It's a mixed blessing for sure, but at least we get somewhere. Inefficient as military might be (I doubt it's too bad compared to some others), it's way better off than American science. Not a fan of aggression, but we need enough to protect our interests around the world and pay for the GI Bill.
If you are not Bisu, chances are I hate you.
BluePanther United States. August 09 2012 14:02. Posts 2669
On August 09 2012 11:54 biology]major wrote: I see what you are saying but you have nothing to fear U.S. could stop defense spending to 0 and still be ahead of the world for many years. Outside of the completely pacifist/neutral countries, The U.S. is the safest country to be in if a war were to ever break out.
On August 09 2012 14:10 {CC}StealthBlue wrote: And going all over the world and implementing, sometimes forcefully, to control certain interests never won any friends and in the long run, allies.
In a way, it does. We do have Israel, after all . Of course, we did burn more bridges than we created. Still, there is value in enforcing our interests, even if only with an implicit threat of force by having the means to use it. Not that peace isn't better, but there's a fair number of factions in the world incapable of seeing reason that we need to be able to oppose with military.
On August 09 2012 11:54 biology]major wrote: I see what you are saying but you have nothing to fear U.S. could stop defense spending to 0 and still be ahead of the world for many years. Outside of the completely pacifist/neutral countries, The U.S. is the safest country to be in if a war were to ever break out.
On August 09 2012 13:55 BlueBird. wrote: So we should extremely overpay on all of the military and defense, not just the research/science part of it, so we can keep the research/science part cause the rest of our countries policies towards science suck?
I find it hard to believe the majority of that money is going to r&d, maybe half of it is, and if it is, I find it hard to believe it's anywhere near efficiently spent. We could do much much better in the sciences with that money, and probably improve social programs as well as reduce the nations debt, all in one fell swoop if we cut the funding for the military in half. Oh and we would probably still be more armed and dangerous then every other nation.
While US defence directly funds some R&D efforts quite nicely, that's only a very small part of their budget, and I'd guess that much of the rest of the money is funnelled to military contractors instead. Defence R&D has some good points, such as being able to back long-term projects, but it's still rather limited in which fields it supports.
sam!zdat United States. August 09 2012 15:12. Posts 4170
On August 09 2012 14:10 {CC}StealthBlue wrote: And going all over the world and implementing, sometimes forcefully, to control certain interests never won any friends and in the long run, allies.
In a way, it does. We do have Israel, after all . Of course, we did burn more bridges than we created. Still, there is value in enforcing our interests, even if only with an implicit threat of force by having the means to use it. Not that peace isn't better, but there's a fair number of factions in the world incapable of seeing reason that we need to be able to oppose with military.
On August 09 2012 11:54 biology]major wrote: I see what you are saying but you have nothing to fear U.S. could stop defense spending to 0 and still be ahead of the world for many years. Outside of the completely pacifist/neutral countries, The U.S. is the safest country to be in if a war were to ever break out.
On August 09 2012 14:10 {CC}StealthBlue wrote: And going all over the world and implementing, sometimes forcefully, to control certain interests never won any friends and in the long run, allies.
In a way, it does. We do have Israel, after all . Of course, we did burn more bridges than we created. Still, there is value in enforcing our interests, even if only with an implicit threat of force by having the means to use it. Not that peace isn't better, but there's a fair number of factions in the world incapable of seeing reason that we need to be able to oppose with military.
On August 09 2012 14:17 Elegy wrote:
On August 09 2012 11:54 biology]major wrote: I see what you are saying but you have nothing to fear U.S. could stop defense spending to 0 and still be ahead of the world for many years. Outside of the completely pacifist/neutral countries, The U.S. is the safest country to be in if a war were to ever break out.
FYI: The truth about the impending defense cuts is that it is a result of a deal the Republicans and Democrats agreed to to avoid default.
There is a curious omission in Mitt Romney’s speech to the VFW today.
He warns against the dire consequences of the massive Pentagon budget cutbacks scheduled to take effect at the end of the year. And that’s an absolutely legitimate issue, prompting concern in both parties.
But here’s the rub that Romney neglects, at least based on excerpts released by the campaign: The Republicans agreed to these cuts. The GOP-controlled House went along as part of a bipartisan deal last summer to prevent the government from sliding into default.
Romney describes the looming threat as “an arbitrary, across-the-board budget reduction that would saddle the military with a trillion dollars in cuts, severely shrink our force structure, and impair our ability to meet and deter threats. Don’t bother trying to find a serious military rationale behind any of this, unless that rationale is wishful thinking. Strategy is not driving President Obama’s massive defense cuts. In fact, his own secretary of Defense warned that these reductions would be ‘devastating.’ And he is right.” (Mindful of his audience, Romney adds that this will hurt VA health care as well.) Fine. But is Romney saying John Boehner and Mitch McConnell were wrong to agree to this?
How can it all be Obama’s fault if Romney’s party signed on the dotted line?
Obama tried to exploit this argument in a speech Monday, saying Republicans would "rather protect tax cuts for some of the wealthiest Americans, even if it risks big cuts in our military"--cuts that he also agreed to. The defense cuts were part of an intricate deal in which both sides swallowed provisions they didn’t want. There are deep domestic spending cuts as well, along with the expiration of all the Bush tax cuts.
The idea was to create such pressure on Congress that a Super Committee would forge a rational plan. Well, you remember what happened with that. Hill leaders could still strike a deal to modify the cutbacks and extend the tax reductions, but there’s no sign of that happening until after the election, if then.
The truth is, Democrats added the defense reductions as a sort of poison pill to force Republicans to seriously negotiate a way of the endless budget crisis, including potential tax increases.
Defense cuts are a perfectly fair target for Romney. But restoring hundreds of billions of dollars in planned reductions, along with the tax cuts he’s pushing, would blow a deeper hole in the deficit. And that needs to be part of the conversation as well.
Last edit: 2012-08-09 18:50:27
Mohdoo United States. August 10 2012 02:20. Posts 3945
On August 09 2012 11:54 biology]major wrote: I see what you are saying but you have nothing to fear U.S. could stop defense spending to 0 and still be ahead of the world for many years. Outside of the completely pacifist/neutral countries, The U.S. is the safest country to be in if a war were to ever break out.
just a little perspective for how far ahead we are, I think at some point we have to stop calling it "defense" spending.
Edit: I don't want defense to go to 0 lol that was just a hypothetical
wow the U.S. has spent 44% of the world military expenditure... 1 country...
US defense spending is, when considered to be a percentage of GDP, hardly anything extraordinary.
Discussing the size of the US military in absolute figures is a silly adventure in terribly misleading statistics at best.
Why should you not look at absolute figures? It's true that %GDP is better way to gauge some things, such as its impact on the US economy. But when you actually go to war, what matters is the relative absolute amounts. Saudi Arabia spends twice what we do as a percentage of GDP, but we could spend a quarter of what we do and we'd still be way more powerful than them. We shouldn't spend more than is necessary to keep us safe, even if we can manage to afford it. If we spent on average the same percentage of GDP as the world overall, we'd still have by far the most powerful military, and we'd have a much, much better economy long-term. (And probably some other countries would feel less pressure and reduce their spending as well, so our gap would even be bigger than the simple calculation shows.)
paralleluniverse Australia. August 10 2012 02:41. Posts 2963
On August 09 2012 08:50 darthfoley wrote: What hasn't Mitt Romney lied or flip flopped about? Why would anyone want a president who's made complete 360's on every major policy to pander to whoever?
it's comical.
So he ends up where he started? 360's look impressive too. What's wrong with that
Happy Birthday.
Maybe he's referring to THIS 360.
So, it's come to this. Today, a spokeswoman for Mitt Romney responded to an attack ad disseminated by a super PAC supporting President Barack Obama. The ad was a controversial broadside, worthy of a response. The spokeswoman spoke against the ad with conviction. She offered a counter argument that was precise and logical and fair. The spokeswoman cleanly invoked her candidate's greatest legislative achievement, in an eminently reasonable way, in her candidate's defense.
And that spokeswoman's response is being hailed as one of the 2012 campaign season's most collossal cock-ups.
In the immediate aftermath of the ad's deployment, the Romney camp issued a relatively standard response, referring to the ad as dishonest and accusing the president and his allies of using such attacks to distract from economic issues. And nothing more might have come of this had Romney's team stuck to that story.
But on Fox News this morning, Romney spokeswoman Andrea Saul went "off-script," and amid a larger declaration about the ad being despicable and some pushback on the facts of the ad, she offered this statement in Romney's defense: "To that point, if people had been in Massachusetts, under Governor Romney's health care plan, they would have had health care."
After that came the deluge of conservatives savaging Saul for getting lost on the road to Damascus, essentially accusing her of giving away the election.
The thing is, though, Saul's logic in citing Romney's creation and implementation of CommonwealthCare in Massachusetts is impeccable. Her baseline argument: If you are going to hit Romney with the Bain practices that allegedly led to this woman losing her health insurance, you surely must credit him for his legislative accomplishments, which enabled thousands of uninsured people to obtain life-saving care. That is, for the most part, pristine reasoning.
The only problem, of course, is that this wasn't offered in 2008, when it would have been hailed as a brilliant defense. We've once again come face to face with the perplexing weirdness at the center of Romney's entire presidential effort: in 2012, Romney is not allowed to run on the singular achievement of his career -- Massachusetts health care -- that earned him a spot in the world of GOP presidential contenders in the first place.
Yes, that was colossally stupid. She should be summarily fired from the campaign for incompetence.
The truth hurts.
"If people had been in Massachusetts under Governor Romney's healthcare plan, they would of had healthcare." -Andrea Saul.
Last edit: 2012-08-10 02:43:07
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DamnCats United States. August 10 2012 03:14. Posts 1323
Romney is in a lose/lose situation. He can fire Andrea Saul which will mean he further looks weak and in no control of "his" campaign i.e. he looks like a puppet. Or he can keep her and piss conservatives off even more.
It'll take a lot more than words and guns ... The hands of many must join as one, and together we'll cross the river.
Kaitlin United States. August 10 2012 03:54. Posts 2200
On August 09 2012 14:10 {CC}StealthBlue wrote: And going all over the world and implementing, sometimes forcefully, to control certain interests never won any friends and in the long run, allies.
In a way, it does. We do have Israel, after all . Of course, we did burn more bridges than we created. Still, there is value in enforcing our interests, even if only with an implicit threat of force by having the means to use it. Not that peace isn't better, but there's a fair number of factions in the world incapable of seeing reason that we need to be able to oppose with military.
On August 09 2012 14:17 Elegy wrote:
On August 09 2012 11:54 biology]major wrote: I see what you are saying but you have nothing to fear U.S. could stop defense spending to 0 and still be ahead of the world for many years. Outside of the completely pacifist/neutral countries, The U.S. is the safest country to be in if a war were to ever break out.
On August 09 2012 14:10 {CC}StealthBlue wrote: And going all over the world and implementing, sometimes forcefully, to control certain interests never won any friends and in the long run, allies.
In a way, it does. We do have Israel, after all . Of course, we did burn more bridges than we created. Still, there is value in enforcing our interests, even if only with an implicit threat of force by having the means to use it. Not that peace isn't better, but there's a fair number of factions in the world incapable of seeing reason that we need to be able to oppose with military.
On August 09 2012 14:17 Elegy wrote:
On August 09 2012 11:54 biology]major wrote: I see what you are saying but you have nothing to fear U.S. could stop defense spending to 0 and still be ahead of the world for many years. Outside of the completely pacifist/neutral countries, The U.S. is the safest country to be in if a war were to ever break out.
"We" have Israel? Or does Israel have us? I'd like to think that Israel has us - we give them so much money it's unbelievable.
Pakistan also gets a healthy sum from the US annually. They've received 20 billion from the US since September 11th.
As deplorable as that sounds, it's a lot cheaper than say ... having to invade Pakistan to kill Bin Laden.
IIRC, we did invade Pakistan to kill Bin Laden, without the knowledge, let alone assistance, of the government of Pakistan.
By 'invade', I mean having to make a formal declaration of war.
The covert operation to kill Obama could have been interpreted as an act of war. Instead, Pakistan sat on their hands and pretended it was hunky-dory because the US essentially bought their loyalty.
Still a lot cheaper than trying to occupy a country (like Iraq).
Last edit: 2012-08-10 04:03:43
darthfoley United States. August 10 2012 04:06. Posts 2233
On August 10 2012 03:31 {CC}StealthBlue wrote: Romney is in a lose/lose situation. He can fire Andrea Saul which will mean he further looks weak and in no control of "his" campaign i.e. he looks like a puppet. Or he can keep her and piss conservatives off even more.
He's just a major fail right now, his campaign is in shambles...
"It's not trying to be perfect; it's being yourself."-Liquid'NonY
coverpunch United States. August 10 2012 04:11. Posts 604
On August 09 2012 14:10 {CC}StealthBlue wrote: And going all over the world and implementing, sometimes forcefully, to control certain interests never won any friends and in the long run, allies.
In a way, it does. We do have Israel, after all . Of course, we did burn more bridges than we created. Still, there is value in enforcing our interests, even if only with an implicit threat of force by having the means to use it. Not that peace isn't better, but there's a fair number of factions in the world incapable of seeing reason that we need to be able to oppose with military.
On August 09 2012 14:17 Elegy wrote:
On August 09 2012 11:54 biology]major wrote: I see what you are saying but you have nothing to fear U.S. could stop defense spending to 0 and still be ahead of the world for many years. Outside of the completely pacifist/neutral countries, The U.S. is the safest country to be in if a war were to ever break out.
"We" have Israel? Or does Israel have us? I'd like to think that Israel has us - we give them so much money it's unbelievable.
Pakistan also gets a healthy sum from the US annually. They've received 20 billion from the US since September 11th.
As deplorable as that sounds, it's a lot cheaper than say ... having to invade Pakistan to kill Bin Laden.
IIRC, we did invade Pakistan to kill Bin Laden, without the knowledge, let alone assistance, of the government of Pakistan.
By 'invade', I mean having to make a formal declaration of war.
The covert operation to kill Obama could have been interpreted as an act of war. Instead, Pakistan sat on their hands and pretended it was hunky-dory because the US essentially bought their loyalty.
Still a lot cheaper than trying to occupy a country (like Iraq).
Obama = good. Osama = bad. A common error, I know.
On August 10 2012 03:31 {CC}StealthBlue wrote: Romney is in a lose/lose situation. He can fire Andrea Saul which will mean he further looks weak and in no control of "his" campaign i.e. he looks like a puppet. Or he can keep her and piss conservatives off even more.
He's just a major fail right now, his campaign is in shambles...
He boxed himself in by pandering to too many divergent special interest groups that dictate who gets the Republican nomination, among them:
Fundamentalist, hyper-religious Christians Zionists NeoCons Norquist-No-Tax-Libertarians and Tea Partiers 'Rural' (Racist and Homophobic) Tea Partiers Evangelical Latinos Working Class white males
There's some overlap there, but also conflicting agendas that are impossible reconcile between each other and his own career history as a businessman and governor.
Let's put it this way: the reason why McCain looked so confused during the last election wasn't because he was old.
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Lightwip United States. August 09 2012 13:59. Posts 5497
{CC}StealthBlue United States. August 09 2012 14:10. Posts 15326
U.S. could stop defense spending to 0 and still be ahead of the world for many years. Outside of the completely pacifist/neutral countries, The U.S. is the safest country to be in if a war were to ever break out. 
