My original article in the Huffington Post written on 29May2008 was entitled, "Well, Barack, We Have a Problem... On 2August2008 I then said, "Why Do We Spend So Much on National Security?" Earlier this month I repeated the above in "The 10% Simple Solution to Peace," which drew all of three comments...two of them were from me to myself. Clearly, there is no interest in world peace, for my subsequent posting on Cloning and Immortality drew, at current count, 217 comments.
If you're too lazy to click on those above postings, very simply, an intriguing way to gain world peace, forever, is for our Commander in Chief to, at the next G8 Summit, shock the world by stating: the United States this year will reduce our military spending by 10%, and if you all also do this, next year we will repeat a 10% reduction of our defense budget. I would hope that you all will also do the same. In a decade, if the president following me continues this policy, world military spending will become relatively insignificant. All these saved funds can then go into paying off our national debt, remediating global warming, initiating a crash program for commercializing the renewables and shoring up our basic infrastructure.
Wouldn't it be wonderful if, instead of building yet another aircraft carrier--which, by the way, will be known as the Gerald R. Ford class, and will cost $14 billion each--these funds can instead be used to embark on a national high speed rail system to ease the jam on our national highways. We can build a next generation national smart grid system to wheel wind and solar power electricity. Let me add that the reason why the price is only $14 billion for the next one is because we are committed to build three. We taxpayers got bargain rates for volume. We now have 11 aircraft carriers, with the U.S.S. Enterprise scheduled to be decommissioned in 2013 after 51 years of continuous military service.
You say, nah, our general population is so afraid of China, Russia, North Korea and Iran that, supported by the military-industrial complex, this will be impossible to do. Yes, that lobbying group is formidable, but I was surprised to learn of a poll reported in the 26July2010 issue of Time magazine:
If Congress and the President had to reduce spending, in which areas would you want them to cut?
Wars in Afghanistan and Iraq (55%)
Other defense spending (46%)
Unemployment compensation (34%)
Medicaid (20%)
Education (17%)
Medicare (16%)
Social Security (12%)
The fact of the matter, actually, is that there is no place to cut, but the military budget is the largest (more than half the annual Federal expenditure)...and we have no enemy to fear into the foreseeable future. I can't see any justification for increasing our military budget for a rag-tag bunch of several hundred dangerous terrorists, an Iran which is soon to implode and a North Korea on the verge of collapse.
President Barack Obama hosts the G8 meeting in 2012. He thus has less than two years to get his staff working on convincing the G8 to consider this monumental step. From my first HuffPo, where a 10% solution was deemed neat, but crazy...today, who knows, maybe. It's not as idiotic as it sounded just two years ago.
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The Dow Jones Industrials surged 202 to 10,322, with world markets also all up, except for the Japan Nikkei, down 57 to 9221. Maybe I should buy some Japanese stocks. Yayoi, any recommendations (I was set to purchase some American stocks when the Dow fell below 9,000, but this appears not to be happening, so, maybe, why not Japanese stocks)? Gold increased $9/toz to $1195 and crude oil is at $79/barrel.
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All of a sudden, there are now three storms affecting the Gulf. First that disturbance mentioned over the weekend is now a tropical depression, and headed for the oil spill area:
However, right behind is yet another disturbance, also heading in the general direction of the spill:
But that is not all, for a storm popped up in the western Gulf, but is project to move straight into Mexico.
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