mandated quarterly reports on security, governance, and economic and social development since 2009, incorporating large amounts of information obtained from your agencies. Prior to the collapse of the Afghan government in August 2021, State and USAID generally cooperated with our audits and requests for information. What has changed?
I wanted to write more, and better, but I seem to have a real block about some of this stuff. So enjoy the linked sources:
Good write-up at Gateway Pundit, which also links to the real-deal source docs. (There are several letters in that one pdf.)
Say what you will (and what I will) about TGP, but they got this one right.
h/t patriots
Published in General
Somebody needs to stomp on the State Department’s chain.
Well, it’s not going to be the “justice” department.
It amazes me to think that Merrick Garland might have been a Supreme Court Justice. He’s worse than Eric Holder, and that’s a high bar of corruption to reach.
Too many State Department employees.
Too many Justice Department employees.
I’ve got it! Two words: gladiatorial combat.
Another example of regulatory failure. Progressives used to say that Big Oil (or whatever industry) couldn’t be trusted to regulate itself. For some reason they don’t apply that principle to government.
SIGAR has been auditing the Afghan War for decades – and it was still surprising that the agony collapsed in less than a month. Perhaps you really do need another auditor?
The more the merrier.
When we initiate the panauditicon we will all be government employees.
Garland is probably more competent and more sophisticated in his corruption.
You never want your crooks competent and sophisticated .
The State Dept’s reaction shouldn’t surprise us. How many times have we seen departments simply refuse to cooperate? And when nothing happens to them, the issue just conveniently disappears? Hillary, Eric Holder, the Bidens, the FBI, the CIA . . .
Millions went missing in Iraq, which event begat SIGIR (2004) and SIGAR (2008). This was Congress taking self-audit away from the disastrous CPA in Iraq and whatever the parallel construct was at the time in Afghanistan.
Reconstruction money is a funny thing. I’ve long said that every dollar spent in Afghanistan left that country in the pockets of a different westerner. That’s an exaggeration, of course, but there’s a kernel of truth in it big enough to buckle your hull plates.
The SIGAR website still says that they have an office in Kabul. Oh really? I bet they have security. I wonder if they are embedded in a rump compound of international muckabouts. We will never actually leave Afghanistan, and now that we have brought (what, a hundred thousand?) Afghan refugees here, many of whom still languish in “resettlement centers” or whatever they are called now, Afghanistan will never leave this place either.
In my opinion, SIGAR is the final entity related to the whole thing which should still exist at all, and I wish them luck. I should not have been surprised that we are still sending apparently sizeable amounts of money there — I say cut the damned thing off. The Chinese were always going to take that place over. Why ease their transition.
I am not interested in extending humanitarian aid to Afghanistan, which is heartbreaking. But we expended a damned sight more than “aid” there, and it is enough. We cannot have our own border secured, our own cities policed, our own rights protected or our own elections conducted fairly. We have no business mucking about overseas when our house is on fire. There are a few global points where our attention is warranted — Afghanistan is not one of them.
What stands out to me about the important question “what has changed?” is the indication of an active cover-up of the Biden administration. For starters.
Don’t we want the most qualified inspectors and analysts? Who knows more about the screw-ups than the people who caused them?
We are in the very best of hands.
Well, it’s not going to be the “justice” department.
What Clavius is implying is correct. According to the”Take Care” clause the , the Chief Executive through his Justice Department is to enforce all Federal laws without reservation , which of course under our current Administration is a duty that is now considered “optional” based upon whether our Supreme Leader approves of the law or the consequences of it’s implementation.
So in effect, the Constitution has been trashed and thrown away. For good. All Hail our Supreme Leader!
Yeah, Obama / Holder set that in motion. I forget the case. Borders?