Socialist Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez tried Sunday to explain how Pentagon accounting errors somehow justified the existence of a $32 trillion government healthcare system and failed miserably.
Ocasio-Cortez’s mental gymnastics were based off an excerpt of an article from the far-left publication, The Nation, which stated:
In all, at least a mind-boggling $21 trillion of Pentagon financial transactions between 1998 and 2015 could not be traced, documented, or explained, concluded Skidmore.
Ocasio-Cortez tweeted: “$21 TRILLION of Pentagon financial transactions ‘could not be traced, documented, or explained.’ $21T in Pentagon accounting errors. Medicare for All costs ~$32T. That means 66% of Medicare for All could have been funded already by the Pentagon.And that’s before our premiums.”
Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez
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@Ocasio2018
$21 TRILLION of Pentagon financial transactions “could not be traced, documented, or explained.”
$21T in Pentagon accounting errors. Medicare for All costs ~$32T.
That means 66% of Medicare for All could have been funded already by the Pentagon.
And that’s before our premiums.
jordan
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@JordanUhl
Medicare for All: But how will we pay for it?
Military: We actually have no idea what we’re even paying for
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11:08 AM - Dec 2, 2018
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Brian Riedl, Senior Fellow at the Manhattan Institute, explained why Ocasio-Cortez’s tweet was utter lunacy, noting that the Department of Defense has not even spent $21 trillion in the over 70 years that it has existed.
Riedl noted that the entire Pentagon budget from 1789-2018 has only totaled $18 trillion, which is based on records from the Office of Management and Budget.
For those wondering:
In the original study, $21 trillion refers to transfers back-and-forth between accounts. So the same $1 can be counted 1000’s of times. It *does not* mean that $21 trillion in total spending was mis-spent.
http://www.investmentwatchblog.com/ocasio-cortez-says-something-stupid-again/
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