medin@nike.uucp (Milo S. Medin) (09/15/86)
In article <480@aurora.UUCP> al@aurora.UUCP (Al Globus) writes: >... >May I remind you that the US government is $2 trillion (yes, TRILLION) >in debt and sinking at $200 billion a year? That our trade deficit is >about $18 billion a month? My friend, the USSR may or may not be able >to afford their military but we are obviously unable to afford ours. It >looks to me as if the superpowers are headed into big economic trouble >while Japan - with a small defense burden - is laughing all the way to >the bank. > >The struggle with the USSR will not be won on the battleground. It will >be won by computers, communication satellites and the fact that democracy, >for all its many flaws, is better than communism. However, we can lose. The >way to lose is to waste our strength on weapon systems that will never >be used. Al, I believe we could spend an awful lot more if we were willing to give up some of the spending going to less important parts of the economy, and do it with relative ease. We used to spend 50% of the budget on defense routinely... The real point is a little different. Defense spending is different from other types of government spending. W.F. Buckley once said that you spend whatever is needed on defense, not what you could afford, since if you were skimpy in this area, all your other funded programs would be rendered useless in the case of a major war. Surely if security could be guaranteed, the American public would be willing to spend trillions on defense. Granted, security is hard to guarantee, but the point remains the same. US national security is the highest priority item in the budget. Milo Medin NASA Ames Research Center Moffett Field, CA PS All the usual disclaimers about this being my personal opinion, and not necessarily the opinion of the US Government, its contractors, or any other entity other than myself apply...
gadfly@ihuxn.UUCP (Gadfly) (09/16/86)
-- > Al, I believe we could spend an awful lot more if we were willing > to give up some of the spending going to less important parts of > the economy, and do it with relative ease. We used to spend 50% > of the budget on defense routinely... > > The real point is a little different. Defense spending is different > from other types of government spending. W.F. Buckley once said > that you spend whatever is needed on defense, not what you could > afford, since if you were skimpy in this area, all your other funded > programs would be rendered useless in the case of a major war... > > Milo Medin It's hard to come down on a guy who's both a harpsichordist and a sailor (and good at them), but perhaps he should stick to those things. Our political and economic health are intimately inter- twined, so WFB has it exactly backwards. Funding armaments to the exclusion of all else for long enough will so cripple our democracy (social and economic) as to render said major war irrelevant. There is a good case for that defense spending which will clearly help stabilize our very tenuous international situation, but SDI R&D is as destabilizing as it is unworkable. -- *** *** JE MAINTIENDRAI ***** ***** ****** ****** 16 Sep 86 [30 Fructidor An CXCIV] ken perlow ***** ***** (312)979-7753 ** ** ** ** ..ihnp4!iwsl8!ken *** ***
lazarus@brahms.BERKELEY.EDU (Andrew J &) (09/21/86)
In article <603@nike.UUCP> medin@orion.UUCP (Milo S. Medin) writes: >We used to spend 50% of the budget on defense routinely... > No way. Do you mean something like the routine year 1944? Please cite some source for this. Until the Cold War defense was a remarkably small part of the budget. We did not even have rifles for all of the troops in 1941. andy