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Politics : Formerly About Advanced Micro Devices -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: TimF who wrote (175438)	9/26/2003 7:47:12 PM
From: tejek	Read Replies (4) \| Respond to of 1577900

I don't care. Our defense budget is too high. What standard due you use too determine too high or not too high? The current level. Mandatory budget items are not included with Discretionary spending items like defense. They make up a separate line item on the report but they are still non defense government spending. You can break down government spending in to as many categories as you want but it doesn't change its nature as spending by the government. No news here. The most basic part of government is to be able to protect it citizens against foreign (mostly military and intelligence spending) and domestic (police, FBI ect.). I can not tell you how much I am tired of hearing that "the most important part of our gov't" is military spending/protecting its citizens. Through 4 years of undergrad with a dual major in pol sci. and bus., and 2 years of a grad. program as well as my adult years in LA, and I never once heard that statement until I came to this thread. I realize that its central to the thesis of conservative ideology but it was not the central theme for the founding of this nation. And many people expect much more from their gov't than military intervention and/or protection. Other program can be good ideas, even great ideas and can be very important for many people but they are in the end less vital then the ability to keep the peace and protect our nation from foreign threats. IMO keeping the peace is just one of several vitals areas that requires the gov't's participation. That's only because so much of the budget is not discretionary. Mandatory is 58%; discretionary 42% Exactly. You want to make conclusions about government spending while excluding over half of federal government spending from consideration. You still don't get my point....there is Discretionary and Mandatory. Under Mandatory, there are at least three budget line items, maybe 4. Under Discretionary, there is just defense and other. Defense is half of all Discretionary spending and roughly 1/4 of our budget if you exclude interest payments for the national debt. One fourth of our revenues go to defense spending at a time when we have no real sovereign enemy. Its disgusting! Those projections are completely off now that the Iraqi war is soaking up so much more of our revenues. You think it will soak off this much for 5 years? I think $300-$400 billion is a lot of revenue. ,I>Also the reconstruction money is not defense spending only the actual operations and maintaince spending for the war. A large part of that was using up ammo fuel and other supplies at a high rate during the initial phase of the war. We aren't using up a lot of $1.5mil + cruise missiles or sending hundreds of tanks across hundreds of miles of desert at high speed any more. The pay for the soldiers would have to be paid anyway (except the hazardous duty pay and the extra pay for reserves that are called up). Also military spending isn't the only thing that goes up faster then anticipated. Non-defense spending increases faster then projections all the time. With the new prescription drug benefit it will probably keep happening, most likely at an even higher rate then normal. Its still very likely that the defense spending increase over the next 5 years will be less the increase in non defense spending (measured either by a percentage or in dollars). Tim, Bush has asked for $87 billion this year and Cheney said last week that its very likely they'll be back in for roughly $90 billion in the first half of next year. Rummy has asked that approval of the $87 billion be passed by Congress by next Tuesday. I suspect that's because the initial outlay of $80 billion is nearly gone. Its not even a full year yet. Three hundred billion looks very doable and $400 billion very possible. Congress has gotten snookered by Bush and they will have to go along. Its pitiful! ted