"Surging US economy leads global recovery"

[sandorski]

First you need to define "Defence". To me "Defence" is protecting of one's sovereign territory from Foreign invaders.

 

[charrison]

Originally posted by: WinstonSmith

Originally posted by: Ultra Quiet

would think an analysis of the world situation and the potential emergence of adversaries should be taken into account.

Who would you reccomend do this analysis? The CIA? The same CIA that gave us such great intel on Iraq (this time and last), 9/11, Khobar, USS Cole, the fall of the Berlin wall, etc., etc? I wouldn't trust the CIA to accurately predict a sunrise. We tried this little "peace dividend" experiment back in the early 90's, cutting funding to the .mil and intel communities. I don't know if you realize it or not but it wasn't a real great idea.



WS-- sorry if this is starting to look like a dog pile. That wasn't my intent.

No, I didn't take it that way UQ, and weighing these things is certainly challenging and could be frustrating. I certainly don't want to go back to the early 90's. The other posters have valid points that we use our military for other things than defense. The choice of who makes the decision is vital too.

I don't have an answer. I really haven't a clue. Still, because I don't doesn't mean it's not worth questioning. The military has come a long way in 30 years in many ways. Perhaps looking at funding and allocation would help the situation further.

Edit- One thing that brought this on is the fact (which I had forgotten) that one place makes our small arms munitions. Private companies are helping to make up for some of it, but for practical purposes if that facility were to fall to a terrorist strike, then we are out of bullets in short order. Perhaps a shifting of funding priorities would address that. This concerns me a bit.

The peace dividends on the 90s is responsable for us only having 1 munitions plant. The others were closed as cost cutting measures.

 

[dmcowen674]

Originally posted by:Ultra Quiet

Who would you reccomend do this analysis? The CIA? The same CIA that gave us such great intel on Iraq (this time and last), 9/11, Khobar, USS Cole, the fall of the Berlin wall, etc., etc?

I wouldn't trust the CIA to accurately predict a sunrise .

Excellent Quiet

Also extends to the Administration that believed the Sun won't rise because Hussein was going to launch Nukes at the U.S., Britain and Isreal.

 

[Ferocious]

I think most economists agree that this so-called recovery is due in part to a temporary prop-up by Bush and co. to get re-elected at all costs.

And we all will paying those costs.

Shame on Bush.

 

[Dman877]

Originally posted by: CADkindaGUY

Originally posted by: Dman877
If you made 500k a year and lived in any number of European nations, you would pay 50 - 70% of your income in taxes and you wouldn't need to pay for insurance because it's provided like roads are in the US.

Something I always find interesting about Reagan-ites is how they love to pick apart government spending, especially anything perceived as "the dole" but all government spending.... except defense spending. Why is that? Our yearly defense budget is going over 400 billion a year, eclipsed only by social security and its spent on planes and ships that do absolutely nothing. Meanwhile some crazy nuts fly airliners into the world trade center, 2% of industrial containers coming into the US get inspected, and we spend billions fighting wars and buying bombs that don't make us any more secure then we ever were. If you propone responsible spending, start by getting rid of the biggest pork-barrel project in the world, our massively overweight military industrial complex.

Or we could start with SS

Something I always find interesting about the "what is the gov't going to do for me" folks is that they like to take the nation's defense for granted. All the social programs in the world won't matter if we can't/won't/don't protect ourselves. Sure we could tax "the rich" at 50-70% and give everyone "free" health insurance and give everyone "free" anything else you "feel" they should get but none of that is worth a canadian penny if we don't protect this nation.

IMHO that is

CkG

The United States accounts for half of the worlds defense spending (with less then 5% of the world pop). If you ranked nations by defense spending, the US spends more then the next 10 on the list COMBINED! We could spend 10% of what we currently spend on defense and still be a superpower, immune from out-right attack. We will be just as vulnerable to terrorism whether we spend 4 billion or 4 trillion on defense though.

 

[heartsurgeon]

I think most economists agree that this so-called recovery is due in part to a temporary prop-up by Bush and co. to get re-elected at all costs.

Finally, an unbiased analysis of U.S economic policy.

I think most economists agree that the "surging US economy leads global recovery"

 

[CADsortaGUY]

Originally posted by: Dman877

Originally posted by: CADkindaGUY

Originally posted by: Dman877
If you made 500k a year and lived in any number of European nations, you would pay 50 - 70% of your income in taxes and you wouldn't need to pay for insurance because it's provided like roads are in the US.

Something I always find interesting about Reagan-ites is how they love to pick apart government spending, especially anything perceived as "the dole" but all government spending.... except defense spending. Why is that? Our yearly defense budget is going over 400 billion a year, eclipsed only by social security and its spent on planes and ships that do absolutely nothing. Meanwhile some crazy nuts fly airliners into the world trade center, 2% of industrial containers coming into the US get inspected, and we spend billions fighting wars and buying bombs that don't make us any more secure then we ever were. If you propone responsible spending, start by getting rid of the biggest pork-barrel project in the world, our massively overweight military industrial complex.

Or we could start with SS

Something I always find interesting about the "what is the gov't going to do for me" folks is that they like to take the nation's defense for granted. All the social programs in the world won't matter if we can't/won't/don't protect ourselves. Sure we could tax "the rich" at 50-70% and give everyone "free" health insurance and give everyone "free" anything else you "feel" they should get but none of that is worth a canadian penny if we don't protect this nation.

IMHO that is

CkG

The United States accounts for half of the worlds defense spending (with less then 5% of the world pop). If you ranked nations by defense spending, the US spends more then the next 10 on the list COMBINED! We could spend 10% of what we currently spend on defense and still be a superpower, immune from out-right attack. We will be just as vulnerable to terrorism whether we spend 4 billion or 4 trillion on defense though.

Sure, we might still be a "super power" but is that really the point? or is security and stability a greater concern. Here is what I said earlier in this thread:
*********

Originally posted by: CADkindaGUY

Originally posted by: WinstonSmith
OK, here ya go. We spend more on defense than the rest of the world combined IIRC. Sometimes I wonder if that is necessary in the post cold war era. How many nuke subs do we need to defeat potential enemies? We outspent the USSR once, and I wonder if we might do that to ourselves someday.

Just kicking around a thought.

OK, I'll play.

So sure, I think we could scale back operations and pull out of all but a few well placed military instillations around the globe and still be able to protect "our land". I wonder though....how exactly would the rest of the world like that? Seems to me that every time we try to pull out of somewhere there is a firestorm of criticism from somewhere. Seems to me that if we scaled back our troop levels across the globe then NATO would find themselves severely under staffed. Also what are the potential consequences, security wise, of a downsize across the globe? Would regional stability be affected by the pull-outs? Would we be able to respond quick enough and with enough force if necessary?

These are the things that we must contemplate and weigh in decisions like that. Don't get me wrong - I think there is plenty of room to remove "waste" in the defense budget, but I also think that if there is one place we need to err on the "over side" it's with defense.

Again all is IMHO

CkG

************

Regional and world stability is almost just as important as protecting our borders. Reducing us to 1/10th the size we are now might sound great on paper but it just doesn't work when really assessed for risk.

CkG