Budget time again, and this is about more of the same ol’ same ol’. No wonder we don’t have money for things like feeding the homeless (illegal in Las Vegas anyway), health care and so on.
Chris Kelly: Watching the Submarine Races
I like submarines the way some people like that Frank O. Gehry crap. There’s no rational way to defend it, and I’m not going to try.
But even I can see that we don’t need to spend $2.5 billion on a stealthy new Virginia class attack submarine.
Still, there it is, in the new budget. Along with the stealth fighter, the stealth destroyer and the Marine Corps’ incredible tilt-wing V-22 Osprey, that takes off like a helicopter, flies like an airplane, and crashes like a fireball.
The budget also includes $15.9 billion for star wars weapons, in case Boston ever has to defend itself against guerilla marketing from space.
But there’s something that sticks out about $2.5 billion for another submarine. Maybe it’s because ships are traditionally called “she,” you know, like welfare queens.
Part of the justification for building another attack submarine — to go with the 55 we have — is, “Why the hell not?” It’s money we’d otherwise just blow on the growing rate of infant mortality. The other reason, and this isn’t one of those “top” secrets, is that it makes work in Connecticut and Virginia.
Actually submarines are probably more valuable then any other type of ship with the exception of carriers. They are unseen, can deliver awesome weapons payload and can go anywhere in the worlds oceans.
I know some will argue we don’t need this, but remember, China is on the move and relations with Russia could go full on cold war status in a moments notice, especially with Putin in charge.
The Osprey you mentioned is a different story. Its just some Marine General’s pet project, no matter how big of a piece of shit it is.
asymmetrical politics. the people who are for the submarine – the pols in the states where it is built – have a BIG stake in keeping it. the people against the submarine – anyone who realizes that the US’s absolute naval supremacy doesn’t require it and the money could be spent on something that we actually DO need – do not have as big a stake in the fight. to them, it is just another $2.5B wasted out of many. they can be bought off with their own Pentagon pork project.
thus, the people for it win.
Do people really care how big the government budget is as long as they have a job and pay very little in taxes?
The Military Industrial Complex is alive and well. It’s ironic that President Eisenhower, the former military general alerted us to the threat in his farewell address. I guess he would know better than anybody. His farewell address is a good read and hauntingly applicable even today. What better way to grease the wheels of the MIC than to create imaginary enemies and go to war.
than to create imaginary enemies and go to war.
What utopian and unrealistic thinking. Good thing you’re not running the government.
We would get more for our tax monies building up our “human infrastructure” instead of feeding the Military Industrial Complex.
What would have been a better investment of tax dollars:
1.) Investing in alternative, clean and efficient energy sources (fusion, hydrogen, solar) or, investing in weapons system to invade countries to protect our sources of oil.
2.) Investing in world class public education (vouchers, pell grants) so our leaders will have brains enough to say no to war or, again investing in weapons system to invade countries to protect our sources of oil.
3.) Investing in world class government labs to help fuel our economy with innovations or again investing in weapons system to invade countries to protect our sources of oil.
Unfortunately boob tube Americans enable/encourage our government to invest in weapons system to invade countries to protect our sources of oil, instead of investing in people.
American innovations which used to be our powerful economic engine, (Bell Lab, Watson Lab, Glidden labs, Silicon Valley ….) are being moved to offshore manufacturing because companies can hire people with no say at slave labour wages, that’s our new democracy.
It’s ironic, the only country we will manage to “bomb back into the stone age” is our own. The world used to think our military was world class, but given our record in Vietnam, Iraq, Korea and numerous previous campaigns in South America and Somalia who are we fooling, ourself.
We are approaching the point were we literally don’t own our future, because foreign countries (china, middle east …) will own more of our countries infrastructure then we do.
This country was founded on investing in “human infrastructure”, because we wanted an informed participatory democracy. Now all we want are ill informed avaricious consumers to enrich the upper class. I don’t see us lasting another 200 yrs. WAKE UP!!
The world used to think our military was world class, but given our record in Vietnam, Iraq, Korea and numerous previous campaigns in South America and Somalia who are we fooling, ourself.
The only one fooling themselves is you if you think our military is incapable of obliterating any of the countries you mentioned if it wanted to. It was politics and fear of world reaction that tempered our military. One Ohio class missile submarine could reduce all those countries to ash in less then an hour. We are and have been afraid to release the full power of the weapon systems we have spent our tax dollars on.
We would get more for our tax monies building up our “human infrastructure” instead of feeding the Military Industrial Complex.
I’m laughing even harder with this comment that the one above. Don’t think for one minute that our government wouldn’t find some other pork barrel useless program or project to waste our money if it wasn’t spent on the military. At least with the military you can see something tangible. Pork projects often put the cash right into the pockets of our shithead pols.
No matter how many glitzy weapons of war we produce it won’t change the fact that two hundred years from now the dirt under our feet will still be here, but it probably won’t be called America and the dominant ethnicity will be either Hispanic or Oriental. For whatever reasons the Caucasians are not breeding fast enough to maintain a numerical advantage over the other races and in nature numbers count. What kind of life these folks will have is unclear, but I seriously doubt they’ll be living in some kind of technological utopia. More like fuedal baronies with the barons using high tech weaponry to hold the peasants in dirty, starving bondage while they eat high off the hog.
#7 (gquaglia) if your laughing, it’s an idiots laugh, as you are obviously very dull.
The weapon launch platform, for an ICBM by example, doesn’t change the nature of a nuclear explosion, be it a submerged sub or whatever. So if your criteria is: the ability to “reduce all those countries to ash in less then an hour ” then we are on par with other nuclear powers. If you had a brain you would have noticed 9/11 demonstrated very plainly that subs, ICBMs or satellites are not needed to deliver a weapon on target.
If you think US military spending since WWII is not filled with pork barrel, you are indeed very dull. If you think Americans get tangible results only from our military spending as opposed to domestic spending again your ignorant of facts. If you graphed education level of US vs. military spending you would see our education level has gone down while our military spending has gone up. If you graphed a countries education level vs. military spending by country you see the US way out spends other countries yet our education level is ranked near the bottom.
Noname, you sound like an uniformed Keynesian –
1 & 3.) Investing into alternative sources – Throwing money at a problem will not always yield the best result. Instead a lot of economists, mainly supporters of pigovian taxes, suggest that taxing fossil fuel consumption should be made greater. At the same time the federal income tax should be lowered to balance out the aggregate negative effects; leading initially to a zero sum game (Acknowledged, that the poor or those that do not pay a high income tax will not benefit initially). This would give incentives for people to change their energy consumption patterns, and if they can choose more efficient cars, heaters, light bulbs, T.V.’s, & ect, their real wage will increase. This heightened demand will foster greater incentives to invent (increase supply) in more efficient fossil fuel consuming products.
2.) Funding for Pell Grants have increased – (from CNN.com) “President Bush’s 2008 budget will include a proposal for the biggest hike in Pell grants for low-income college students in three decades.” As a side note, statistical studies have shown that just increasing funding into poor performing schools does not always cause higher performance; there are several other variables that need to be accounted for.
Your point on outsourcing jobs is ignorant. These firms out-source because it is more efficient for them and the foreign recipient, and those outsourced high-tech jobs are the envy of people in under-developed countries.
“This country was founded on investing in “human infrastructure”, because we wanted an informed participatory democracy.” Actually, this country was initially founded on slavery, indentured servitude, and rich land owners.
Your points on graphing military spending vs. education levels is incomplete and inconclusive. Heres a quote from the OECD study on educational funding among all 20 members, “The United States spends $11,152 per student. That’s the second highest amount, behind the $11,334 spent by Switzerland.”
I find the USA abit dence on the subject of fighting.
They would rather pick up the biggest ROCK and throw it, in a fight, then to understand you only need to take out a FEW. I would rather Throw 10,000 Little rocks and hit MORE, then to miss my target.
So, what, we have a new Submarine, WHAT can it do?
We were astounded when Russia fell, and we had a chance to see the Russian subs…At last count it was noted that we had the ability to track only 1/2 of the ones that came into the sea.(go read up).
so what we make a sub that can race at 40+ knots under water. That ISNT being silent, deadly, or anything NEAR it. It makes a great target.
So what it can fire cruse missles from 2000 miles away…It cant carry enough to hit EVERYthing, we want to kill, and not need reloads.
NOW…
Build a Sub BASE underwater In the Mid pacific…and I just might, Kiss someone..
Gee. Social engineering or empire building. Why can’t I just keep my property?