“What the reporter thought was a toilet set was a structural part of the aircraft that the toilet seat was attached to, the toilet seat was only $12.”
Keith is correct.
While that idiot reporter’s misinformation was reported on page 1 and has been repeated ad infinitum, the later retraction of the story got virtually no publicity. And, that bogus story has been repeated for so long that it is now part of many adults’ lists of “truths”, even though it was never true.
Just as left-wing anti-military types cite that misinformation as “proof” that military spending is out of control, right-wing types frequently cite my other favorite bit of misinformation, namely, the McDonald’s “Hot Coffee Case” as “proof” that we need tort reform. Those of both political extremes take misinformation and spread it like manure on the field of human thought in order to grow their own twisted causes.
As Joseph Goebbels, the Nazi Propaganda Minister said, When you lie, make sure that your lies are big ones, and then keep repeating that lie until it becomes truth in the minds of most people.
The military/political collusion is the black hole of the federal budget. Every senator and representative has a constituency dependent on some part of the military budget and joins in the mutually profitable gambit of supporting any spending that benefits colleagues and in return they support his.
I am curious, @texases. Do you post the bogus charts and graphs that manipulate the FICA component to propagandize for the right wing to the gullible or do you actually fall for the gibberish yourself?
Those, and these, charts are 100% factual, as far as I know, and FICA was included. Your link conveniently leaves out the lions share of spending, for social programs.
If you have facts, fine. Leave the insults at home.
Those of us who have had to develop programs compliant with DOD-480 configuration controls, and have had to design and run qualification testing (heat vibration, impact, sand and dust, etc. etc.) to the various design and environmental requirements, understand why the military pays seemingly so much for seemingly simply items. But the requirements are there for a reason. Remove them and some poor troop will inevitably find himself in the field or in flight with a part or a wrench that doesn’t fit, or a rusting wheel trunion, or a toilet seat that shatters when he sits down.
But 100% of these expendatures should be based on the military’s mission requirements. None of it should be based on some politician wanting to bring money to his/her district.
In 2000 the budget was 2T. Today it's 3T? And defense spending percent stayed the same? So defense spending went up 50%?
Little problem with understanding 7th grade math??
If overall spending increased 50% AND the defense spending percentage (as compared to the rest of the budget) stayed the same…then YES…defense spending went up 50%.
Example.
Using YOUR numbers…
If the budget in 2000 was $2 Trillion and the defense budget was 30% of the overall budget…that would equal an amount of $600 Billion.
And today the budget is $3 Trillion and again the defense budget was 30% of the overall budget…that would equal an amount of $900 Billion.
So YES defense spending increased by 50% OR a total of $300 Billion since 2000.
Which is MORE then the next highest 12 countries COMBINED.
By the way, I owe you a response to your charts on the cost of housing and cars vs income. I just haven’t gotten there yet. Been busy preparing for retirement.
It would be impossible to contrive a chart of any sort that would convey the economic situation we are in and the possible results of continuing on the current course or changing course, @texases. It is quite obvious that the chart you posted was contrived to convince people that social programs are the downfall of the nation. Many don’t buy it though.
The Fed continues to print money and feeds it through the banks making them wealthier and pumping Wall St. The seeds for inflation are planted and watered and the results are only visible on the ticker to a small degree so far but when inflation comes rushing in will the Fed be as helpless in controlling it as they have been in stimulating growth? Who has suffered the most since the crash of 2008? Who has benefited the most since the crash of 2008? Who will suffer and who will profit from the inflation that seems inevitable?
“It is quite obvious that the chart you posted was contrived to convince people that social programs are the downfall of the nation. Many don’t buy it though.”
If facts are ‘contrived’, or don’t fit your preconceptions, then maybe it’s not the facts that need to be examined.
My point is that the defense budget isn’t the source of all, or even most, of our budget problems, and focusing on it instead of the entire budget guarantees failure at solving the budget problems.
Should we minimize waste? Absolutely. Should the Congress follow the recommendations of the armed forces on how to spend those very limited $$. Yes. But to think that government waste is isolated to the armed forces is just plain wrong, don’t you think? And the more money we cycle through the government, the more will be drained off by groups of all kind.
An adequate national defense is without question the first priority of government, @texases. And I recognized that the hammer, toilet seat, etc., were just sensationalism from the Peace at any price crowd on the far left.
Our military, like the environmentalist movement, has for the most part passed the point of diminishing returns. The enemy that is most often in the sights of the Pentagon is the waning of fear among voters who are more and more recognizing that the financial crisis far outweighs the threat from foreign aggression. We are being sold a bill of goods by the military industrial complex just as Ike warned us. The Pentagon should have sold the USMC base in San Diego when real estate prices were at the top.
I don’t think it’s the military/industrial complex that’s selling us the “bill of goods” in the case of the subject tanks. It’s the self-serving unethical politicians.
While you folks argue about which chart is correct, you should be worried more about the interest rate. With our current level of debt, if the interest rate goes up much at all, we will be in serious budget trouble. We need to get the budget under control and that means cutting back in all areas including section 8, social programs, bus stop grants, and so on. I can’t believe when we have this great opportunity now to actually do something about controling the budget, we are just throwing it away. This is irresponsible.
Absolutely no one has ever cut the debt by cutting programs and govt. expenditures alone It has never been done in our history after a severe recession or depression and every economist will tell you there is only one proven method of eventually cutting the deficit. You must grow the economy, put people to work by proper investment. That has little to do with investing in the military. It has to do with things like the GI Bill in the past and education in general and infrastructure and appropriate technology. Most successful businesses had to invest and not cut back before the grew. It is not only common sense but seems counter intuitive to everyone but those who want to cut, cut, cut…everything but the military. What did we do to get out of any depression ? Invest in our people, social programs, infrastructure and education.
The single biggest step to growing the economy is going to single payer national healthcare and taking healthcare off the backs of businesses in our employer based system. No other country straps their small businesses with that responsibility and it alone is the BIGGEST obstacle to full employment. The single payer then controls costs of healthcare while allowing businesses which have to make contributions to significantly increase wages and hire more people. It is an absolute no brainier solution un recognized by those us without one.
Lets get the special rate for capital gains eliminated, Bing. That would be a good faith effort by the right to show they are sincere in wanting to reduce the deficit. 30 years ago the Republican Party assured US that deficits were no problem whatsoever as long as they financed growth through reduced taxes on the wealthy.
No arguement on single payer and no arguement on the cap gains rate either. Most of my stuff is taxed as ordinary income like I think it all should be. I understand the growth argument too except as we have had growth, we just continue to expand expenses rather than reduce the debt. The idea was way back, that you’d over-spend in a recessionary time and pay it back when the economy improved. The problem is we never do.
I don’t even have a problem borrowing for major infra-structure that will pay back in the future. That’s just smart. Roads, bridges, electrical grid, schools, telecommunications, and so on are worthwhile long term investments. But I think throwing money at section 8, EPA over-regulation, school testing, and on and on, is just throwing money out the window. Taking money from Joe who would spend it locally, and giving it to the feds to give it to someone else to spend, really doesn’t help the economy and just makes Joe mad and the receiver more dependant.
It just keeps getting worse. The latest is trying to help kids through the University by providing additional grants and loans but these have to also be made available to ILLEGAL aliens because we cannot discriminate. How silly. I have to pay for the tuition of an illegal alien? Makes no sense and that’s just one of many examples where common sense has just been thrown out the window.
"The single biggest step to growing the economy is going to single payer national healthcare and taking healthcare off the backs of businesses in our employer based system."
Do you work for the insurance industry? To have affordable healthcare, we need a system like the British National Health service. Adding a layer of management (insurance) does not reduce costs.
Rod and texases are an example of the Fairfax Law. Any facts that support your side of the argument are “fair facts”.
