I’m trying to figure out how, if the Central Committee can’t decide, a $600
billion cut to defense over 10 years represents a “deep cut”? Seriously?

Armed warfare is anyway even more insane than it used to be. The wars that
matter even more by now are the directly economic ones. For instance, the one
fought by Texas on the rest of the country. Which has also helped Perry. The
state willing to offer the most to business will always be the winner, no matter
the cost to the state’s population. Who cares about them anyway? Except for the
top 5% or so, who reap the benefits of victory. Nevada’s been waging war on
California (and the rest of the states) for some time in exactly the same fashion.

The costs of that kind of warfare are even harder to determine, but they do
lead to considerable deficit spending. Texas is right up there that way too,
because give-aways will cost someone something either at present or down the
line. (Because Texas isn’t New York or California, media doesn’t mention so
often its debt problems.)

Not that it’s wrong in the least for governments to run deficits. Perry got one
thing right in responding to the ridiculous Romney, when he said governments
aren’t businesses. (Course Perry probably said it purely out of defense and not
because he really thinks that’s true. But it IS true.)

Otherwise, I guess Daddy Bush had the right idea—get others to pay for it. If
we’re going to keep policing the world, we might at least get other nations that also benefit to pay for it.

As for what the money for the later war on Iraq (after Desert Storm and
sanctions) and the ones on Afghanistan and Libya might otherwise have been
spent on, nothing is the answer. Except possibly for even more defense or even
more corporate welfare.

All wars are fought for economic reasons, no matter the superficial claims by
either side. Not that those aren’t at least partly believed by the parties who start
wars. But such people are even more capable of self-deception than the
average person. (That’s one reason they get where they get—into positions of
power. And why hypocrisy doesn’t matter so much.)

The wars on Iraq were obviously fought over oil, while the one on Afghanistan
is a little more complicated, very unusually so. It’s one of the more truly
ideological wars ever fought.

But cost is never obstacle to waging these wars. They are almost always
profitable for the few who count and sometimes for a lot more than those few.
Especially when other people’s money (taxpayer’s in these cases) is used to
fund the wars. At the very same time, Bush also pushed through tax cuts for the
wealthy. (Hightower’s right, Bush wasn’t so stupid, or ignorant.)

It’s not as though there’s a set amount of money that can be used for this or
that or the other thing. In theory, deficit spending could continue into infinity,
which is the main reason the recent debate was a complete fraud. What no one
really knows is where the line is. So far, it’s wherever some party or other
arbitrarily decides it is, though they don’t usually really mean it! Providing no
one calls. If all were to call, then the world would become a very different place.
But calling’s gotten to be as risky or more risky than never calling. (Advanced
capitalism is as bizarre as it could ever get. One could never have made it up,
so weird and unreal has it become—actualized fiction.)

Bush would not have otherwise spent the money (as he seemed to be able to
get Congress to do what Obama can’t get it do) to bolster Medicare Part D or
better fund education, for example. He’d likely not have spent the money at all
if not on aforementioned.

One thing is certain: He was never concerned for deficit or debt. Only Dems
have to worry about that, as everyone knows they’re the real big spenders. That’s
just accepted “fact.”

The cost of the two wars has increased the defense
budget by 80%. 

Reduced to keeping the military/industrial complex
flush, we declared war on (bombed, invaded and are
now occupying) two sovereign nations,  In actuality
we declared war on an unknown enemy and an abstract
noun.

The invasion of Iraq was the most evil calculation in
American history.  With Bush’s numbers falling, with
binLaden apparently not to be caught, Bush needed a
‘proper’ war, a number raiser.

And now in Iraq?  We’re there because we must stay
there in order to defeat those who do not want us
there.  A tautology of the first order, rather like
that famous tautology “Either it will rain tomorrow,
or it won’t.”

And, yes, the Stiglitz estimates, which are much, much, higher. But comes, I submit, to the same conclusion regarding “opportunity costs” - meaning “funding trade-offs between various national policies”.

It’s like picking investments towards a goal of maximizing return on the expense of the investment. Governments would do well to perform the same sort of analyses, or at least the same process of rationalizing government investments even a “return” is difficult to evaluate exactly.

At least the Romans were smart enough to keep the nations they invaded. Like Alexander, they too ran out of “worlds to conquer”.

Asimov wrote in “Foundation” that a charactor (Harry Seldon) uttered the words that were considered most treasonous to the powers that be, “The empire is dying”.

We are dying because we cannot eat bullets and bombs.

PLAYING WITH NUMBERS

Ever hear of a search engine ... called, um, Google?

Here‘s a good estimate.

Now imagine how much health care that $1.3T could have bought. How about 19.3 months of Medicare/Medicaid? How about 22.3 months of Social Security? 

Let’s look at it another way. Presume that $1.3T was spent on Stimulus Spending, that is, assisting states to keep teachers on the payroll, repairing highway systems, upgrading our national electricity grid, etc., etc.?

Now given that the average household income in the US is $44.6K, that means Stimulus Spending creating jobs for 29 million “average American households”.

Given that the US only needs about 8 million jobs to get back to 5% unemployment, what a waste of money those wars have been. (Except for some people in the M-I-C.)

MY POINT

Everything for which the budget accounts, literally EVERYTHING, is a matter of decisional policy making in a context fixed by a “ceiling”. Meaning that, since we can’t have everything, there are trade-offs to be made.

Those policy trade-offs affect what we can and cannot do - and often, their full consequence is way beyond the year in which they were taken. Are we beginning to understand the Colossal Mistake that the Bush2 administration caused?

Do we want to elect this same breed into the Oval Office next year? We, the sheeple, shall decide ...