Ron’s Paul’s strong second place finish in New Hampshire’s Presidential Primary greatly raises his prospects in the Republican Presidential race, and will lead to more attention on his policies. Paul’s policies are laid out in his “Plan to Restore America” where he targets five cabinet level departments for elimination: Energy, Housing and Urban Development (HUD), Commerce, Interior, and Education. The resulting cuts would enable Paul to attain his economic goals of balancing the U.S. budget in three years and cutting the budget by one trillion dollars in his first year. The pros and cons of Paul’s radical economic plan is likely to be vigorously debated in the mainstream media in the months ahead during the Republican Presidential primary. Unlikely to appear in these debates is discussion of the community that is likely to be most impacted if Paul succeeds in implementing his Plan to Restore America – those benefiting directly from America’s deepest held secret. Ron Paul’s “Plan to Restore America” is a direct challenge to America’s secret trillion dollar Black Budget.

Paul’s growing popularity and increasing possibility that he may emerge as a dark horse candidate to win the Republican nomination has led to increased scrutiny of his voting record and past associations. That has led to some controversy over decades-old newsletters published under his name, and support for conspiracy theories that go too far in the opinion of the mainstream press. The key behind Paul’s growing support are his firm libertarian views about cutting back on the size of the Federal government, supporting individual liberties and ending foreign U.S. military interventions. The heart of Paul’s economic message is outlined in his “Plan to Restore America” Paul’s plan to eliminate five cabinet level departments and trillion dollar budget cut appeals to a cross spectrum of American society, while also alarming some Americans that benefit from a host of programs funded by these Federal departments. It will be surprise to many that among those likely to be most alarmed by Paul’s “Plan to Restore America” are not private citizens; but powerful corporate, government and military entities that use excesses, inefficiencies and waste in these five government departments as a cover for secretly funding a vast network of classified projects. A secret trillion dollar Black Budget has been created to fund this network of projects, which has all been hidden from most Americans, the media, the U.S. Congress, and even the President himself!

The ‘official’ black budget comprises single line items in the Department of Defense (DoD) budget that don’t refer to any real weapons system. These single line items are covers for a Congressionally sanctioned and publicly funded ‘black budget’ – a top secret slush fund for intelligence organizations such as the CIA, and classified weapons programs by the DoD. There is, however, a second black budget that is not congressionally sanctioned, but it is nevertheless publicly funded – America’s ‘unofficial’ black budget.

The conventional political view is that covert operations are funded by Congressional appropriations authorizing the DoD to use U.S. Treasury funds for classified projects and intelligence activities that appear as vague single line items on the DoD budget. Subtracting the cost of known weapons systems and intelligence programs from the total DoD budget gives Congressional analysts a means of estimating the size and scope of operations of the covert world of ‘black projects’, without knowing their precise budgets or activities.

There is however compelling evidence that the covert world of highly classified projects is primarily funded by a black budget created by the CIA rather than the DoD. Rather than being a beneficiary of a Congressionally sanctioned DoD ‘black budget’, the CIA has its own ‘unofficial’ black budget. The CIA’s black budget is a conduit for funds secretly siphoned into the various military intelligence agencies and private contractors associated with both the CIA and the DoD, for intelligence activities, covert operations, and weapons research and development.

The CIA has the unique legal ability among all U.S. government departments and agencies to generate funds through appropriations of other federal government agencies and other sources “without regard to any provisions of law,” and without regard to the intent behind Congressional appropriations.

Every year, according to Catherine Austin Fitts, a former Assistant Secretary of HUD (United States Department of Housing and Urban Development), billions of dollars of Congressional appropriations are diverted from their Congressionally sanctioned purposes to CIA and DoD based intelligence agencies without knowledge of the public and with the collusion of Congressional leaders. The covert world of ‘black programs’ acts with virtual impunity, overseen and regulated by itself, funding itself through secret slush funds, and is free of the limitations that come from Congressional oversight, proper auditing procedures and public scrutiny. The departments from which many of these black budget funds are secretly siphoned from are the very same as those proposed by Ron Paul for elimination: Energy, Housing and Urban Development, Commerce, Interior, and Education.

The key to uncovering the true size of the black budget is the chronic accounting anomalies in the DoD budget. In the three year period from 1998-2000 when the DoD was audited by the Office of the Inspector General, it was found that an average of 1.7 trillion dollars per year could not be accounted for. These auditing anomalies is evidence that over one trillion U.S. dollars annually is being siphoned by the CIA into the DoD for secret distribution to various military intelligence agencies and corporate contractors, and the ‘deep black’ programs they support. Such siphoning, with dubious constitutional status, is made legal by various Congressional enactments, senior Congressional officials, and the Executive Office.

The size of the Black Budget, the secrecy surrounding it, the extent senior Federal officials and agencies go to in targeting individuals and companies threatening to reveal where Congressional appropriations are ultimately going, point to a vast network of ‘deep black projects’. This network collectively forms a highly classified second Manhattan Project whose existence, goals and budget are kept secret.

As Ron Paul proposes balancing the federal budget within three years and cutting one trillion in costs in his first year with his “Plan to Restore America”, he directly challenges those that benefit from America’s “unofficial” black budget. If the experiences of Catherine Austin Fitts are any guide, then the more success Paul enjoys during the Presidential primaries, the more likely he will be targeted in covert ways by beneficiaries of America’s black budget. The stakes are very high for Paul’s campaign as he threatens congressional funds flowing through cabinet departments that are most involved in secretly funding a trillion dollar black budget.

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