Bernie Sanders versus the Pentagon
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Since he arrived in Congress, Bernie Sanders has been a fierce crusader against Pentagon spending, calling for defense cuts that few Democrats have been willing to support. Should he defeat Hillary Clinton, analysts say, he will likely be the biggest critic of the Pentagon to win a major party nomination since World War II.
“He fits in that category of very liberal members of the U.S. Senate that have consistently attacked the Pentagon time and time again because they want the money to go to the entitlement side, even at a time when the world is more unstable and more dangerous,” said Arnold Punaro, a retired Marine Corps major general who served as Democratic staff director on the Senate Armed Services Committee in the 1980s.
That position might benefit Sanders with liberal primary voters. But Democrats focused on national security fear it could be a liability in a general election among moderate voters more worried about terrorism and growing aggression from Russia and China. Some suggested that, if nominated, Sanders would struggle to win support and endorsements from Democratic-leaning retired military officials.
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Sanders’ defenders say the notion that the Pentagon’s $573 billion budget is filled with waste is hardly radical and insist that his tough line on military spending will appeal to voters of all stripes.
“This is why people are so attracted to Sanders — because he’s telling it like it is,” said Lawrence Korb, a former Pentagon official under President Ronald Reagan whom Sanders recently named as a possible secretary of defense. Korb said billions of savings are achievable at a Pentagon that has what he called “a management problem.”
Read more: http://www.politico.com/story/2016/02/bernie-sanders-defense-budget-pentagon-219386#ixzz40XfkjjQh