Military spending that it can't afford. This is what helped bring about the collapse of the Soviet Union. And it will bring about the collapse of the US. The US Congress is full of crackpots and nutcases. And look at the the crazy ammendment that Coburn is adding: legalizing concealed weapons in public parks. Peacenik is dumbfounded.
It is laughable. It is crazy. But these are the leaders of the "free world." They don't even pretend to care about saving the social safety net. Healthcare? Deficits? What dat? It's time to feed the military industrial complex.
by dday
Damn.
Lawmakers defy veto threat on F-22 fighter
Congress on Thursday moved forward with plans to build more Lockheed Martin F-22 fighter jets, disregarding a veto threat from the Obama administration.
Lawmakers also moved to authorize the funding for an alternative engine for the Joint Strike Fighter F-35.
Congress is setting the stage for a showdown over the 2010 defense authorization bill with the administration and in particular Defense Secretary Robert Gates, as the Office of Management and Budget issued a statement outlining the veto threat Wednesday over both issues.
Read on...
Showing posts with label military industrial complex. Show all posts
Showing posts with label military industrial complex. Show all posts
6/2/09
Whence the Terror Hysteria? Follow the Money
By Philip Girardi
www.antiwar.com
One of the unique pleasures of living near our nation’s capital is to sit down with the first morning cup of coffee, open the Washington Post, and flip through the full-page ads placed by defense contractors. The ads almost always feature dedicated young soldiers, fierce bald eagles, and American flags. They extol our heroic warriors and note how they, the contractors, are on the front line defending freedom and the American way. They do not mention that the ads are paid for by the taxpayers, courtesy of the huge profits generated by unneeded defense spending. Their CEOs and shareholders must smile when they see the ads. The rest of us shouldn’t.
This is not to suggest that defense contractors don’t do a lot of good in the world. They support armies of lobbyists and contribute to congressmen who otherwise would have to find real work. They make sure that the pundits and ideologues who promote a vigorous defense of American interests at home and abroad are well-funded through their contributions to think-tanks like the American Enterprise Institute, the Hudson Institute, and Frank Gaffney’s ubiquitous Center for Security Policy. They hold gala dinners and invite Bush administration hacks and blue dog Democrats to speak, paying them generous honoraria to make sure they have comfortable retirements. They sometimes show incredible ingenuity, figuring out how to make gasoline that costs $1.13 per gallon in Kuwait cost $8 when it arrives in Iraq a day later. They produce ships and planes and missile systems that America doesn’t need, but doing so surely keeps workers in their factories in key congressional constituencies from having to file for unemployment. It’s a win-win.
And defense contractors know how to make people afraid and keep them that way. The next war, against Iran, will no doubt be prepped by claims that Tehran was involved in 9/11 and that it is the principal supporter of al-Qaeda. Those Persians are "killing our soldiers." And nothing much changes when you flip from Republican to Democrat. Even if the Global War on Terror (GWOT) is now being referred to as Overseas Contingency Operations, there has been no shift in how Washington approaches the terrorism problem. Overseas Contingency Operations are just as big a business as was GWOT; they are designed to make money and create good jobs for a lot of people. If one opens that same Washington Post featuring the full-page self-congratulatory ads and turns to the employment pages, the few jobs available in this recession-wracked economy are in the quarter-page listings for defense contractors. Squeezing money from the taxpayers or borrowing it from foreigners appears to be the entirety of Washington’s local economy.
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Punditman says...Oh yeah, that's why we're here. This article is a great reminder of why punditman created punditman in the first place: The so-called war on terror and its complementary propaganda and the military industrial complex and its complementary propaganda and how they work in tandem—for profit. There are those who still can't see this connection or who refuse to. They prefer a much simpler narrative, like "They fight for our freedom." Perhaps some of these lost souls pop by here once in a while and learn a thing or two that changes their consciousness. One can hope.
Peacenik talks a lot about economic decline, doom and disaster. That's fair game, but then Philip Girardi summarizes the ever-present, incestuous connection between the US defence industry lobby and the highly leveraged Global War On Terror—and he nails it. There always seems to be money for the war makers even if the war is a fraud and everyone else's money is in tatters. Always. Unless you're talking Russian Revolution and WW I, or later, how the money the Soviet Union wasted on the arms race, war in Afghanistan, etc. contributed to its collapse. Surely the US is not immune to a similar fate...I think.
www.antiwar.com
One of the unique pleasures of living near our nation’s capital is to sit down with the first morning cup of coffee, open the Washington Post, and flip through the full-page ads placed by defense contractors. The ads almost always feature dedicated young soldiers, fierce bald eagles, and American flags. They extol our heroic warriors and note how they, the contractors, are on the front line defending freedom and the American way. They do not mention that the ads are paid for by the taxpayers, courtesy of the huge profits generated by unneeded defense spending. Their CEOs and shareholders must smile when they see the ads. The rest of us shouldn’t.
This is not to suggest that defense contractors don’t do a lot of good in the world. They support armies of lobbyists and contribute to congressmen who otherwise would have to find real work. They make sure that the pundits and ideologues who promote a vigorous defense of American interests at home and abroad are well-funded through their contributions to think-tanks like the American Enterprise Institute, the Hudson Institute, and Frank Gaffney’s ubiquitous Center for Security Policy. They hold gala dinners and invite Bush administration hacks and blue dog Democrats to speak, paying them generous honoraria to make sure they have comfortable retirements. They sometimes show incredible ingenuity, figuring out how to make gasoline that costs $1.13 per gallon in Kuwait cost $8 when it arrives in Iraq a day later. They produce ships and planes and missile systems that America doesn’t need, but doing so surely keeps workers in their factories in key congressional constituencies from having to file for unemployment. It’s a win-win.
And defense contractors know how to make people afraid and keep them that way. The next war, against Iran, will no doubt be prepped by claims that Tehran was involved in 9/11 and that it is the principal supporter of al-Qaeda. Those Persians are "killing our soldiers." And nothing much changes when you flip from Republican to Democrat. Even if the Global War on Terror (GWOT) is now being referred to as Overseas Contingency Operations, there has been no shift in how Washington approaches the terrorism problem. Overseas Contingency Operations are just as big a business as was GWOT; they are designed to make money and create good jobs for a lot of people. If one opens that same Washington Post featuring the full-page self-congratulatory ads and turns to the employment pages, the few jobs available in this recession-wracked economy are in the quarter-page listings for defense contractors. Squeezing money from the taxpayers or borrowing it from foreigners appears to be the entirety of Washington’s local economy.
Keep Reading...
Punditman says...Oh yeah, that's why we're here. This article is a great reminder of why punditman created punditman in the first place: The so-called war on terror and its complementary propaganda and the military industrial complex and its complementary propaganda and how they work in tandem—for profit. There are those who still can't see this connection or who refuse to. They prefer a much simpler narrative, like "They fight for our freedom." Perhaps some of these lost souls pop by here once in a while and learn a thing or two that changes their consciousness. One can hope.
Peacenik talks a lot about economic decline, doom and disaster. That's fair game, but then Philip Girardi summarizes the ever-present, incestuous connection between the US defence industry lobby and the highly leveraged Global War On Terror—and he nails it. There always seems to be money for the war makers even if the war is a fraud and everyone else's money is in tatters. Always. Unless you're talking Russian Revolution and WW I, or later, how the money the Soviet Union wasted on the arms race, war in Afghanistan, etc. contributed to its collapse. Surely the US is not immune to a similar fate...I think.
4/14/09
Cold War Déjà-Vu
by Mike Gravel
In his speech in Prague, President Obama's rhetoric was essentially no different than that of George Bush. He promised, because of our "moral responsibility," to rid the world of nuclear weapons. He then averred that the US would not lower its defenses while others are pursuing a nuclear threat.
He's right about his last promise. Under his budget the US will continue to spend on defense (and a nuclear capability) more than all the rest of the world put together, "While others are pursuing a nuclear threat" an obvious reference to Iran, which our intelligence community reports is not pursuing a nuclear weapon. Obama who knows this intelligence information said to a cheering crowd: "As long as the threat from Iran persists, we will go forward with a missile defense system that is cost-effective and proven." So much for his recent peaceful overtures to the people of Iran whose defense budget is less than 1% of ours.
"Cost-effective!!!" The missile shield is the biggest boondoggle in military history with constant cost overruns. "Proven!!!" All tests have failed save one where the target's location was programmed into the interceptor guidance system. The President's false exaggerations are statements right out of a lobbyist's briefing paper. The missile shield in Alaska was deployed before the system was ever proven to work at a cost of $100 billion. The shield for Poland and Czech will cost more than $100 billion. The great majority of knowledgeable scientists, not on the payroll of the benefiting defense contractors, state that the system will not work and that a threat does not exist.
Keep Reading...
punditman says...
Ah yes, missile defence. Punditman is having an early 80s flashback.
The idea of a missile "shield" has always been misleading, dating back to Reagan's SDI. According to assistant professor Tom Sauer at the University of Antwerp in Belgium and professor Dave Webb of Leeds Metropolitan University in the United Kingdom, "it is a solution that technically does not work being applied to a problem that does not actually exist...The systems cannot effectively target incoming missiles without assistance from homing devices."
As the above piece by Mike Gavel points out, missile "defence" is not so much a defense against incoming enemy missiles as it is an "offense" in that it seeks to knock out enemy communications leaving them blind and vulnerable to a first strike. Moreover, missile defence is not a stabilizing influence; it is destabilizing, because when one country develops any weapons systems, whether deemed "offensive" or "defensive," it inevitably spawns more weapons systems from other countries. Nor is missile defence cheap; it will only lead to a new expensive arms race in space that the world can ill afford, while lining the pockets of Raytheon, Boeing, Lockheed Martin and the rest of the military industrial complex.
So once again, most of what you hear is propaganda, meant to benefit the few while endangering and impoverishing the many.
In his speech in Prague, President Obama's rhetoric was essentially no different than that of George Bush. He promised, because of our "moral responsibility," to rid the world of nuclear weapons. He then averred that the US would not lower its defenses while others are pursuing a nuclear threat.
He's right about his last promise. Under his budget the US will continue to spend on defense (and a nuclear capability) more than all the rest of the world put together, "While others are pursuing a nuclear threat" an obvious reference to Iran, which our intelligence community reports is not pursuing a nuclear weapon. Obama who knows this intelligence information said to a cheering crowd: "As long as the threat from Iran persists, we will go forward with a missile defense system that is cost-effective and proven." So much for his recent peaceful overtures to the people of Iran whose defense budget is less than 1% of ours.
"Cost-effective!!!" The missile shield is the biggest boondoggle in military history with constant cost overruns. "Proven!!!" All tests have failed save one where the target's location was programmed into the interceptor guidance system. The President's false exaggerations are statements right out of a lobbyist's briefing paper. The missile shield in Alaska was deployed before the system was ever proven to work at a cost of $100 billion. The shield for Poland and Czech will cost more than $100 billion. The great majority of knowledgeable scientists, not on the payroll of the benefiting defense contractors, state that the system will not work and that a threat does not exist.
Keep Reading...
punditman says...
Ah yes, missile defence. Punditman is having an early 80s flashback.
The idea of a missile "shield" has always been misleading, dating back to Reagan's SDI. According to assistant professor Tom Sauer at the University of Antwerp in Belgium and professor Dave Webb of Leeds Metropolitan University in the United Kingdom, "it is a solution that technically does not work being applied to a problem that does not actually exist...The systems cannot effectively target incoming missiles without assistance from homing devices."
As the above piece by Mike Gavel points out, missile "defence" is not so much a defense against incoming enemy missiles as it is an "offense" in that it seeks to knock out enemy communications leaving them blind and vulnerable to a first strike. Moreover, missile defence is not a stabilizing influence; it is destabilizing, because when one country develops any weapons systems, whether deemed "offensive" or "defensive," it inevitably spawns more weapons systems from other countries. Nor is missile defence cheap; it will only lead to a new expensive arms race in space that the world can ill afford, while lining the pockets of Raytheon, Boeing, Lockheed Martin and the rest of the military industrial complex.
So once again, most of what you hear is propaganda, meant to benefit the few while endangering and impoverishing the many.
9/16/08
Military Industrial Complex 2.0
Cubicle Mercenaries, Subcontracting Warriors, and Other Phenomena of a Privatizing Pentagon
by Frida Berrigan
Seven years into George W. Bush's Global War on Terror, the Pentagon is embroiled in two big wars, a potentially explosive war of words with Tehran, and numerous smaller conflicts - and it is leaning ever more heavily on private military contractors to get by.
Once upon a time, soldiers did more than pick up a gun. They picked up trash. They cut hair and delivered mail. They fixed airplanes and inflated truck tires.
Not anymore. All of those tasks are now the responsibility of private military corporations. In the service of the Pentagon, their employees also man computers, write software code, create integrating systems, train technicians, manufacture and service high-tech weapons, market munitions, and interpret satellite images.
Whenever Peacenik reads about the money the U.S. spends on the military industrial complex Peacenik can't help but think of the collapse of the Soviet Union. There are whole books written on the similarites between the two empires. Read "Closing the Collapse Gap" by Dmitry Olav if you're interested. The point is that once this huge military machine stops being fed, it decays very quickly. Will it take economic collapse to curb America's appetite for war? Peacenik thinks that it might.
by Frida Berrigan
Seven years into George W. Bush's Global War on Terror, the Pentagon is embroiled in two big wars, a potentially explosive war of words with Tehran, and numerous smaller conflicts - and it is leaning ever more heavily on private military contractors to get by.
Once upon a time, soldiers did more than pick up a gun. They picked up trash. They cut hair and delivered mail. They fixed airplanes and inflated truck tires.
Not anymore. All of those tasks are now the responsibility of private military corporations. In the service of the Pentagon, their employees also man computers, write software code, create integrating systems, train technicians, manufacture and service high-tech weapons, market munitions, and interpret satellite images.
Whenever Peacenik reads about the money the U.S. spends on the military industrial complex Peacenik can't help but think of the collapse of the Soviet Union. There are whole books written on the similarites between the two empires. Read "Closing the Collapse Gap" by Dmitry Olav if you're interested. The point is that once this huge military machine stops being fed, it decays very quickly. Will it take economic collapse to curb America's appetite for war? Peacenik thinks that it might.
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