War is 60% of our budget. That's the ONLY place cuts need to come from.

[grahamhgreen]

The wars have ended, lets get that money back before we starve the elderly.

Cutting Social Security makes no sense, since SOCIAL SECURITY DOES NOT ADD ONE NICKEL TO THE DEFICIT.

On Edit: I feel compelled to keep posting this stuff, since the arguments seem to have gotten down into the the weeds with that Fiscal Bluff/chained CPI nonsense.

[treestar]

1. Totally agreed

If only the House of Representatives did.

[uponit7771]

2. If it's military "RELATED" expenses then it's even more than 60% CIA, DIA, NSA etc...

...are part of that picture

[grahamhgreen]

3. Homeland Security... (3.5%)

[nineteen50]

19. Look at all the costs

of securing America. From the soldiers in the field to the cop on the beat and all their weapons, legal, court and incarceration cost. America what are we afraid of? Ourselves?

[AAO]

88. America's afraid of it's own formidable shadow. We are a nation at fear.

And as FDR so presciently pointed out, we especially fear fear!

[woo me with science]

68. Thank you.

As if the official numbers weren't obscene enough, additional splurging on war has been purposely concealed all over the budget for decades now.

[DavidDvorkin]

76. Some of the military budget is hidden in strange places

NASA does some military work, and some of that is covered by the NASA budget.

Unless things have changed, the Department of Energy does a lot of the maintenance (and development?) for nuclear weapons, and that's in the DoE budget.

The Department of Agriculture does some military-related research.

I'm sure there's more of it scattered throughout the civilian side of the government and not counted as military dollars.

[uponit7771]

77. +1, Used to work for DOD...money is spread out

[reACTIONary]

98. Almost any science / technology program is dual purpose, even medical research...

and it works both ways. DARPA funded the advanced prosthetic program because military personnel are uniquely subject to loss of limbs. This program, which principally serves wounded war fighters, will make a big difference to many civilians, both here and all over the world.

I work with NASA. Aside from the fact that almost all technology is dual use, what NASA programs are specifically military-related?

[DavidDvorkin]

105. That's what I was told when I worked there, 1967-1971

It was all quite open, then.

In those days, some Air Force satellite launches were covered by the NASA budget. We had a lot of AF people working in our offices. Their salaries were paid by the AF, but they were being trained by NASA and acquiring needed skills for what was planned to be a manned AF space program. The original Shuttle program included a few (3?) extra shuttles that would be handed to the AF -- the "Blue Shuttle". Lots of official details here: http://history.nasa.gov/SP-4102/ch8.htm

The "Blue Shuttle" part no longer applies, of course. I'd like to think that the division is now fairly strict, but I have my doubts. I do read references, even now, to military work being done under the NASA budget.

[reACTIONary]

110. Thanks for the info. When LBJ said that we should seize the "high ground" of space...

...he wasn't talking about the "moral high ground". Anything done in space that has an advanced engineering component, even pure science missions, has military benefit.

Personally, I don't think there is any attempt to "hide" military spending in civil programs, if for no other reason than it is unnecessary. I'm not against cutting the military budget, however, the more it is cut, the more there will be a perceived necessity to hide some of it in other programs. Just the way the political world works, methinks.

[TheProgressive]

4. Media and pundits always say that Social Security/Medicare is ~40% of the budget

That is a lie to propagandize Americans.

Social Security in particular is 100% funded each year by payroll taxes and the interest we
earn (thank you very much).

So, your graphs are right on as they show the true picture.

[guardian]

23. Not true. You are the one not telling the truth.

Social Security is NOT 100% funded by payroll taxes and earned interest. Go see what that Social Security Administration says. Here is an excerpt from THE 2012 ANNUAL REPORT OF THE BOARD OF TRUSTEES OF THE FEDERAL OLD-AGE AND SURVIVORS INSURANCE AND FEDERAL DISABILITY INSURANCE TRUST FUNDS

http://www.ssa.gov/oact/tr/2012/tr2012.pdf

Under the long-range intermediate assumptions, the Trustees project that
annual cost for the OASDI program will exceed non-interest income in 2012
and remain higher throughout the remainder of the long-range period. The
projected combined OASI and DI Trust Fund assets increase through 2020,
begin to decline in 2021, and become exhausted and unable to pay scheduled
benefits in full on a timely basis in 2033. However, the DI Trust Fund
becomes exhausted in 2016, so legislative action is needed as soon as possible.

[TheProgressive]

26. But it is... please read the 'Highlights'

From the SS Trustee Report


"In 2011

At the end of 2011, the OASDI program was providing benefits to about 55 million people: 38 million retired workers and dependents of retired workers, 6 million survivors of deceased workers, and 11 million disabled workers and dependents of disabled workers. During the year, an estimated 158 mil- lion people had earnings covered by Social Security and paid payroll taxes. Total expenditures in 2011 were $736 billion. Total income was $805 billion, which consisted of $691 billion in non-interest income and $114 billion in interest earnings. Assets held in special issue U.S. Treasury securities grew to $2.7 trillion.

"

[grahamhgreen]

28. Disgree. That issue does not happen for 21 years! Simple fix:

raise the cap!

ie: Have people that make more than $110,000 per year continue to pay into the trust fund.

[klook]

35. +47% (n/t)

[Grins]

141. Agree!!!!

I've been for that for years, but I'd make a small change:

1.
Lift the cap completely.
2.
Make the contribution percentage higher for those making more than $400,000, and lower for those making less than $60,000. (Reducing the amount for lower incomes has the added benefit of putting more money into workers pockets, money that they will quickly spend on goods and services boosting the economy.)

The argument from the right is that the payroll tax is a contribution that all pay and share equally. But when you use Soc. Security funds to fund the general obligations of government because you don't want to raise income/corporate/interest-dividend taxes normally used to pay those obligations, then you have been getting a free ride.

[spooky3]

72. Those trust fund assets came from FICA contributions over the years (and interest).

Go back to the SSA site and read about the 1983 actions (and subsequent actions) to create and maintain the trust fund.

Only in the last two years did were general fund revenues committed (to make up the difference in the temporary cut in FICA contributions in order to stimulate the economy). This was legislated by Congress.

[tecelote]

50. And, what about the funds that have been borrowed?

Today's SS doesn't have to be covered by today's income.

[TheProgressive]

56. What borrowed funds are you referring to?

And what do you mean by 'SS doesn't have to be covered by today's income'?

[jmowreader]

65. You mean the funds that were invested

Social Security always worked by loaning the money it received in payroll deductions to the rest of the government...because when it is paid back it is with interest.

[jmowreader]

63. There are two ways to look at the budget

The way RW pundits and prognosticators do it is add all outlays together, which makes Social Security and Medicare equal around 40 percent of the total outlays.

Social Security funds outside the general budget, so the OP's chart, showing general expenditures, is better.

[a geek named Bob]

5. +1000 n/t

[bunnies]

6. knr.

absofrigginlutely.

[smirkymonkey]

7. +10,000

K&R!

[Gregorian]

8. Fear and greed versus the wellfare of the people.

This is the real issue. Counterproductive misuse of our tax dollars.

[Scuba]

9. Something's not right here ...

I can only rec this once.

[Coyotl]

10. You left out the military golf courses for all the generals

[SnowCritter]

48. The golf courses can be used by any military personnel of any rank

At least they could back when I was serving. It was a pretty sweet deal, too. The greens fee was based on your rank - as a Sergeant (E-5) I paid only a fraction of what a General (0-7 and above) paid and only slightly more than anyone ranked E1 - E4.

On edit, I decided to see if I could find information about the golf courses at Camp LeJeune. It turns out that E-5 and below all pay the same rate now (or maybe they always did - heck, it was 35 years ago). The courses are also open to the public (I don't know if that's the norm for golf courses on military bases, but that's the case at LeJeune).

[jmowreader]

52. Those are general-funded, not taxpayer-funded

Last edited Fri Dec 21, 2012, 05:12 PM - Edit history (1)

Research, development, test and evaluation is the big money hole. How many uncountable billions were spent on developing antiaircraft guns that can't shoot down airplanes, manportable radios the troops wouldn't have been able to lift, and space-based lasers to zap ICBMs out of the sky while they're still over Russia?

On edit: A simple example is the M9 pistol. 9mm pistols were popular in police departments at the time and the simplest thing would have been to find out the most popular police sidearm in America and get that. In the 1980s the most popular gun to issue to cops was the Beretta 92. The government doesn't do that. They call for manufacturers to send 100 guns to the government who then did all sorts of tests - immersion in sea water, dropping 100 times on concrete, and firing 50,000 rounds through each gun being just some of the tests. At the end the chosen pistol was the Beretta 92. The Army didn't like the test results (truth be told, what the Army didn't and still doesn't like is the 9mm part; the Army likes putting big holes in people so that when you shoot people they stay shot) so the whole test was rerun. The winner was the Beretta 92 - the same gun they could have chosen by writing letters to every cop shop in America asking what their officers are issued.

This had an unexpected civilian windfall. The stock 92 is an ounce heavier than the M9. To get it that way they take metal out of the frame, with frame cracking the result. It has become a tradition in Special Operations to go to Jim's Pawn Shop in Fayetteville, buy a Beretta 92 with personal funds, and carry it to the field. They are far more reliable and all the Army's parts fit.

[Coyotl]

64. The Military-Leisure Golf Complex = officials are tee-ing off at taxpayer expense at hundreds

The Military-Leisure Golf Complex
Pentagon elites and high government officials are tee-ing off at taxpayer expense at hundreds of courses all over the planet.
April 11, 2008 | http://www.alternet.org/story/82009/the_military-leisure_golf_complex

Back in 1975, Senator William Proxmire (D-Wisconsin) decried the fact that the Department of Defense spent nearly $14 million each year to maintain and operate 300 military-run golf courses scattered across the globe. In 1996, the weekly television series America's Defense Monitor noted that "Pentagon elites and high government officials [were still] tee-ing off at taxpayer expense" at some "234 golf courses maintained by the U.S. armed forces worldwide." In the intervening twenty-one years, despite a modest decrease in the number of military golf courses, not much had changed. The military was still out on the links. Today, the military claims to operate a mere 172 golf courses worldwide, suggesting that over thirty years after Proxmire's criticisms, a modicum of reform has taken place. Don't believe it.

In actuality, the military has cooked the books. For example, the Department of Defense reported that the U.S. Air Force operates 68 courses. A closer examination indicates that the DoD counts the 3 separate golf courses, a total of fifty-four holes, at Andrews Air Force Base in Washington, D.C., as 1 course. The same is true for the navy, which claims 37 courses (including facilities in Guam, Italy, and Spain) but counts, for example, its Admiral Baker Golf Course in San Diego, which boasts 2 eighteen-hole courses, as a single unit. Similarly, while the DoD claims that the army operates 56 golf facilities, it appears that this translates into no fewer than 68 actual courses, stretching from the U.S. to Germany, Japan, and South Korea.

Moreover, some military golf facilities are mysteriously missing from all lists. In 2005, according to the Pentagon, the U.S. military operated courses on twenty-five bases overseas.

A closer look, however, indicates that the military apparently forgot about some of its golf courses -- especially those in unsavory or unmentionable locales. Take the unlisted eighteen-hole golf course -- where hot-pink balls are used so as not to lose them in the barren terrain -- at the U.S. naval base at Guantanamo Bay, .....

[jmowreader]

89. Take anything Proxmire ridiculed with a grain of salt

My favorite Proxmire shitstorm is the Worcestershire sauce specification.

There is a military specification for this product. There is a MILSPEC for nearly everything the military buys...because without one, the government is required to buy strictly on price. If you can put "must comply with MIL-C-11796 (the specification for axle grease, which only applies here because the french fries at the 1/3 Air Defense Artillery's mess hall tasted like they were cooked in it)" you are far more likely to get compliant grease than doing a bid solicitation for 40,000 pounds of "wheel bearing grease, not otherwise specified."

Proxmire's "award" talks about how the government has a 15-page document telling them how to buy a bottle of Worcestershire sauce. The Army doesn't buy a bottle of it, they buy a 53-foot trailer full of it and without a document that contains absolutely no wiggle room there is almost nothing stopping someone from buying 50 barrels of it, cutting it 1:1 with water, hiring illegals to bottle it with funnels, and being the low bidder every time. People used to pull that shit regularly. You're probably like "so what? It's just a condiment." Which it is, but if the cooks need to use two bottles of Army issue sauce to do what one of French's will and we pay 80 percent of French's prices for Army issue...all of a sudden it's just gotten expensive.

Back to the subject: the golf courses, riding stables, auto shops (every base has a place troops can go to work on their cars), movie theaters, bowling alleys, Walmart-size department stores, liquor stores, bars, ceramics workshops, day care centers and hundreds of other things for soldiers to do off-duty are required to fund themselves through user fees and retail sales. Google Fort Bragg MWR or Nonappropriated Fund activities.

To put the $14 million in perspective, it will pay a year's hazardous duty pay for 778 paratroopers. Fourteen mil to the Army is a rounding error. The military has a very bad habit of reinventing wheels, a practice that must be stopped.

[woo me with science]

11. Thank you. Cannot kick and rec often or strongly enough.

It is time to stop swallowing the propaganda.

It is time to stop playing their game.

[Ian62]

125. Agree with you ONE HUNDRED percent

Last edited Sat Dec 22, 2012, 08:34 PM - Edit history (1)

.

[2naSalit]

12. That's my

argument and I'm sticking to it.

[TheProgressive]

13. Could you provide a link to the data source?

Just would like to read what else is in your data source (and how to get there!).

[valerief]

102. You should try The Google.

But here's one.
http://nationalpriorities.org/en/blog/2012/04/30/you-ask-we-answer-how-much-federal-budget-funds-military/

[RoccoR5955]

14. +10^100 n/t

[closeupready]

15. K&R

[ellisonz]

16. Exactly.

Over the cliff!

[daleanime]

17. Hell yes!

[Bucky]

18. Mostly agree, though I think the VA department needs to be left out of that 60%

VA is ultimately about healthcare, employment & housing services, and entitlement benefits. I don't think any of that stuff should be cut.

[Ligyron]

44. absolutely!

at this point, it's about the only war related area we should be prepared to spend much money on.

[Ian62]

126. The increase required to the VA budget due to going to war

should be included in military costs.

Vets medical bills (as a result of injury during their service) should also be included in the military budget, they are NOT included in official defense budgets.

If a marine gets blown up or shot in a war theater and subsequently gets disability, how the heck are his medical and disability costs NOT a cost of going to war and therefore a defense cost?

The government is trying to hide as much as possible of the cost of going to war.

It should be made plain.

[DeSwiss]

20. Been sayin it.

What Eats Up 53 Cents Of Every Tax Dollar?

K&R

[woo me with science]

25. Great video.

Thank you.

[grahamhgreen]

42. Wow. War eats $95,000 PER SECOND!

[DeSwiss]

54. De nada.

- And once again, if we're diligent we can always find the answers had already been given, but are almost always overlooked. Shakespeare was right, what's past is prologue.....

The Purpose of War According to George Orwell (1984)

The primary aim of modern warfare is to use up the products of the machine without raising the general standard of living. Ever since the end of the nineteenth century, the problem of what to do with the surplus of consumption goods has been latent in industrial society. From the moment when the machine first made its appearance it was clear to all thinking people that the need for human drudgery, and therefore to a great extent for human inequality, had disappeared. If the machine were used deliberately for that end, hunger, overwork, dirt, illiteracy, and disease could be eliminated within a few generations. And in fact, without being used for any such purpose, but by a sort of automatic process — by producing wealth which it was sometimes impossible not to distribute — the machine did raise the living standards of the average human being very greatly over a period of about fifty years at the end of the nineteenth and the beginning of the twentieth centuries.

But it was also clear that an all-round increase in wealth threatened the destruction — indeed, in some sense was the destruction — of a hierarchical society. In a world in which everyone worked short hours, had enough to eat, lived in a house with a bathroom and a refrigerator, and possessed a motor-car or even an aeroplane, the most obvious and perhaps the most important form of inequality would already have disappeared. If it once became general, wealth would confer no distinction.

It was possible, no doubt, to imagine a society in which wealth, in the sense of personal possessions and luxuries, should be evenly distributed, while power remained in the hands of a small privileged caste. But in practice such a society could not long remain stable. For if leisure and security were enjoyed by all alike, the great mass of human beings who are normally stupefied by poverty would become literate and would learn to think for themselves; and when once they had done this, they would sooner or later realize that the privileged minority had no function, and they would sweep it away. In the long run, a hierarchical society was only possible on a basis of poverty and ignorance.

MORE

[leftlibdem420]

80. It cost $300 million TOTAL in the period from 1967 to 1980 to eradicate small pox.

http://www.who.int/mediacentre/news/notes/2010/smallpox_20100517/en/index.html

We can and must do better than the perpetual war machine.

[DeSwiss]

83. I agree.

- Now if we can just ''find the keys'' to turn that machine OFF.

[Ian62]

124. An excellent quote and very prescient for America today

Thank you for posting

[Overseas]

130. This is such a great statement on the purpose of war. Thank you for posting it.

[on point]

21. 1000% Agreed. No cuts to safety not at ALL!!

[JEB]

22. hey, killing a noun (terror) isn't free.

Cut grandma and disabled vets to keep the Bush era charade alive. Sickening.

[cese]

24. cese

I agree...who is putting out the miss info about SS on this site....SS is self sufficient...it needs to be left alone when ever some Politician wants to balance they're budget....the defense budget should be whacked up a bit,,,we budget more for defense than all other Countries on this Planet combined,,,,

[korak]

27. Chart is a picture of only the discretionary budget.

Tolal military spending is about 20% of total.


http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:U.S._Federal_Spending_-_FY_2011.png

[korak]

34. Correction

Actually nearer to 30% if discretionaryt military is as large as the OP's chart indicates...

[Lydia Leftcoast]

119. The pie chart in the OP represents the GENERAL FUND (programs paid for by income tax)

Your "federal spending" includes things like Social Security, which is a separate funding stream.

How many seconds of the Iraq and Afghanistan wars is your annual federal income tax paying for?

In my case, it's less than one.

[Ian62]

127. Total military spending for 2012 is $1,219 bn - that is 35% of TOTAL government spend

That total includes a heck of a lot of items NOT in the official DoD budget.

Things like maintaining America's nuclear weapons, veterans medical bills, veterans or war widows pensions.

[grahamhgreen]

137. 'Total Govt spending" includes SS payments that

come from a seperate pool of money and DON'T CONTRIBUTE ONE NICKEL TO THE DEFICIT!

The game the pro-war types plays is to mix these two pools.

The deficit is caused by the military, it's pretty plain to see.

[ileus]

29. 100% spot on.

[mother earth]

30. It's not just the "elephant" in the room, it's the pig in the room, considering more is paid to

employ mercenaries than is paid to US military personnel, and then the other thread about vets dying before claims are paid out.

How greedy is the military industrial complex?

Our values are simply not represented, not in any shape or form. But, they'll sure as hell take our tax dollars.

K & R, grahamgreen, I'll check out that film in your sig line too, kudos to you for bringing it to our attention!

[spanone]

31. K&r...

[heaven05]

32. yep

right on the mark. The defense of this nation would still be enabled even with large cuts in the defense budget.

[airplaneman]

33. I count the military, homeland security, and TSA in the same bucket.

2000: $350 billion
2011: $800 billion
In fact if you eliminate these from the budget the federal government has been shrinking.
The reasons the Republicans cant tell you where to cut is because they don't have any place to cut without screwing the rest of us and it does not exist given their refusal to cut the military.
-Airplane

[Plucketeer]

36. Absolutely!!!

That big, blue section of the pie should be ONE FOURTH of it at the most. And YES - I DO have concern for folks that might be put out of a job. But building stuff we DO NOT need is just plain STUPID.

[mostlyconfused]

37. And how about a link that breaks out the defense budget into war related items

Of that $700 billion I've seen it estimated by someone on DU that $150 billion of that goes to the two wars. I've got no idea if that is currently accurate.

The one thing about social security is that the taxes collected do not cover the payments. What happens to cover the shortfall? If it gets covered out of general treasury funds, then it is directly impacting the deficit, right? If it is covered from interest on the trust fund it should be noted that the single largest holder of US debt is the SS trust fund, so the interest collected by the trust fund is added to our national debt, and the interest payments on our debt come out of the federal budget so SS is at least indirectly adding to the deficit. Or am I wrong?

[Egalitarian Thug]

38. Largest single source of corporate welfare as well. K&R n/t

[ReRe]

39. Great charts!

K&R

And this is PEACETIME! Yip, it's the big elephant in the room that nobody seems to see, and of course which our politicians like to keep our eyes off of. Don't you just love our EMPIRE. Makes me want to puke! Our society is coming unglued, yet we spend that much on defense. What I would like to see is where we have bases (besides the US) and how much it costs per annum to operate each one of them. I'll show them where to cut some corners!

[Denise21]

40. War is 60% of our budget. That's the ONLY place cuts need to come from

i totally agree that is the only place that cuts should take place!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

[The Wielding Truth]

41. Absolutely! It looks by your graph that our best years were during low defense spending.

[grahamhgreen]

69. That is a very interesting observation,

if I get the time I'll try to do a comparison.

[npk]

43. Too many profiteering warmongers

They keep these politicians in check. All it takes is the threat of closing that check book, and they (politicians, congress) come to their senses.

[humbled_opinion]

45. You make an excellent point

The wars have ended shouldn't we already be seeing the deficit shrink because of the money not going to the war anymore, why have the deficits risen if war was causing so much of the debt?

[Panasonic]

46. The military budget ought to be sliced down to 15%

and redirected to education, mental health, real life COLA increases for SS, and jobs!

NOT FUCKING MILITARY.

China is second, and they only spend about 12% of their budget.

WE ARE NOT THE FUCKING WORLD POLICE!

[Uncle Joe]

47. Kicked and recommended.

Thanks for the thread, grahamhgreen.

[Maineman]

49. Damn Right !!

[Rex]

51. Until we rid ourselves of our current plutocracy,

expect nothing to change.

[Raster]

53. Hear! Hear!

This is LONG PAST TIME for the merchants of death to ante up and pay their fair shares. LONG PAST TIME!

[Octafish]

55. ''Money trumps peace.'' -- George Walker Bush, Feb. 14, 2007

Know your BFEE: WikiLeaks Stratfor Dump Exposes Continued Secret Government Warmongering

[Tanta]

57. I would post these on Facebook but...

I was wondering if I can have links/sources for this material for a deeper insight to these numbers.

Thanks

[whatchamacallit]

58. Someone tell the president n/t

[Cleita]

59. What exactly is operations and maintenance? Is this the money spent on

contractors like Bechtel and Halliburton? If it is, I say this is a good place to start with trimming down the military budget. Second place would be closing down the bases we have in Europe and Japan.

[grahamhgreen]

60. Operations as in "Operation Iraqi Liberation" (OIL) aka War on Terra

"The Operation and Maintenance, Army (OMA) appropriation provides the resources to organize, equip, and train forces for the conduct of prompt and sustained combat operations on land and in support of Combatant Commanders." - DOD

[think]

61. The Pentagon can't even provide accurate accounting for the funds it receives.

A full audit needs to be done:

Toss Wasteful Defense Weapons Programs Off the Cliff
Rep. Barbara Lee
U.S. Representative, California's 9th congressional district
Posted: 12/05/2012 1:30 pm

~Snip~

Nearly 60 cents of every federal discretionary dollar now goes toward defense spending, and by the Pentagon's own admission, it cannot properly account for how the money is spent. There is no doubt that these circumstances have contributed to instances of waste, fraud, and abuse at the Pentagon. It is past time to audit the Pentagon just like the 34 other Executive branch agencies. That is why I introduced H.R. 6528, the Audit the Pentagon Act of 2012, and plan on reintroducing it for the 113th Congress.
~Snip~

Full post:
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/rep-barbara-lee/toss-wasteful-defense-wea_b_2245671.html

[grahamhgreen]

71. "The bloated Pentagon budget has increased a staggering 95 percent dating back to 2000."

"The Project for Defense Alternatives, CATO Institute, Taxpayers for Common Sense, Center for American Progress, and Bowles-Simpson Commission have all called for deep cuts in defense spending ranging from $350 to $590 billion beyond the cuts already in place. "

And we're not even auditing???? That's amazing to me!

[Auggie]

106. Bingo

[ProudProgressiveNow]

62. K&R nt

[Scootaloo]

66. Part of the same culture of fear that brings us the "gun culture"

We need overwhelming military expenditure! We need to militarize the police! We need several domestic spy agencies! We need for every citizen to be heavily armed! Someone somewhere wants to touch our stuff!!!!!!

If nations were people, the US would be the paranoid schizophrenic wearing kleenex boxes on its feet and sleeping with a shitgun.

[libodem]

67. Agree

Shoot the Pentagon into outerspace.

[rustydog]

70. We borrow 800-million a week from China to continue the war in Afghanistan

We are borrowing money to perpetuate the killing of thousands of American soldiers! FROM CHINA!

[JaneyVee]

73. 100th REC!

And I'll give it a Tweet.

[ehrenfeucht games]

74. Absolutely! (nt)

[pokerfan]

75. and about half of the world's total lilitary spending

[Dustlawyer]

117. The fact that we don't talk about cutting military spending demonstrates the need for

COMPLETE CAMPAIGN FINANCE REFORM!

[pokerfan]

121. Hell, Rmoney wanted to increase the military by $2T

and boost the fleet to over an arbitrary 300 warships.

[Dustlawyer]

136. Yeah, Rmoney was a corp whore too! Let's see who Obama pays back.

[dkf]

78. The wars have not ended. Have you seen the budget for Afghanistan?

[JDPriestly]

79. I suppose a Republican would include Social Security benefits even though they don't come from the

general fund.

[xtraxritical]

81. God damn soooooo right. Too far right.

[bvar22]

82. DURec!

[font size=3]”Every gun that is made, every warship launched, every rocket fired signifies, in the final sense, a theft from those who hunger and are not fed, those who are cold and are not clothed. This world in arms is not spending money alone. It is spending the sweat of its laborers, the genius of its scientists, the hopes of its children."
---Republican President Dwight Eisenhower

"They were arrogant and spoiled; they had everything they needed and still refused to help the poor and needy." Ezekiel 16:49

"For the scoundrel will speak like a scoundrel and will hatch evil in his heart; he is an impostor in all his actions, and in his words a liar even to the LORD; he starves the hungry of their food and refuses drink to the thirsty. The villain's ways are villainous and he devises infamous plans to ruin the poor with his lies and deny justice to the needy."-- Isaiah

[/font]



[font color=firebrick size=3][center]"If we don't fight hard enough for the things we stand for,
at some point we have to recognize that we don't really stand for them."
--- Paul Wellstone[/font][/center]
[center][/font]
[font size=1]photo by bvar22
Shortly before Sen Wellstone was killed[/center][/font]

[font size=5 color=firebrick]Solidarity![/font]

[Canuckistanian]

84. That's a good way to put it

It's not defense, it's external aggression.

This is a war machine, not a defense machine. Without a war, ANY war, most American military spending would be pointless.

[adieu]

85. I completely agree

100% of any reduction in the expenditures can come from the DoD. If we just reduce the DoD from its current $600B/yr to the Clintonian levels fo $300B/yr, we will be in the black before the next president's reelection.

[Shrike47]

86. Can't help but agree.

Our military budget is appalling. And we're not at war!

[andym]

87. How much is the total discretionary budget?

There's supposedly something like a 1.1 trillion dollar deficit. How much is discretionary spending contributing to that deficit? Is any other non-discretionary spending contributing to the deficit? How big is the discretionary budget?

[Ian62]

90. A truly excellent article - spread it FAR AND WIDE

not just on here.

[Sancho]

91. +++

I'm a draft-card burning, baby-boomer. I have been protesting military spending since my parents build a bomb shelter in our back yard in the early 1960's. Doomsday preppers are nothing new to me.

In my lifetime, the US has spent enough on secret weapons, nuclear weapons, foreign wars, bases all over the world, etc. that it is insane. We could have funded health care and free education all the way through college for everyone in the country for the $$'s we've spent on the military.

Personally, I'd like the entire DOD limited to 10% of the budget - and I'd bet no one would notice except a lot fewer people would be killed.

[Phentex]

92. Agreed.

It seems so logical.

[FlyByNight]

93. It's long past time to dismantle the empire

The war/empire maintenance/national "security" budget runs, roughly now, a trillion dollars per year. That's where budget cuts should come from FIRST. Regarding this, the silence from the Beltway is deafening and telling.

Putting SS/Chained CPI on the bargaining table was/is appalling. That SS adds NOTHING to the debt and deficit should be repeated over and over again from here on out. And any "savings" from chaining CPI would be chump change and hurt those who most need it.

If President Obama doesn't like or trust his own left flank on this, all he needs to do is reference YouTube and type in "Ronald Reagan on Social Security" for additional perspective.

[Civilization2]

94. yes cut the military till it stays in America!

de-fund the over seas murder campaigns,. stop building weapons of mass-destruction, and use the military as it was intended; to defend America,. you know, inside our own shore-line.

[Iggy]

95. And.....?

WHERE are the "democrats" in congress calling for a serious/significant cut to our bloated defense budget??

it's over, folks. over fifty years ago, a general, a war hero (Eisenhower) warned us about the military industrial complex and the potential dangers. obviously the powers that be ignored him, and a Frankenstein monster was created-- a monster which NOBODY in congress has the balls to deal with honestly.

BTW, the around $2 Trillion poured down the ratholes in Iraq and Afghanistan the last ten years-- that's more or less the same amount of money the American Society of Civil Engineers is on record stating we need to spend NOW on our nation's pathetic, crumbling infrastructure.

[another_liberal]

96. So true!

Military types will say that it costs a great deal to maintain helicopters and jets when they are deployed in places like the deserts of Afghanistan and Kuwait. My response is:

"Keep the damn things at home!"

[valerief]

97. I wonder how much of that Operations and Maintenance goes to the oil industry.

And thanks for calling it WAR rather than DEFENSE. Because it is WAR. It kills people at home and all over the world.

[Agony]

99. Great! as long as _none_ of the cuts come from veterans benefits.

[sulphurdunn]

100. It would not be dfficult

to trim some money from operations and procurement.

[Ian62]

131. Yes, it would be easy to save large amounts in operations & procurement

Last edited Sun Dec 23, 2012, 10:29 AM - Edit history (2)

The US in 2012 spent :-

$170bn on building & supplying foreign military bases

$105bn on 7,000 "contractors" in Iraq

About $100bn on the Afghan war.

$4.8 bn of new military procurement contracts were signed today.
http://www.defense.gov/contracts/contract.aspx?contractid=4943

The largest was for $1.8bn for the next stage of development for the next generation of ballistic missile submarines. Who is Barack Obama planning to shoot nuclear missiles at?

The $1,450bn (estimated cost) development of the next generation stealth plane is on-going.
The US hasn't had a plane shot down for 20 years.
Everybody knows that defense contracts generally over run by 3 or 6 times the original budget.

Obama is ordering increasing numbers of drones. 73% of Pakistani's now consider America their enemy because of the drone warfare program and the high rate of civilian casualties.
Each predator and reaper drone costs $36m - I would like to know how much profit General Atomics is making on each one. China is building their copies of these drones for $1m a pop.

[sulphurdunn]

135. All this stuff

comes from operations and procurement.

[ladjf]

101. Absolutely! nt

[Owl]

103. Absolutely agree!

The MIC / war budgets are obscenely bloated and need serious reductions.

Ironically, MIC / war budgets are killing America.

[ProSense]

104. This is why no deal is best.

Sequestration, which has already been signed into law, cuts $500 billion from defense automatically in January if no deal is reached.

The White House Shows its Hand and the Republicans Fold
http://www.democraticunderground.com/10021969595

[Ian62]

132. No it doesn't

It trims the already planned for large future INCREASES to the military budget by about $50bn a year.

The military budget in 2016 is planned to be FAR HIGHER than in 2012, even with the so called "cuts".

[Rosa Luxemburg]

107. Hi, do you have a link for the diagrams please?

do you have a link to the original document please?

We are wasting far too much on war. Defense is one thing.

[CrispyQ]

108. This 4 minute YouTube video should be required viewing for all Americans.

The graphics are outstanding, the points are sobering. I posted it on FB & it was deleted. A friend shared it on her page & it, too, was deleted.

Thanks to Will Pitt for the original post of this.

[november3rd]

111. Thank you

This is going viral.

[pasto76]

109. first of all, there is still one war going. Second lemme educate you as a soldier...

...that my beloved military is fat with waste and pork. Not talking about pay for troops, vehicles I need, equipment I need. Nor any part of the training budget.

What we havent needed in the past 12 years are two(2) stealth fighters. Or really the osprey. Or a future combat system for soldiers. Or literally thousands of contracts for "new weapons" that never get past development, let alone prototype phase. When I came home in 2004, they were 'field testing' the XM-8 rifle. Im sure to quite an expense. Never saw the light of day. An my universal camo pattern uniforms I wear right now? they suck. That shit cost $5B. replacing them will cost another $4B.

so yeah, there is __plenty__ of waste in the DOD. This soldier supports cutting all of it. And then give my troops a goddamn raise that says "thank you".

[CrispyQ]

116. +1.

This is what sickens me about flag lapel pins & this trumped up 'big bad military to keep us all safe' bullshit. It's not keeping us safe. It's just a huge mechanism to siphon our tax dollar to the 1%. If their GD flag pins meant shit, they would do just what you said, give my troops a goddamn raise that says "thank you".

For the 1%, war is a profit & a very good one at that.

[abelenkpe]

112. K&R nt.

[Festivito]

113. I don't see debt retirement, interest on debt. Rolled in with military?

I'm all for that, that is charging the military expense with our overspending.

[think]

114. Good points /nt

[grahamhgreen]

122. There's also 38 billion in increased Social Security costs from vetrans who can't

work after their tour of duty....

[Festivito]

123. And, that would raise that 60%, AND, we the NON-rich have to pay for it.

Social Security is off-budget so it is not included in this circle budget shown. It should be. The federal government should pay SS back for the cost to SS of its wars and the cost of the disabled in general, instead of making the poor and middle class to pay for it all, letting the rich and moderately rich pay nothing more than what they intend to get back.

The rich need to pay their fair share.

[benld74]

115. As a federal worker I have been stating the same fact for YEARS,,

with only blank stares coming back at me when I say as much. My 1st statement in my office was response to someone agreeing with the GOP talking points of budget cutting for the agencies.
I stated," How can cuts from agencies that make up only 40% of the entire budget REALLY reduce the budget when a 60% military budget is NEVER discussed?"
Blank Stares
Crickets
Then I said, "Thats what I thought".

[BlancheSplanchnik]

118. another rec and kick. n/t

[Lydia Leftcoast]

120. I can't help thinking of the contrast between Britain and Norway

Both receive a considerable amount of money from North Sea oil.

Norway has invested its oil earnings in improving its own infrastructure and the lives of its people. They enjoy one of the highest living standards in Europe. Even business magazines have praised the wise way in which Norway uses its oil money.

Britain, on the other hand, has a huge military budget--the fourth largest after the U.S., China, and Russia--as if it can't get over the fact that it no longer rules 1/3 of the world. Frankly, despite the country's many charms, Britain's roads, railroads, public housing, and newer buildings look shabby in comparison to those in Norway. Where it was once one of the richest countries in Europe, it now has the largest gap between the rich and poor in Europe and is tied with the U.S. for lack of social mobility. The Tories' austerity program is barely touching the military budget.

Things that make you go "hmmmm."

[Ian62]

133. A very good point

Norway has one of the lowest National Debts as a percentage of GDP in Europe.

It has a large and successful Sovereign Wealth Fund, derived from it's oil revenues.

Norway continues to generate large revenues from it's North Sea oil reserves, whilst the Brits have almost exhausted theirs.

Norway spends very little of it's wealth on it's military with a budget of $7.3bn in 2013 or about 2.5% of GDP.

Apart from the farce over butter runners with stupid import controls, Norway is very well governed - unlike the Brits.

[Old and In the Way]

128. At the very least, bill Big Oil for the US military's "muscle" to get their product to market.

We've subsidized Big Oil's business plan for decades..maybe a trillion dollars worth of protection.

[Arugula Latte]

129. Sickening.

When I think of the billions upon billions of dollars we've wasted over the past several decades by slaughtering innocent people, invading their countries, taking their resources and propping up corporate war enablers it just makes me SICK.

"Fighting for Freedom" my ass.

Just think what this country could have been if we'd invested that wasted money in education, healthcare and infrastructure.

Slash the military now.

[AntiFascist]

134. + trillions...K&R! n/t

[woo me with science]

138. Amen again. Cannot kick this enough times. nt

[woo me with science]

139. Keeping it up top. nt

[No Compromise]

140. kick

nt