World military spending in 2009 = $1.53 trillion. USA share = 43%
- Thread starter Kassz007
- Start date
I think Mav is a stooge for right wing, expansionalistic ideas that are DEAD for a while. The Empire has no teeth....it is only matter of time that people will revolt and stop paying all taxes and the chinese will not support the US military spening forever....
Fuck you Mav and your outdated, stupid ideas......
Fuck you Mav and your outdated, stupid ideas......
Quote from bigarrow:
Mav88 = smart
any views different than Mav88 = dumb
most logical pragmatic intelligent man = Mav88
Thank you Mav88, thank you
Winston Churchill was a leftist?
Now I'm only 18, but isn't one of the main reasons we are in the current mess we are in now (militarily) precisely because we decided to ignore threats 20 years down the line?
Like how, 20 years ago, the Soviet Union was collapsing, and then we decided to say "fuck you" to our allies (of sorts) in Afghanistan? And even when people said, "HEY, 20 YEARS DOWN THE LINE THIS COULD BE REALLY BAD" other people said "whatever, it's 20 years down the line."
History really, really does seem to repeat itself. Wow.
Like how, 20 years ago, the Soviet Union was collapsing, and then we decided to say "fuck you" to our allies (of sorts) in Afghanistan? And even when people said, "HEY, 20 YEARS DOWN THE LINE THIS COULD BE REALLY BAD" other people said "whatever, it's 20 years down the line."
History really, really does seem to repeat itself. Wow.
Ho hum, here we go again. Defense spending is not mandatory. Congress defines it as discretionary. Mandatory programs are social security, medicare, etc. The constitution mandates we have a defense department. But it does not mandate we bankrupt ourselves with military spending.
Also, do you dispute the fact that defense spending has grown by $500B without a proportionate increase in tax revenue? Do you dispute the fact that defense spending has grown from around 300B 10 or so years ago to $800B now? Do you dispute the fact that ~80% of defense contracts are overbudget? Do you dispute the fact that Social security and medicare have run surpluses over their lifetime and are not responsible for any of the existing 13T deficit ( does the term social security trust fund ring a bell)?
To even imply that our troops, who are armed with the best tanks, aircraft carriers, drones, artillery, satellites, stealth airplanes, guns, medical care, etc of any military in the world will be instantly outgunned by the Taliban (who use AKs and RPGs) if we cut spending, is a weak argument. The main impediment to our troops is the rules of engagement.
I've read countless articles about our troops complaining that the Taliban shoots at them, then hides behind a building and drop their weapons, then walk right in front of our troops and our troops can't shoot because they don't have a weapon. An army can have the best weapons in the world. But if they are so limited in using their weapons, the war will drag on anyway.
Also, I never mentioned medicaid once in my argument. I limited my argument to medicare since a tax is collected for that. I don't believe in lumping medicaid with medicare since medicaid is a pure giveaway. I also never said we had a 2.4T deficit. I stated a 1.5T deficit several times. Perhaps you should read my post more carefully.
Do you dispute the fact that military spending should rise during wartime?
Do you dispute the fact that much of the military spending is beneficial to the world economy? Such as the 20+ carriers that help maintain the shipping lanes?
Do you dispute the fact that you aren't including anything close to an all-inclusive list of social welfare programs?
Do you dispute that fact that the Constitution says the government should spend on defense, and never mentions "health care," "education," or "welfare programs"?
You are interpreting the Constitution how you feel it should be based on your values, and not what it does or doesn't clearly say.
Oh, NOW you shift the argument to mandatory versus discretionary whereas before you used 'funded versus unfunded'.
Mandatory is just what was put into law on a continuing basis, there is nothing stopping congress from changing it. Civil servant pensions are mandatory, but they will have to be cut, nothing special about the word mandatory except for interest on the debt.
You single out the military to take a 40% cut during wartime while ignoring stimulus, bailouts, etc. All this is your anti-military agenda- nothing else.
news bulletin 1: we are at war
news bulletin 2: there is widespread fraud waste and abuse in medicare, medicaid, and almost all gov't programs
news bulletin 3: there is a hell of a lot more to the rest of the non military budget outside SSI and medicare.
Do you know why the income tax was started in the US? To pay for war. The current income taxes are more than adequate to pay for the military, the DoD is funded. The income tax was never intended to pay for medicaid, HHS, HUD, Ag, bailouts, etc.
The argument can be made that the militray also then has run a surplus because the original purpose of income taxes was to fight wars.
I actually agree partially, these assinine rules are the product of trying to appease anti-american and anti-military folks. However you still do not understand the military budget. The vast majority of it is overhead, going back to 2000 levels for the RDT&E and acquisitions budget would only save about $40B. That peanuts for a big stepper like Obama. All the rest of the increases are mainly about homeland security and war fighting costs.
You are right about your deficit comment, I apologize. the fact that you won't mention things like medicaid is exactly my point, you are anti-military and don't care what everything else is costing. That's really all that needs to be said.