One recurring narrative about President Joe Biden's administration that was dutifully perpetuated by the media is that he would restore fiscal sanity and responsibility to the federal government's bloated and mismanaged budget -- which, of course, hasn't been the case.

In fact, it was just revealed that the Defense Department failed to pass its annual budgetary audit for the seventh year in a row, meaning the Pentagon cannot fully account for how its massive $840 billion budget has been spent, according to the Washington Examiner.

Yet, a senior Pentagon official has insisted that the Department's continued failure to account for all of its spending is not as bad as in years past, and further asserted that all audits could be passed within the next few years.

Pentagon failed its annual audits ... again

The Defense Department's budget is broken down into 28 separate reporting entities for the purpose of annual audits, and of those 28 entities, only nine received an unmodified opinion while one received a qualified opinion, 15 were hit with disclaimers, and three remain pending, per a Friday news release.

"Despite the disclaimer of opinion, which was expected, the Department has turned a corner in its understanding of the depth and breadth of its challenges," Michael McCord, the Pentagon's Under Secretary of Defense (Comptroller) and Chief Financial Officer, said in a statement. "Momentum is on our side, and throughout the Department there is strong commitment -- and belief in our ability -- to achieve an unmodified audit opinion."

The senior official credited the Pentagon's current leadership for the supposed progress toward actually passing an annual audit and continued, "The path forward is clear. Significant work remains and challenges lie ahead, but our annual audit continues to be a catalyst for Department-wide financial management reform, resulting in greater financial integrity, transparency, and better-supported warfighters."

The release provided several examples of the reporting entities that had received unmodified audit opinions but also highlighted a few others where improvements are still needed.

"The Department continues to need the sustained investment, senior leadership commitment, and the support of our partners in Congress, federal regulators, the audit community, and our military and civilian personnel to accomplish its audit goals," McCord added. "An unmodified audit opinion has always been the Department's primary financial management goal, and with their help, I know it is achievable."

Only "half good" is not good enough

Fox News reported that as part of the annual National Defense Authorization Act, achieving unmodified audit opinions across the board is a mandatory objective for the Pentagon -- one that it has consistently failed to reach.

However, in a press conference on Friday that coincided with the release of the Pentagon's financial reports, McCord pushed back against media claims that the Department had "failed" its audits because those audits included "about half clean opinions."

He likened the audits to a student's report card for grades and said, "So if someone had a report card that is half good and half not good, I don’t know that you call the student or the report card a failure."

Perhaps McCord is familiar with some other grading scale than what most other Americans are familiar with, but in keeping with the school comparison, only being "half good" will not suffice to pass, as anything less than 60% would be an "F" for "failure."

Pentagon hopes to fully pass audits within the next few years

Both the Examiner and Fox News noted that the Pentagon aims to have completely clean audits by 2027 or 2028, and McCord was insistent in his press conference that such a goal was achievable and within reach.

"This result was not a surprise and I know that on the surface it doesn’t sound like we’re making progress," McCord acknowledged. "However, that is not the case … The department has improved from less than 7% to over 82% of its funding being free of material weaknesses."