The 800 pound gorilla

We all appreciate the sacrifice made by our boys in uniform. That’s not the point. The point is that military spending is bankrupting the country. How disappointing to hear President Obama declare a freeze on desperately needed investments into our capital infrastructure but won’t cut back a dime on military spending. This is not the action of a capitalist. It is the action of a fascist.  If that doesn’t alarm you, you need a remedial course in history.

I wish our politicians could read a balance sheet and financial statement. A tank is not a capital item by any definition of the word. It is an expense, a night watchman’s expense. Based on the spending for military nonsense the past 50 years one could make the case that we have had a military coup in this country. In fact, we have. It seems everyone welcomes it. Well, not everyone but the military has an 80% approval rating. Compare that to the approval rating of congress.

I’m a factory owner, competing in a market economy. If I had the same night watchman’s expense as the United States I’d have to double the price of everything I sold –  which explains our trade deficit. Our military consumes half our total industrial output annually. Is the reason we aren’t told this because we’d instantly see the lunacy of such a policy? This misdirection of our labor, credit and material resource must come to an end. Nothing is more detrimental to commerce than war, invented or real. Unless of course, you own stock in defense contractors.

We’ve been sold protection we didn’t need. We have no enemies with the capacity to do us real harm. We are protected by vast oceans and are individually armed to the teeth, impossible to occupy by foreign invaders. The simple fact is nobody wants our territory, so polluted it is. Our forests are ravaged. Our roads, sewer systems, bridges and cities are crumbling before our eyes. Our farms are sterile and poisoned. And all we do is make weapons. This is a mindset worthy of a true hillbilly.

thruthout.org: A Plea to the US Military and Its Enforcers