Greenwald on the New Military Economy
Mort Zuckerman
BELOW
================================
They - the Secret Govt (CIA, Heiney
and the Krolls) -
http://www.actionlyme.org/100120.htm
want everyone to get a dot
guv job.
Me? I am applying for the Directorship
of Homelame Stupidity, since I am obviously
better at detecting spies and fools who
expose our/USA illegal bioweapons secrets
than anyone we know in US History.
For instance, I'da throwd the likes of
Sweeg and Durland in
http://www.actionlyme.org/GOLDWATER_LETTER.htm
http://www.actionlyme.org/USDOJ_COMPLAINT_RICO.htm
jail, and allowed people with Lyme to be
treated, rather than have the whole Pam3Cys
"Stealth Disabler"
http://panindigan.tripod.com/aidsdodhear.html
http://www.actionlyme.org/JohnDunn_Brookhaven.htm
thing explode... and the likes of the
SUPERbanksters investing in Chinese medical
science:
http://www.highbeam.com/doc/1G1-216551468.html
They could have kept up the charade
if they hadn't decide to torture Lyme
and GWI victims.
If *I* get to be Super Chief Homelamer,
I will keep Yale, the CDC and their Kaiser
business partners out of the loop:
http://www.actionlyme.org/CDCS_PARTICIPATION_IN_LYME_CRIMES.htm
http://www.actionlyme.org/CONNOLLY_FISH_WEINSTEIN.htm
No Weinsteiners, No CDC, No Yale, No
Psychopathic Entomologists:
http://www.actionlyme.org/PIIB.htm
Kathleen M. Dickson
http://www.actionlyme.org
http://www.relapsingfever.org
==================================
http://www.commondreams.org/view/2010/01/26-2
Published on Tuesday, January 26, 2010 by Salon.com
The Sanctity of Military Spending
by Glenn Greenwald
Administration officials announced last night that the President, in
tomorrow's State of the Union address, will propose a multi-year
freeze on certain domestic discretionary spending programs. This is
an "initiative intended to signal his seriousness about cutting the
budget deficit," officials told The New York Times.
But the freeze is more notable for what it excludes than what it
includes. For now, it does not include the largest domestic spending
programs: Medicare, Medicaid and Social Security. And all "security-
releated programs" are also exempted from the freeze, which means it
does not apply to military spending, the intelligence budget, the
Surveillance State, or foreign military aid. As always, the notion of
decreasing the deficit and national debt through reductions in
military spending is one of the most absolute Washington taboos. What
possible rationale is there for that?
The facts about America's bloated, excessive, always-increasing
military spending are now well-known. The U.S. spends almost as much
on military spending as the entire rest of the world combined, and
spends roughly six times more than the second-largest spender, China.
Even as the U.S. sunk under increasingly crippling levels of debt over
the last decade, defense spending rose steadily, sometimes
precipitously. That explosion occurred even as overall military
spending in the rest of the world decreased, thus expanding the
already-vast gap between our expenditures and the world's. As one
"defense" spending watchdog group put it: "The US military budget was
almost 29 times as large as the combined spending of the six 'rogue'
states (Cuba, Iran, Libya, North Korea, Sudan and Syria) who spent
$14.65 billion." To get a sense for how thoroughly military spending
dominates our national budget, consider this chart showing where
Americans' tax revenue goes:
* Continue Reading
Since much of that overall spending is mandatory, military spending --
all of which is discretionary -- accounts for over 50% of
discretionary government spending. Yet it's absolutely forbidden to
even contemplate reducing it as a means of reducing our debt or
deficit. To the contrary, Obama ran on a platform of increasing
military spending, and that is one of the few pledges he is faithfully
and enthusiastically filling (while violating his pledge not to use
deceitful budgetary tricks to fund our wars):
President Barack Obama will ask Congress for an additional $33
billion to fight unpopular wars in Afghanistan and Iraq on top of a
record $708 billion for the Defense Department next year, The
Associated Press has learned.
In sum, as we cite our debtor status to freeze funding for things such
as "air traffic control, farm subsidies, education, nutrition and
national parks" -- all programs included in Obama's spending freeze --
our military and other "security-related" spending habits become more
bloated every year, completely shielded from any constraints or
reality. This, despite the fact that it is virtually impossible for
the U.S. to make meaningful progress in debt reduction without serious
reductions in our military programs.
Public opinion is not a legitimate excuse for this utterly irrational
conduct, as large percentages of Americans are receptive to reducing
-- or at least freezing -- defense spending. A June, 2009 Pew
Research poll asked Americans what they would do about defense
spending, and 55% said they would either decrease it (18%) or keep it
the same (37%); only 40% wanted it to increase. Even more notably, a
2007 Gallup poll found that "the public's view that the federal
government is spending too much on the military has increased
substantially this year, to its highest level in more than 15 years."
In that poll, 58% of Democrats and 47% of Independents said that
military spending "is too high" -- and the percentages who believe
that increased steadily over the last decade for every group.
The clear fact is that, no matter how severe are our budgetary
constraints, military spending and all so-called "security-related
programs" are off-limits for any freezes, let alone decreases.
Moreover, the modest spending freeze to be announced by Obama tomorrow
is just the start; the Washington consensus has solidified and is
clearly gearing up for major cuts in Social Security, Medicare and
Medicaid, with the dirty work to be done by an independent "deficit
commission." It's time for "everyone" to sacrifice and suffer some
more -- as long as "everyone" excludes our vast military industry, the
permanent power factions inside the Pentagon and intelligence
community, our Surveillance and National Security State, and the
imperial policies of perpetual war which feed them while further
draining the lifeblood out of the country.
UPDATE: I just saw this scary headline on MSNBC, became very
frightened, and have changed my mind, as I now realize we need to
massively increase our military spending to Stay Safe!!!
The Washington Post is hyping the same report. Apparently, it's
breaking news -- meriting screaming red-alert headlines -- that Al
Qaeda would like to ("aims to") acquire WMDs and use them against the
U.S. But we should all try to remain a little calm, at least. I'm
sure if we just buy some more fighter jets, create some better
underground bombs, invade a few more Muslim countries, keep more
Muslims imprisoned forever with no charges, give the Pentagon, the CIA
and their private contractors a lot more unaccounted-for cash and stay
out of their way, expand our domestic spying networks even further
through private sector telecom contracts, pour tens of billions of
dollars more into the coffers of our Middle East client states, and
kill a few more civilians with drones, this problem will be handled.
It's just a matter of making sure we bulk up our military budget --
and Look Forward, not Backward to what was done in the past -- and
we'll be able to Stay Safe from this Terrorist-WMD menace.
As for the deficit, no need to worry about that. We can just freeze
programs for national parks and cut Social Security and Medicare.
© 2010 Salon.com
Glenn Greenwald was previously a constitutional law and civil rights
litigator in New York. He is the author of the New York Times
Bestselling book "How Would a Patriot Act?," a critique of the Bush
administration's use of executive power, released in May 2006. His
second book, "A Tragic Legacy", examines the Bush legacy.