Obama Proposes Defense Cut (To Above 2007 Levels): Wingnut Outrage.

By Cernig

According to Fox News, Obama is proposing a measly 10% cut in the Pentagon's declared budget. Predictably, wingnut heads are exploding.

But Justin Gardiner of Donklephant has some real facts at his fingertips in an astute comment over at Poligazette. I'm going to lift his comment in its entirety:

A few things…

1) The Pentagon’s budget (not including expenditures for Iraq and Afghanistan) has grown from $316B in 2001 to $536B in 2009. This represents a 70% increase. So a 10% decrease is funding will take us from $536B to $483B, which is still more than the $463B the Pentagon had for 2007. All Obama is doing is preventing the budget from growing an average of 10% year after year when there’s no discernible advantage to doing so.

2) Obama has said consistently that ALL government agencies will see cuts, but the military budget is the biggest so that has to be one of the first to be addressed.

3) The United States spends more than the next 40+ countries combined in defense spending. How that’s tolerated by our taxpayers is beyond me, but I’d imagine they’d like a little of that money back at a time like this, wouldn’t you?

But to the broader point of this post, I think it would be refreshing to see these cuts being characterized as something other than an ideological win for the Dems. Cutting back right now makes sense because our current budgets aren’t sustainable.

In other words, if McCain had won the election and was proposing these cuts, what would this post say? Would you call Republican voters gullible? Would you tell people to contact their congressional reps or senators?

Well yes, exactly. Plus, remember that the declared budget doesn't include supplementary amounts for Iraq and Afghanistan or the defense spending spread around other departments like Energy (nukes), veteran care and Homeland Security. Add it all up and its closer to $1 trillion, or well over half of all government spending.

And no, defense spending is not good stimulus spending unless you work for a neocon think-tank. If it were, increased spending since 9/11 - almost a trillion a year - would have had a far more noticeable effect on GDP. Lets face it, we've had tax cuts for the rich and defense spending out the wazoo. If they were effective as stimuli to rescue the nation from depression, the economy wouldn't be in this state to begin with.

Comments

[Brent]

Well I think the reason the spending hasn't helped the economy at large is because it was never meant to. When one looks at the current economic situation it's obvious that this whole 'war on terror' nonsense is just a cleverly concocted sham designed to drain public funds into the hands of a very few, very rich men. Some might even call it conscienceless, fascist, or totalitarian, and in my opinion their dead on.

[Russ Wellen]

How that’s tolerated by our taxpayers is beyond me, but I’d imagine they’d like a little of that money back at a time like this, wouldn’t you?

You can say that again, Justin.

[anderson]

I wonder if we are ever going to get to the point where a majority of Americans recognize that the Pentagon's "budget" functions mostly as a welfare/make-work program for the small cadre of special interests otherwise known as defense contractors. They produce a bunch of crap that serves no public utility whatsoever, except to heat up the fevered minds of trough-sloppers like Lockheed Martin and the Heritage Foundation. In fact, Dod activities -- apart from the obvious detriment they cause populations abroad -- are the most polluting on the planet. The Pentagon is the single biggest user of oil in the world, and have little or no concern about consumption.

Despite the near-zero public utility created by DoD spending, and the profligate nature of it, it is still beyond the pale for some to see anyone propose trimming back this shockingly wasteful enterprise.

[Jerry Kershner]

I'm glad I'm not depending on you folks to defend me. When we have a defense department that is defending half the free world don't be surprised that it costs a chunk of change. So when they come for you, maybe we should just let you fend for yourself.

As for the economic condition. Go study. Toxic assets from too many unqualified people getting loans. Credit lock up because of toxic assets. Economic stall from credit lock-up. Spending anywhere isn't going to help until the toxic assets are sequestered. Once they ARE sequestered then spending on defense is as good as any other stateside industry.