Another Bit of Silence Regarding the Crushing US Defense Budget
Op-Ed Columnist – The Tea Kettle Movement – NYTimes.com
And it would require us to reduce some services — like Social Security — while expanding others, like education and research for a 21st-century economy.
What really steams me here is yet another well regarded writer only including the safety-net entitlement when mentioning cuts. Why so few opinion makers and nary a politician regard the defense budget when talking of cuts in our overall national budget is beyond me.
I am not a policy expert, wonk, or researcher, but rather just a ticked off citizen. I’ve long railed against our national priorities and the anger I see on the right side of the aisle at the left and vice versa. There is zero dialog on who we really want to be in the new world. Do we only want to be seen as a war mongering state, leaving our military outposts in countries which haven’t seen war in multiple generations? Do we continue an attempt to tie our defense spending to a percentage of GDP while other matters of civil life are left crumbling? This is who we are as a people?
We need to pull our troops out of Germany, Japan, Korea, and other nations first. Then get on quickly with the task of getting completely out of the Middle East entirely. Leave it to the world to work on, we are in dire straits. But while we are planning the logistics of pulling out of countries we fought in 60 years ago immediately start cutting weapons platforms. Keep the good, practical stuff by using honest field data — we have a lot of information about what works and doesn’t work after 9 years of war. Don’t build our military for every contingency possible.
I like the simple answer: the U.S. currently out spends the trailing 15 or so countries in total military expenditure at a per capita rate of $2100.00! Let’s cut that in half and only spend more than the trailing 7 or 8 countries combined for a total of $1050.00.
Just look at the breakdown of discretionary spending and tell me why someone would leave defense out of the conversation? http://www.armscontrolcenter.org/policy/securityspending/articles/fy09_dod_request_discretionary/