Its hard to keep with current events when you spend half your time with the bong and the other half running ultra-marathons.
2016 US Presidential Elections | Trump Wins
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Its hard to keep with current events when you spend half your time with the bong and the other half running ultra-marathons.
First time the Libertarians get more of a spotlight and this is what we get... I prefer uninteresting people: "what else do you do?" "nothing, politics is all I do"
Tbf to Gary, Trump would've started talking about a leper there.
It's a jobs program, 75% of the US military is a jobs program.
Look, your argument is based on one bonkers article. It is too time consuming to debunk all the nonsense – it is just too much -, so I just try to keep it short. Let me just start with quoting the same author, since you seem to trust him so much:
Now I don´t know if the first claim is true, but lets take a look at some basic numbers.
The EU spends in total almost 200billion€ (~1,4% of the GDP) on military. They have 1,4million people in the military and about 400.000 are effective deployable fighting force. Russia spends about 66billion€ on its military (in comparison: the UK alone spends 48billion). They have manpower of about 800.000 people, but it is hard to confirm how many are actually ready to fight. The EU has more planes, ships and submarines. Russia´s military is still in the process of modernization and only about ~50% of their forces have modern equipment yet (this will change in the next 5years). They have a serious problem to find enough people that they can conscript and their economy is already at its limit.
So you tell me that an army with a budget 3x higher and better eqipment can´t win a defensive war against Russia?
The only reasonable claim of this article is, that Russia could blitz the Baltics before Nato could react. That said they can do that with or without the USA helping out. I genuinely don´t know if Nato would be willing to go to war over such action, but Russia would collapse if they get involved in an open war with Europe. Their economy would never be able to handle it and their military isn´t structured to fight an open war with europe.
So yes, your argument is completely bonkers, but it is hard to argue with Americans when it comes to the military. I hope you do a better job when you teach history.
You know, I live near one of those base. At least reasonable near. They are an enclosed economy: Americans work in the shops on the area itself, the restaurants are American (only Taco Bell in Germany! But not even open to the public), a lot of supplies gets flown in from the US. So, nah.
This. I know a lot of things really are shelled out and we definetivly lack transportation and logistic capabilities. But neither the Russian airforce, nor the russian naval forces are any match. As are the land forced, both in number and equipment.
@PedroMendez But what if the Brits say "we aren't doing this without our yank buddies, plus the rest of you speak funny languages"?
Can we move the NATO discussion to another thread?
Bingo! And it´s a jobs program where a large majority (like the military industrial complex) are conservative voters, thus the right wing never wants to bring these groups up in their Anti big government and fiscal conservative schemes.
I have to laugh at all this Cold War and NATO bs still being bandied about and how we have to spend, spend, spend and protect . . . against whom? When will countries free themselves from all this make up grandiose war crap on a a chessboard world scale. Neither Russia nor the United States can even defeat Afghanistan for fecks sake.
I would say Chicago, Baltimore, parts of Philadelphia etc are far more dangerous for Americans than any of these bullshit scare tactic boogiemen of Russia, Isis, China etc. We really need a revolutionary change in thought.
Russia invaded Ukraine and Georgia before that, Saddam invaded Kuwait, Eritria/Ethiopia...are happened recently in the past 25 years imo. And there are loads of territorial disputes even today in every part of the world. Add in the ISIS and the 'war on terror' putting a modern spin to warfare.
I don't see an end to militarization. Getting rid of nukes was a huge problem...forget ending all wars!
Well, I guess we´ll welcome or new Russian overlords. I always suspected that one of my aunts who lived in eastern berlin had beneficial contact to the Stasi. So it might open up new career opportunities and I always wanted to work for an intelligence agency.
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I liked accessing FiveThirtyEight's election forecast a lot more when Trump's chances were estimated around 20%
http://projects.fivethirtyeight.com/2016-election-forecast/?ex_cid=rrpromo
http://projects.fivethirtyeight.com/2016-election-forecast/?ex_cid=rrpromo
Russia invaded Ukraine and Georgia before that, Saddam invaded Kuwait, Eritria/Ethiopia...are happened recently in the past 25 years imo. And there are loads of territorial disputes even today in every part of the world. Add in the ISIS and the 'war on terror' putting a modern spin to warfare.
I don't see an end to militarization. Getting rid of nukes was a huge problem...forget ending all wars!
So the US needs bases in how many countries? Like 800 bases in 70 countries? fecking ridiculous. Putin invaded Ukraine even with NATO and the whole American military might. Do you think he´ll go further? Really? Let America clean up its own cities. This militarism is on such a ridiculous scale. I´m so tired of this thinking and the scare tactics. We need a tax payer revolt!
Of course the US needs a military, but let´s rethink this on such a tinier scale.
Was watching it now... jeez. Guess its time to pack it up, show up again in 4 years.
Governor of a nothing state is about his level.
Agree wholeheartedly. The US spend much more then the next ten countries combined on military. If I was CIC I would restructure a very large portion to humanitarian causes, merge the air force with NASA completely and restructure the pentagon that requires a significant portion of their budget be spent on RnD. I would also give 33% of the military budget to the VA for the next five years so they can sort their shit out. Whereas Trump would have them sailing around the world pillaging and strong arming for Putin while broadcasting the shit show on national tv.
By the way, were any of you as shocked as I was that this monkey doesn't even see an authoritarian regime for what it is??? 80% approval is a good thing in his mind, totally disregarding how the "polls" came to that number. The guy wants to be mentioned in the same breath as Putin, the Kims and Mussolini. Not Roosevelt, Churchill or Kennedy. This is the guy these dumbfeck republicans have been arming themselves to defeat yet they are standing under him basking in the golden glow of his wrinkly balls and facist statements and blocking out any fact that disparages their idea of a perfect leader.
The guy is surrounded by serial abusers, Russian insiders and a long long list of criminal and unethical behavior. It's kind of sick. Maybe if the media mentioned his subpoena in a civil case where he is implicated the rape of a 13 year old as much as they have shoveled Clintons understanding of a c next to a paragraph in an email we could end this farce of a candidate.
Not once has anyone mentioned the cause of this humanitarian clusterfeck. If anyone was paying attention 7 years ago when DROUGHT took hold we could put this civil war in to perspective. I never trust a republican or libertarian to be well informed about anything except Clinton conspiracies. If you could get a degree in that they would all be college professors.
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Don´t be mean to him.
He is just a bit…eh…simple-minded and clumsy at times. He might not be your heavy hitting intellectual, but he has practical talent. It is like when your new much loved puppy shits on the carpet because too many people tried to cuddle him at the same time. Can you really be angry about this? Yes of course ffs. Jeeze; he really dropped the ball. It is over before it begun. fecking idiot. This is a cyclical thought...when people forget lessons from history.
How did Pearl Harbour happen? US had a non-interventionist attitude all through...till Pearl Harbour. World is a smaller place and no country can take a isolationist attitude anymore.
And US needs those jobs. US DoD is the biggest employer in the world with employing 3.1 million US Citizens. Add another 3 million employees to the support industry making weapons directly or in support activities like infrastructure development/maintenance etc. And that's still not counting the employees from feeder industries like transportation, Iron and Steel, Electronics etc that also feed on Defence Structure. Have you ever thought of the impact to "let's have a smaller military" type throwaway statements? The resulting unemployment and economic downturns?
As for your other point...yes. I do believe that the presence of US bases (say in South Korea) actively prevents an escalation of conflicts. Same with Russia. They can still rattle their cages here and there, but an all out conflict is only prevented because of threat of MAD (Mutually Assured Destruction). If US unilaterally cuts down its military, the status quo will not exist anymore and what may occur is free for all and I don't think it will be positive....even to the US.
Would US be comfortable if Pakistan sold nuclear blueprints to Iran and North Korea or ISIS or do you want to actively prohibit such stuff?
Whether people like it or not, whether it is US or any other country....the world needs a global policeman. I'd prefer a more active UN, but that's for another debate. It is a like a self-fulfilling prophesy...the US needs to be global policeman as much as the world needs a global policeman.
And here I am having a rational conversation.
Not when a presidential candidate has floated completely restructuring the US' NATO responsibilities.
I'm talking about stateside buddy, not jobs for Germans.
Edgar, you talk sense most of the time but that is a seriously fecked up reason to blindly carry on with the status quo. If jobs created by the military complex is so important then they should try to diversify their damn economy from a military based one.
No, the world has moved on. Russia is a paper tiger and China has become an economic animal. You and all the others justifying this massive, massive fleecing of American tax payers on military expenditures need to move on as well and get voted out of office. People need to stand up and say this. The problems in American inner cities and rural areas like West Virginia are far more pressing than this scarecrow Putin, ffs.
No one will invade the US. No one will invade Western Europe or Russia or China or Australia/NZ. No one will invade India. Don´t believe the hype.
Of course there will be local skirmishes in places like the Middle East, but they are cyclical as well and will work themselves out without the massive militaries of the super powers.
If nuclear bombs fly, what good is a huge military?
The Middle East is going through its worst drought in 900 years . . . yet we need bigger militaries and more costly armed meddling and boots on the ground!!! And oh yeah, climate science is a hoax!
Unfortunately most polticians are Realists and in their world military = power. Also, Russia annexed another country, and China are defending North Korea. To underestimate these two countries' intentions would be naive.
I'm not saying it makes sense or expressing my support. I'm just saying it is what it is now. Agree that this should be a far wider geopolitical/socioeconomic discussion which is far simpler than "Let's cut down military". And the problem with staus quo is that it cannot be unilaterally rescinded!
This is where we differ. Realistically Russia will go no further than annexing a majority Russian population of Ukraine, old problems from the Soviet Union. They are a paper tiger, and even less so with falling oil prices. And do you think China really like North Korea? Jesus, talk about naiveity. Granted they must be treated with kid gloves, but they will soon go the way of all the other dying communistic dictatorships.
Hopefully these Cold War, War and Power realists will go away with these communistic dictatorships which are on their death beds. Good riddance! Godspeed!
What is Pakistan proliferates nuclear material to North Korea or even the ISIS considering their connections to Bin Laden and such. Surely they'd not hesitate to nuke US or somehow take a kinder stance that US has cut down its military? You are thinking old fashioned warfare.....9/11 led to war on terror and one more such incident and US citizens will be clamouring for US to be doing the invading.
Somehow, I fear walking in many parts of many American cities, especially at night, more than I do North Korea, ISIS, BinWho? and a drastically reduced military. Let´s fix the fixable first.
How did that gazillion dollar over bloated military work on 9/11? In Iraq? In Afghanistan? I think we´re arguably worse off than before, especially financially.
I like Gary Johnson.
This isn't a geography test. Having said that, I'm not sure if he is presidential material as he is very unorthodox (which of course can be a good thing). He wants basically very limited government (which is the libertarian way) so you would fancy he would steal more votes away from Trump than Clinton if he gets into the debates (and I hope he does) and if people go along with his ideology, he is a very charismatic person.
All of this reminds me a bit of this classic exchange.....
https://www.redcafe.net/threads/livestream-out-of-syria.348338/page-11#post-11767538
https://www.redcafe.net/threads/livestream-out-of-syria.348338/page-11#post-11767538
Not good for him. It's dominating the news cycles so far. When he has little media exposure to begin with, getting so much negative coverage isn't ideal.
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