Obama to increase defense spending beyond Reagan / Bush levels

[dmcowen674]

What are their names and locations? I have no idea what you're talking about.

You fail at Internet 101

Search engines are all working fine as well as Wiki-Pedia

 

[Nebor]

You fail at Internet 101

Search engines are all working fine as well as Wiki-Pedia

I guess it's just a talking point you're using then.

 

[dmcowen674]

I guess it's just a talking point you're using then.

The Internet and Wiki-pedia are talking points?

Besides talking points is a Republican thing.

 

[Londo_Jowo]

We could close down the four bases Bush set up

As usual talking out your ass. Please provide information on these permanent bases or STFU!

 

[Schadenfroh]

Looks like the admin caved a bit to congress, but still managed to increase defense spending with the latest budget deal.

http://www.google.com/hostednews/ap...5RxZpQ?docId=e8cc56da889042888c712e6a69be5643

The hard-fought deal negotiated by the president, House Speaker John Boehner, R-Ohio, and Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, D-Nev., calls for $513 billion for defense, a cut of $18.1 billion from what the administration envisioned but $5 billion more than last year's amount.

The total $ will increase, but it looks like it will be a bit more efficient as they are cutting several programs:

The bill calls for cuts in 759 defense programs.

 

[bamacre]

The hard-fought deal negotiated by the president, House Speaker John Boehner, R-Ohio, and Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, D-Nev., calls for $513 billion for defense, a cut of $18.1 billion from what the administration envisioned but $5 billion more than last year's amount.

WTF

It's as if Bush and Cheney never left office.

 

[Throckmorton]

This is the ONLY stimulus that Republicans will allow.

Edit: Oh wait, this is an old thread and I already posted this

 

[JS80]

WTF

more LOL for me than WTF

 

[Fern]

$5 billion more than last year's amount

I oppose the increase.

As Nebor noted above, Iraq is winding down so I think we should be able to cut some defense spending.

Fern

 

[manimal]

japan and germany should be charged for their entire footprint base wise. Does anyone else thing its preposterous for japan to hold over a trillion of our debt and we give them half off their military bases?


BTW ww2 was a half century ago...

 

[werepossum]

Looks like the admin caved a bit to congress, but still managed to increase defense spending with the latest budget deal.

http://www.google.com/hostednews/ap...5RxZpQ?docId=e8cc56da889042888c712e6a69be5643

The total $ will increase, but it looks like it will be a bit more efficient as they are cutting several programs:

Makes sense considering that we are now fighting in a third theater. Air power is especially expensive.

This does show the problem with fighting wars on the cheap. If I had my druthers every authorization to use force would have to include the phrase "We declare war on " (hopefully filled in with a name) and an immediate surcharge on everyone's income and capital gains tax to pay for it. That way we wouldn't have to kill needed defense projects to pay for these wars and everyone would have "skin in the game".

 

[Throckmorton]

Wait, why do we have bases in Japan and Germany?

 

[boomerang]

Gee Wally, it sounds like those Democrats are nothing but a bunch of war-mongers.

 

[xj0hnx]

Wait, why do we have bases in Japan and Germany?

Germany is at least a logistical jump point to ...everywhere. Also having medical facilities there for our injured is a lot better coming out of theater than having to truck them all the way to the states, and maybe back again, but there is definitely room to cut, hell I know for a fact that a few units weren't just moved from there, they were completely deactivated, and the bases given either back to the locals, or different services.

 

[Schadenfroh]

The House panel overseeing defense spending has approved Obama's request, it is moving forward.

http://www.cnbc.com/id/43015302

The Armed Services panel voted 60 to 1 to authorize $553 billion of the total for the Defense Department's base budget, matching President Barack Obama's request sent to Congress in February.

Although, it looks like Congress might try to block some of the defense spending, similar to how they shaved the request made by Obama for 2011

The House Appropriations Committee, which is responsible for writing the 13 bills that actually fund the government, said on Wednesday it tentatively planned to shave $8.9 billion from Obama's request for the Pentagon's core budget.
...
Congress provided $668.6 billion for the U.S. military complex and wars in fiscal 2011, down from $709 billion requested by Obama.

Unfortunately, politicians seeking pork for their home state, are trying to shove projects down the throat of the army.

http://abcnews.go.com/Politics/budget-cuts-army-plan-halt-abrams-tank-production/story?id=13582237

The Army says taxpayers could save $1.3 billion in the defense spending bill for fiscal year 2012 if lawmakers agreed to temporarily shutter the nation's only tank production facility in Lima, Ohio, for at least three years, starting in 2013.
...
"We've got a very fit and complete fleet that we'll have at this time. And that's what has caused us to stop buying something that we no longer need," Lt. Gen. Robert Lennox, the Army's deputy chief of staff, told a Senate committee last month.
...
General Dynamics has told lawmakers that closing and reopening the plant four years later would cost $300,000 more than continuing limited production over the same period.
...
The Army estimated closing the plant and reopening it later would not cost more than $800 million, while keeping the plant running at a minimal level would cost roughly $2.1 billion.
...
But with U.S. defense spending expected to top $700 billion this year -- twice the amount spent 10 years ago -- critics say programs such as the Abrams tank line shouldn't be immune from cuts to help trim the federal deficit.

Also, I hear that they are trying to revive the other pork project that the military does not want, the alternative F-35 engine, ugg....

 

[Jhhnn]

As usual, I think there's a lot of confusion wrt budget numbers and actual spending, particularly during the Bush years, when enormous expenditures were placed off budget to make the numbers look good to people who didn't know the difference. It's called creative accounting.

Last year, the Obama Admin put the war costs on budget, unlike their predecessor, which makes the numbers look worse, but is actually more honest. I doubt this is any different.

Defense spending is the porkiest part of the budget, imho, particularly since most of it isn't about actual defense of the nation, but rather about defense of american business interests abroad.

Rome had similar issues towards the end of their empire. They had so many troops tied up in garrison duty that it limited their options and drained their finances, too... At last count, the US maintains ~1000 military bases worldwide... so many that nobody really knows for sure...

 

[classy]

Mistake

 

[senseamp]

It's a jobs program. If Republicans are going to block all the other ways to create jobs, Obama is going to go through defense spending.

 

[Jhhnn]

It's a jobs program. If Republicans are going to block all the other ways to create jobs, Obama is going to go through defense spending.

Indeed. Reagan did much the same, as did GWB. The economy has been hooked on creating implements of death & then burying them somewhere in the desert for a very long time...