Gotta agree. The defense budget is a huge problem and a direct cause of our shortcomings at home...shitty infrastructure, poor education, non-existent healthcare, etc. It’s not an anti-troop position to take either (for anyone trying to twist it into that), most of that money never makes it to the guys on the ground, it ends up in the pockets of CEOs of big defense contractors. There was an instance during Iraq of the government refusing to outfit hummers with extra under armor to defend against roadside bombs, which led to multiple deaths that could’ve been prevented. Meanwhile there are countless examples of contractors price gouging and the government happily forking over your and my money to them. There are multiple books outlining hundreds more egregious examples. If everyone knew how the defense budget was actually spent they’d probably be sick.
Perhaps it is too much. The alternative if not enough is disaster. Improve the process all you like, but never put your Troops at risk. Never, let anyone think; maybe.
My response would be that its not the spending that is causing danger to our troops but that we have our troops in every corner of the globe and many of those places they dont really belong.
Wasnt that the point we dont need their oil, why are our troops over their fighting for it...
Who gets to choose whether the reason was righteous to begin with?
That is what we elect a President to do, the sovereign. He/she answers to the people, the electorate, thus they have the ultimate responsibility. It might be difficult to get better than this.
Just put those people to work doing something more productive. Like getting to Mars or building a moon base. Or mining asteroids etc... The money is already being wasted...
infrastructure....how about a high speed rail system from Alaska to Mexico ….a traffic system that works to stop congested traffic in cities like Portland? The French are cleaning up around the globe with high speed rail contracts we show no interest in....the one they built in Taipei virtually cleaned the air in the city and made traffic manageable....convenient transport from the coast to the mountains should boost local ski biz, coastal restaurant biz...etc..casinos...I shouldn't have to drive 3 hours from Lane county to go to a Blazer game....high speed rail would get you there in a fraction of the time.....I'd go to Portland and Bend often if there was one.
An awful lot of that expense is in military pensions and pay which happens to be higher, much higher, than the military pay levels of any other country. The average sergeant earns over $50,000 a year plus room, board, clothing allowance, laundry, private gym, Special Services benefits such as skiing and the like and a host of other benefits. Almost forgot educational assistance. Subtract all of that and our military expense isn't that great. Now, consider all that we must protect around the world. Not just principally but all the leadership, bases, and exercises. Now add on the nuclear umbrella we provide.
Absolutely. High speed rail would be a game changer.
yes sir! anytime you can take a step or more out of a process and get a better result, that's efficiency! hopefully at a lower cost!
Which reminds me, all of Boeing's military contracts had the task of improving producibility. I was tasked with monitoring producibility in our tasks at Boeing Electronic's Manufacturing Engineering. We had this one manager who refused to comply even the slightest. My boss and his boss both told me to forget about him. I look back on it and realize he was cheating the government out of what they were paying us for. It's kind of pissed me off for the last few years.
