The Constitution requies those same elected officials to provide from the commond defense and the general welfare. However, I have yet to find where those same elected officials are required to spoon feed anyone after they screw up investing or buying beyond their means!

Anyone care to explainf?

If we keep going the way we have the last few decades; as a nation — we will have to declare bankrupsy, and start over. (??) Maybe that’s not such a bad idea. Wipe out the debt to China and others. Tax the hell out of products coming into this country from them. We are spinning our ‘wheels’ the way we’re going. I wish President Obama and his staff would look at the two small(by comparison) ideas I sent him. (on my website.I made the mistake of asking for funding as ‘ear marked’ funding. Now I have to go back and ask for the ones that don’t have to be repaid.I have a plan to repay mine — if I get it. All this is spelled out on my website: http://www.navalairestates1.com. By the way, the biggest economic recovery plan would be to build a second ‘great wall of china’ Right below San Diego to the Gulf of Mexico.Create jobs for Americans –and round up and ship back all illegals. Put ‘real’ Americans back to work.

As far as procurement, if companies ran the way DOD let them run, everything would be imported. Granted we’re getting that way due to WalMart and its business model, but its cost plus some amount. There is no incentive to economize, they’re going to get paid anyway. And if you look at the Wall Street bloat, defense contractors are just as bad, if not worse, in part due to the revolving door where the general officer types step into a cushy job when they retire.

No defense does not help the economy. Ike had it right when he talked about the military industrial complex. It got way worse under Bush. Especially with how he had so much contracting embedded in the military. Its hurting morale and causing losses in the ranks. Why stay in service if there are contractors with big pockets that are mighty deep.

You think $30B is a drop in the bucket? What about $400B? That is how much (and then some) we paid on interest to our national debt. That is a lot of stimulus in my small mind.

DC2

“Prime example from this week. Obama and the Dems expand SCHIP health care for children that covers families of four up to $80k/year and families of five that make up to $100K/year of which 80% already have private healthcare coverage. That means that a single person making $35k a year with no kids will subsidize the others. Does this make sense to anyone?”

It makes about as much sense as a 55 year old man (not me) complaining that he has to pay for education for children whenn he and his wife never had any. Or how about my former neighbor that said he never needed anything from the government so he never paid his business taxes.

It is funny that a great many former and current military members blog on and read this site daily. All of us that are veterans swore unconditionally that we would be willing to give out lives for this nation. Yet we complain because of how much we pay in taxes. What we should be complaining about is not how much we pay but what it is spent on. That salmonella (sp) spewing peanut factory was last inspected by the FDA in 2001. What about the Cradal Mine that collapsed because of the method they were using to mine coal? MSHA inspectors weren’t around then either.

DC2

So if the politicians were unable to, at all levels, adequately plan for infrastructure repair and construction let’s give them more money to waste?

My point about increasing defense spending is simple, after offering one trillion of ADDITIONAL spending any argument that there is not enough for defense is a little disingenuous (that’s nice for a lie)

Here is a thought experiment for everyone.

1) Government at all levels has never spent more money and has been a larger percentage of the economy as right now (WW’s not included)
2) Defense is a SMALLER percentage of the economy than in the last 50 plus years.
3) Roads, sewers, water lines, etc. are supposedly crumbling due to lack of funds.

Could the government be spending money on things that.…just maybe.… they should not be spending on.

Prime example from this week. Obama and the Dems expand SCHIP health care for children that covers families of four up to $80k/year and families of five that make up to $100K/year of which 80% already have private healthcare coverage. That means that a single person making $35k a year with no kids will subsidize the others. Does this make sense to anyone?

Also it is kind of difficult to “drop” the political crap when it is politicians making political decisions. It is political 24/7.

Sounds a bit ominous to me.

Our nation’s infrastructure has not been improved or upgraded in years. How many times each month do we hear about a 6′ water pipe burst, or a bridge collapsing? In more simpler terms, how many more potholes are on our streets than in years past?

We have neutered our federal oversight agencies in the name of trimming the size of our government. That is what leads to our wonderful peanut butter fiasco we are going through.

Spending and upgrades to our schools has fallen behind. Why shouldn’t our kids have computers at their desks? Why shouldn’t teachers be able to teach on digital blackboards? We are the most powerful nation in the world and we debate whether we spend enough on our kid’s education?

Research and development with our universities and national research labs has also been cut. I will never forget Bush travelling to the Energy Dept. research lab promoting alternative energy research. Unfortunately he had just laid off most of the researchers and they had to scramble to hire them back for the photo-op.

Look at our military today. We are flying fighter planes we hope will not break apart in high-g maneuvers. Out tanker fleet is 50 years old. Oh, and when will the B-52 ever be replaced?

All of these areas and more need to be addressed and why not now? If consumers aren’t going to spend money then the government needs to so that people can get good paying jobs and level out this recession. The government just don’t need to be spending money on condoms (unless they are for the orange box in medical).

If $800B is not enough then we are truly screwed.

DC2

Any government spending is stimulus, simple economic principle. That’s what’s missed in the current debate on the stimulus bill by certain politicians. Any job created by additional spending, whether an assembly line worker or somebody watering the lawn, is a job that didn’t exist yesterday.

There is no doubt higher defense spending will stimulate the economy. But not by adding a few billions of dollars. As DC2 Jennings points out, that money could be put to good use. But if you’re looking to military spending to boost the economy, then you must look at orders of magnitude more spending then anybody is considering. Much of the current discussion among economists of the $800 billion stimulus bill is that amount is not large enough to alter the downward trajectory of the U.S. economy.

The author’s position is bunk. There is a lot of that lately. Today’s WaPo says Mr. Obama’s plan is to “preserve 3 million jobs”. Thats funny, I thought it wsa supposed to create “3 million jobs.”