RLENT
Veteran Expediter
It is certainly true that entitlements are a very large part of the problem - and absolutely must be addressed .... but to suggest that military spending is not a very significant part of the problem is simply a hallucinatory delusion ... one that does not stand up to any real scrutiny from a reasonable person ( .... IOW, someone who is not an avowed militarist and fan of empire .....)
...... 700 bases (some say it is actually over 1000 bases) .... in over 130 countries ....
..... 1.3 trillion dollars spent (dollars that we didn't have and was borrowed, by the way) on two wars, one of which was an entirely unjustified war of aggression .... while the other has largely deviated off it's original purpose ... and turned into a Vietnamistan horror show ...
..... Rumsfeld once publicly admitted that the Five Sided Wind Box lost track of 2.3 trillion dollars and cannot tell us how it was spent .....
The U.S. military budget for 2010 was $693 billion. However, when you throw in all "off budget" items and other categories of "defense" spending not covered in the Pentagon budget you get a grand total of somewhere between $1.01 and $1.35 trillion spent on national defense in 2010 alone.
The Pentagon currently gobbles up 56 percent of all discretionary (non-entitlement) spending by the federal government.
The Sustainable Defense Task Force has produced a report which shows that the U.S. could easily slash a trillion dollars from the defense budget over the next ten years ... yet the warmongers and militarists ceaselessly cry and fearmonger that "Defense cannot be cut under any circumstances !" (despite the fact that any "cuts" in question that are being talked about at this time aren't really cuts at all - they are decreases in the increase of the rate of spending)
Sadly, as bad as they seem to be, the "official" budget deficit figures are largely a fraud. If the U.S. government was forced to use GAAP accounting principles (like all publicly-traded corporations must), the annual U.S. government budget deficit would be somewhere in the neighborhood of $4 trillion to $5 trillion.
To claim that defense spending is at "historical lows" (admittedly at least as a percent of GDP) citing data from Heritage (the permanent fans and cheerleaders of the military-industrial complex and perpetual war) .... and then provide a chart to support that assertion - one which claims to show a possible declining rate of future defense expenditures - is just complete silliness and utterly ludicrous.
At best, it's misleading .... and foolishly naive, when considered in light of the past historical record ...
Can we all say "Clinton Budget Surplus" ?
If one actually wanted to provide a truthful picture of what our present circumstances vis-a-vis military spending is, then the following would perhaps be more appropriate:
At this (current) point in time (2008 to 2011), defense spending contributes almost as much (14% as compared to 20%) as entitlements to the budget deficit. In the future, it's certainly possible that that could change - and entitlements could make up a far more significant percentage .... but that premise assumes that there will be absolutely nothing which will cause defense spending to increase significantly.
Considering the rhetoric coming from all of our various little warmongers, that's not a bet I'd be willing to make .... even with odds ....
(BTW, I just watched the former Chairman of ATT explain how the way that the GDP is calculated is essentially a complete fraud - it's literally insane. More of the same old lunatic accounting from inside the Beltway.)
Further, claiming that because (so-called) "defense" spending (it's really militarism spending) is some historically low percentage of GDP, it's completely innocuous would be to completely ignore the realities of the current world economic stage that we find ourselves dancing (or is it twisting ?) on.
It's almost as though one believes that we're currently the same economic powerhouse that we were in 1950 or 1960. For starters, if you wish to understand what is different, look at how "financial services" (which is essentially a parasitic exercise, that produces nothing itself but only extracts wealth) as a percentage is rising:
Consider what has happened to US manufacturing in the last 20 to 30 years.
Now consider the rest of the economic actors on the world stage .... and how far they've come since then.
Newsflash: This ain't the 50's or 60's more ..... Japan, China, Korea, and India (among others) have become, or are becoming, industrial powerhouses ..... and June and the Beaver have left the building ...
We can ill afford to continue to spend on anything that isn't absolutely necessary (to say nothing of the Constitutional aspects) - and foreign adventurism in far off lands, although quite romantic and glorious (particularly if one isn't having to actually participate personally) ain't necessary - in fact, given the context in which it's occurring, it's entirely counter-productive.
We can't afford to extract wealth from those things that make us economically competitive and productive on the world stage ....... only to pizz it away on something that brings no real return, but only a liability that must be paid for somewhere in the future.
Now have a look at the US National Debt - and who held the Presidency at various points:
I mention the part about who was in office, not because I'm advocating that Democrats are better for holding down the debt - clearly, they aren't - the debt still went up when they were in office (as opposed to being retired) under Carter and Clinton - but anyone who thinks that just because a candidate has an "R" after their name, they will be some sort a magical solution is obviously suffering from some sort of medical problem that they should seek immediate treatment for.
Anyone that thinks that anyone with an "R" will be marginally better is just kidding themselves. And there is a distinct possibility that they could actually end up being worse (yes - heresy, I know)
It will take a real leader - not some pandering establishment shill - to actually assume the bully pulpit and really lead this country out of the mess that it is in. Hard choices abound .... it ain't gonna be pretty ..... and it will certainly be painful - but the alternative is national economic suicide.
Yeah ...... and we can really look with confidence to some typical Demopublican or Republicrat to git-er-done ....
The simple fact is that both parties have colluded to push our profligate and utterly irresponsible spending out through the roof, enriching those who empower them - at our expense.
To try make the case for any traditional, "establishment" "R" (or "D") candidate is a completely hollow argument - and speaks of political delusion in terms of where an increasing percentage of the electorate is at (... Obama-hating neocon warmongers excepted of course
) .... particularly if it involves an an articulate but unstable idiot which is appropriately described by a fellow conservative as a "human hand grenade" ..... and is generally despised by those that actually know and worked with him (at least those that aren't busily sucking up at present)These folks are the very ones (who, along with their democratic brethren) have given us this debacle.
There is only one candidate which has the capacity to reach across the political spectrum and bring in those in who are in the middle, the independents, and those who mistakenly voted for Obama and thought that they were actually going to get the real change that they wanted, and who advocates for the only sane path for our continued survival as a nation.
Consider what the overall sense of the electorate is currently and choose wisely ..... because the wrong choice will most assuredly deliver four more years of what we have at present ......
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