Some ground truth on the military sequestration

[Redfish]

How does our military protect this country, when they're
not physically in the country they're defending?​

We park a carrier off the coast, along with a couple of subs loaded with cruise missiles. much cheaper than a full time base.

 

[Redfish]

The other dirty little secret about that HUGE defense cut if Congress doesn't find a way to stop it? It will actually be a $110 billion INCREASE in defense spending? It will just be a large reduction in what they otherwise would spend?

The $995 billion Sequester Cut Is Actually a $110 Billion Spending Increase - Forbes

Right, its not a CUT, its a cut to the increase.

 

[Billo_Really]

We park a carrier off the coast, along with a couple of subs loaded with cruise missiles. much cheaper than a full time base.

We have enough nukes to kill the population of the world 37 times, I think we're safe.

 

[Redfish]

We park a carrier off the coast, along with a couple of subs loaded with cruise missiles. much cheaper than a full time base.

We have enough nukes to kill the population of the world 37 times, I think we're safe.

my point exactly. close the bases, stop wasting money and pumping dollars into another country's economy.

 

[Billo_Really]

my point exactly. close the bases, stop wasting money and pumping dollars into another country's economy.

We've spent over a trillion dollars in these two bullshit wars and got nothing in return.

 

[longknife]

Wasn't it Ike who warmed about the Military/Industrial Complex a few decades ago?

 

[Billo_Really]

Wasn't it Ike who warmed about the Military/Industrial Complex a few decades ago?

That is correct!

 

[Redfish]

my point exactly. close the bases, stop wasting money and pumping dollars into another country's economy.

We've spent over a trillion dollars in these two bullshit wars and got nothing in return.

What did we get out of Viet Nam? 50,000 dead americans and billions of wasted dollars. Iraq and Afghanistan will have the same result.

We are incapable of learning from history, we keep making the same stupid mistakes.

Obama is lying about the consequences of sequestration. If it happens, no one will notice, it will have zero affect on anyone. The lying bastard is using this as a political tool to brainwash the mindless and destroy the GOP.

 

[Foxfyre]

After President Obama magnanimously pledged to veto all pork barrel spending in sppropriations bill, one of his first major duties as President in 2009 was to sign a pork laden appropriations bill. He justified it because they were still working with a Bush budget. Little or none of the pork in that appropriations bill, however, had been budgeted.

In 2010 Obama magnanimously pledged to the Veterans of Foreign Wars to take care of necessary defense, including taking care of the veterans, but would veto any and all unnecessary, wasteful, or non defense related spending included in the defense appropriation.

Soon after he signed off on still another pork laden defense appropriations bill.

In all, Congress added in 1,720 pet projects, including:

∙$5 million for a visitors center in San Francisco
∙$23 million for indigent health care in Hawaii
∙$18 million for the Edward Kennedy Policy Institute in Massachusetts
∙$1.6 million to computerize hospital records in Oakland
∙$47 million for anti-drug training centers around the country
∙$20 million for the World War II Museum in Louisiana
∙$3.9 million grant to develop an energy-efficient solar film for buildings
∙$800,000 for minority prostate cancer research
∙$3.6 million for marijuana eradication in Kentucky
∙$2.4 million for handicap access and a sprinkler system at a community club in New York

Lawmakers also added $5 billion for two destroyers, 10 C-17 cargo planes and to develop a jet engine the Pentagon neither wants nor needs. Critics call it classic pork -- projects that may save jobs, but not money.

"There is a reason they are added to the Defense appropriations bill, because everyone in Congress knows this is a must-pass piece of legislation", said Todd Harrison, a budget studies fellow at the Center for Strategic and Budgetary Assessments.

Despite the billions in pork, the White House says it's making progress. The earmarking total is 14 percent lower than it was on last year's defense bill, and the Obama administration says federal agencies found more than $19 billion in contract savings for 2010. The president has also succeeded in killing funding for the pricy F-22 Joint Strike Fighter and a new presidential helicopter.

Members of Congress are also defending their earmarks. Senator John Kerry, D-Mass., who added the Ted Kennedy Institute to the defense budget, says it is a tribute to the late Senator's leadership on military technology and safety for our troops.

Senator Mary Landrieu, D-La., says she was "proud" to secure $20 million for a new wing of the National World War II museum in her home state.

Read more: Tracking Your Taxes: Defense Bill Pays for Prostate Screenings, Sprinkler System | Fox News

If you look at appropriations in 2011 and 2012, you see no improvement in this pitiful scenario. And the GOP's hands aren't clean on this either. They stick as much as they can into a defense bill that Congress doesn't dare not pass and the President does't dare to refuse to sign.

Until we take away Congress's and the President's ability to buy votes by using our money to hand out goodies, nothing is likely to change.