I happen to agree with this. It is one of the unacknowledged fault lines underneath the republican party. Most of the traditional republicans reflexively support a huge defense establishment, not least because of the contracts it throws off. The Tea Party newcomers have no stake in this system or in perpetuating it and grasp the idiocy of our military strategy and the budget it requires.
With out discussing what massive spending cuts would do during a recession to the unemployment problem and the recession what you're saying is just talk. How much further would this hurt the real estate market ? Do we want to dump a million or two million government workers in the unemployment line what would be the effect on the economy? This isn't a black and white issue we have to see what the governments actions would cause and then decide what to do. An example for me is, I am for eliminating the farm subsidies. But cutting them off immediately wouldn't be the right thing to do. It wouldn't be fair to the farmers or bankers who lend to the farmers, a phase out of the program would be prudent. Congress needs more pragmatic thinkers and business minds and result oriented actions.
I'd consider it preferable to spending billions we don't have paying them to do/accomplish nothing. I don't think it was "fair" to the taxpayers to implement the subsidies in the first place. But I would certainly accept a phaseout versus no cut back at all. Hence my repeated statements that we need a whole new congress along with term limits to foster relatively uncorrupted congresses in the future.
It's my opinion that our foreign intervention is necessary to our present empire, and that a reduction of that intervention will result in a shrinkage in both quantity and quality of various attributes of what we call "the American way of life". I've said this before, but it's been awhile so I'll repeat myself, that when I was in boot camp we were informed that the United States does not have in sufficient quantity some four dozen imputs needed to sustain our way of life, so it's the military's job to protect our supply chains and resource fields abroad. If you think about it, that is self-defense, it's a form of habitat protection. Edit: I tried to write that without picking a side.
I would like to see the government workers employed, by the government and/or public sector, doing work that actually is in the best interest of America. If we cut defense spending in half, that would lead to layoffs...and stock prices of defense firms falling. Can those people be put to work developing and implementing alternative energy solutions? Likely. The money spent on defense is like an insurance policy...but are we over insured? Do the massive profits of the defense contractors get distributed to the workers, or do they go into the hands of upper management and dividends to shareholders? No, the cause of the problem is not government spending, but the way in which government spending does not contribute properly to the economy.
Our present empire doesn't work in today's world economy. Our empire doesn't work when the electorate is deeply divided on social and economic issues. Our empire doesn't work when current technology provide instant information...and disinformation. We need to change. My real question is, could America return to the 50's? If the answer is no, then we need to change our way of thinking to current time, current technology, current threats, etc. Our situation is not the result of some instant change. It has been changing slowly since the 50's. Is there a need to create demand for good and services in America? Not really. Does supply side economics work? Not really. Then what to do? Could America survive and flourish if we closed our borders and made a decision to move into full on isolation? Demographics and the trend in undereducated Americans says no. So what to do?
just curious, but why is all that the republican's fault? because bush was in the white house? shall we discuss who actually approves spending, and who was in control of the house/senate during a good portion of those bush years? lets go back a bit further and see who we can lay fannie and freddie at the foot of? or who was supportive of the "housing affordability act"? to blame this on the "right" alone goes to show how much you lack research and fact.
Plenty of blame to pass around for the democrats too. There was a period of a few years after 911 when Bush was in almost total controll, his and the republicans failure during this time is what I'm talking about. For balance Obama and the democrats totally screwed up, they had a tremendous backing from much of America. Obama's baby, health insurance overhaul was a mess. They had a chance to bring universal health care to the US like the rest of the civilized world. What did Obama do, he turned it over to congress where the democrats pork barreled the process, a failure of leadership by Obama. He had a chance to put America to work to recover from the recession. He turned it over to the democratic congress where they massively pork barreled the process, again a failure of leadership by Obama. And while this was going on the republicans did absolutely nothing to improve the situation. Is that more balanced for you Tsing, both sides are a total screw up when they are in control.
this is an excellent article on krugman from an economic blogger who knows a helluva lot more than krugman. be careful, though. you wont get much of this if you are a krugman fan. it's real economics, and much tougher than the rainbows and unicorns version of krugman. http://www.nakedcapitalism.com/2011...-krugman—the-conscience-of-a-neo-liberal.html