ARMY PAYROLL = POLITICAL FOOTBALL: "If we're going to send hundreds of thousands of young men and women into harm's way, the least we could do is not screw with their paychecks. Common sense – maybe. But Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld presumably disagrees. Back in December, regular Defense Tech readers will recall, Rummy's braintrust decided to dip into the Army's payroll into order to fund truck armor and other wartime expenses. Congress would make up the difference later on, they figured, with a second, emergency 'supplemental' funding bill. The fact that the payroll accounts would dry up in May didn't seem to factor into the Pentagon calculus -- except maybe as a lever to force Congress into action. But as senators loaded the $80 billion supplemental with pet projects -- $23 million for a baseball stadium in DC, $32 million for forest roads in Cali -- and the Pentagon added billions in long-term programs to the supposedly last-minute funding measure, its progress slowed. So now, Rummy is getting all weepy, complaining to Congress that they're keeping soldiers from getting paid."

(Via Defense Tech.)