They can try making real cuts in defense spending, for example three different Weapons Systems to nuke the Soviet Union (subs, air, surface missiles), which country has not existed for 26 years anyway, is probably too many! They can try relying upon just two as Barney Frank has said!
But such Common Sense remedies to complex budget difficulties have never caught fire with anyone. So, stalemate, because they’'re not at all serious about this!
“No one wants to see bases close,” Speier said. “But we have a certain pot of money and we’ve got to use it smartly.”
This. You’ve got over $600 billion, more than all of the next top countries combined. The gravy train is over, or damn well should be. Cut or scale back a few of those massively expensive weapons systems, close some bases, adapt to a new reality.
What happened to the sequester?
Black guy’s second term ended.
It’s still in force. Republicans want to get rid of it, but only for defense spending, which is a deal-breaker for Democrats.
I have to admit, I’m looking forward to watching this play out.
The Pentagon never has enough money. No matter how much we spend, they’re always $10B short of a crisis.
Big hurdles? I guess the Republicans haven’t figured out the big tax break for high-earners to go with it yet!
Right?
There is never enough money for the military industrial complex.
Talk about feeding the beast.
Yep if you talk to “Senior Commanders” the problem is money and the “need to modernize”(re: stealth tanks! And other “future war” bullshit)…
Talk to us enlisted… the problem is sending us to foreign countries to fight for bullshit for 14 years and spending billions of dollars on idiotic weapon systems we neither want nor need, while things we actually need are “just not in the budget” like body armor, and fucking toilet paper, and computers from something like this goddamn century.
This is a terribly constructed piece. All it does is quote heroin addicts who complain about the dwindling supply heroin rather than their insatiable appetite for the stuff and how they need more before they get hives. Honestly, does this stuff belong on TPM? If you are going to do a story pushing the notion how the military was led into disarray by Obama (RW tallking point) without being crystal clear that no other nation on earth comes any where close to this nation’s military capacity, technology, weaponry, and infrastructure, you are carrying the water of the MIC. Money doesn’t buy love or security. It feathers the nests of the revolving door of military armament suppliers who were former military employees. How about a history of the budget busting military budgets that were frittered away on a $2 trillion war of choice and $1k toilet seats and hammers. The utter waste of resources sunk into not just redundant bases but complete boondoggles like the F-35 aircraft that cost $500 billion are enough to make clear those crocodile tears are pathetic.
The military doesn’t need a bigger budget. They just need to have Chiselin’ Trump personally negotiate all of their deals with their suppliers. He would make fabulous deals that would cut the military budget at least in half. The next step would be to claim that the delivered work was shoddy and then refuse to pay for it. That would effectively reduce the military budget to zero. Problem solved!
Lots a spending…yep Very traditional gop value right there… yah, very traditional.
(Head in hands)
I really miss him.
Where is Ike when we need him?
Man, if we can’t get by on $600-plus billion, imagine the dire straits China and Russia are in. They have only a fraction of that to spend on defense.
That too. My problem with this piece is did not find a single source within the military to comment on how the military has been frittering away its resources for decades. Even good ol’ Rummy wanted to reduce bases and ground troops in order to focus military capacity on asymmetrical threats. Of course that strategy was jettisoned with the Iraq War fiasco but there used to be a faction of clear thinking types in the military who at least didn’t want to piss money away on capacity that would never be used because it was a relic before it ever saw action. With all the leaking going on these days, you would think the reporter could have used his sources to find people within the military to give this alternate view, instead of playing the Jackie Speier liberal Californian card.
A little internet searching reveals why. Lardner is in the tank for the military.
Richard Lardner is an international investigations reporter for the Associated Press.
> Prior to working for the Associated Press, he was the general manager of Inside Washington Publishers’ Defense Group in which he published six defense newsletters that covered budgets and programs of the U.S. Defense Department.
We should just give all of our money to the military. They’ll use what they need and give the surplus back to us.
I’m sure it will all work out.
“No one wants to see bases close,” Speier said.
I do. If they’re deemed unnecessary, I want them closed ASAP.
The problem, of course, is that there has never been a Congressman who agreed that the decision to close a base within their district was justified.
I am afraid that soon we will be spending so much money on the military to defend the military, instead of America.