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America's Not Broke, Wisconsin's Not Broke; We're Just Wasting Money on War
“There is simply no rationale for continuing American involvement with no end in sight, rising deaths for civilians and our brave soldiers, declining public sentiment, and serious economic pain at home,” Ohio Congressman Dennis Kucinich explained to his fellow House members during Thursday’s debate on ending the U.S. occupation of Afghanistan. “Continuing our involvement in Afghanistan is not affordable, it's not just, and it hurts American foreign policy interests. It's time to go."
Rep. Dennis Kucinich speaks in favor of withdrawing troops from Afghanistan last week at a Capitol Hill press conference. (Sabrina Eaton/The Plain Dealer)
That message, long true but truer now than ever, resonated with 92 other members of the House, who joined Kucinich in voting for a new bill to bring an end to the war in Afghanistan by the end of 2011.
At a time when President Obama and Republican congressional leaders are both peddling different versions of the fantasy that America is broke, an when Republican governors are claiming that states are facing such hard times that only busting unions will balance budgets, Kucinich and his colleagues have found the missing money. It’s being wasted on a war of whim in Afghanistan.
As Kucinich explains, “There is simply no rationale for continuing American involvement with no end in sight, rising deaths for civilians and our brave soldiers, declining public sentiment, and serious economic pain at home. Continuing our involvement in Afghanistan is not affordable, it's not just, and it hurts American foreign policy interests. It's time to go.”
“While Congress pulls unemployment benefits from suffering Ohio families and proposes slashing health care benefits, vital children's programs, and veterans' services all because we're "broke," it continues to fund a war that has cost us more than $455 billion. We are told we should cut funding for assistance to low-income families with one hand, while with the other hand tens of billions of dollars are approved for a war that does nothing to further our national security. The Center for Arms Control and Non-Proliferation estimates that the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan cost the average American family of four almost $13,000 last year,” adds Kucinich, who says: “Our priorities are simply out of sync. Desperately needed unemployment benefits were filibustered last year because the costs to provide them were not offset with spending cuts or revenue increases. But we are not required to offset the costs of war, even when the war is completely funded by borrowed money - money we have to pay back with interest on the backs of our children and grandchildren.”
That argument gained favor with 85 Democrats, including ranking members such as John Conyers of Michigan, Barney Frank of Massachusetts, Bob Filner and George Miller and Henry Waxman of California, and Charles Rangel of New York. Congressional Black Caucus chair Barbara Lee, D-California, joined them, as did Congressional Progressive Caucus co-chair Raul Grijalva of Arizona and Keith Ellison of Minnesota.
Eight Republicans voted for the resolution, as well. In addition to long-time opponents of unnecessary wars, such as Texas Congressman Ron Paul and Tennessee Congressman John Duncan Jr., a number of younger GOP conservatives with Tea Party ties, such as Utah’s Jason Chaffetz backed the proposal to remove the troops from Afghanistan.
The bipartisan support for the resolution was satisfying, if insufficient. The measure still lost 321 to 93. Especially disappointing was the vote of House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi, D-California, who sided with Republican leaders in voting “no.”
Still, the increased level of opposition to the war was notable, as it put more members of Congress in synch with the American people.
“The U.S. Congress continues to lag far behind American public opinion on the war in Afghanistan. Evidence from opinion surveys reveals that Americans have greatly shifted their opinion on the war, with a two-thirds majority now opposing the war,” notes Kucinich. “Nearly three-quarters -- an overwhelming majority -- want to withdraw substantial numbers of troops by this summer. The vote today illustrates that Congress is unfortunately out of step with the American people on the issue of the Afghanistan war. Nevertheless, the number of Members of Congress voting in favor of the resolution to end the Afghanistan war grew appreciably over a similar vote last year. Most of the increase was due to Democratic members who switched their position. Most new Republican Members of Congress unfortunately opposed the resolution, in spite of the considerable costs of the war.
“The cost of the war, both in terms of blood and treasure is unsustainable. We will renew our struggle to bring U.S. policy in line with American public opinion, and ensure that American lives are not put at risk, Afghan civilians are not put at risk and our ability to address the fiscal needs of America here at home are not put at risk.”
71 Comments so far
Show AllActually, I think America is proving that it's possible to be both. The "deficit hawks" don't go after the "defense" (I can't use that word on this topic without putting it in quotes like that; I just can't do it) budget even though it is the most wasteful and stolen-from part of the federal budget. I don't have (and don't feel like googling and trying to compile) but I think military spending fraud way outweighs Medicare fraud as the biggest instance of stolen tax money.
Revising the tax code so that the big guys couldn't move their money abroad without paying their fair portion and really doing like good ol' Ross Perot said and rooting out waste and corruption just might free up enough money to allow the country to continue to exist. It would be worth a try, but the current "leadership" (here I go with the I Can't Take The Use of the Word Seriously quotemarks again) won't even set out to do that.
Thanks for the laugh, Paranoid Pessimist. In your first sentence you encapsulated the problem -- there are no 'deficit hawks' who are willing to substantially cut 'defense' spending.
You're right -- we're dealing with an organization, the Pentagon, that has acknowledged 'losing' a TRILLION dollars in the last 50 years -- perhaps the dog ate it, or it slipped through the sofa cushions at McDonnell-Douglas. (Excuse me, I forgot -- the Pentagonites neither apologize nor explain their losses -- it's a sign of weakness, you know. Instead, to prove their strength, they continue to beat their head against the same bloody wall, in the interest of profits for their MIC overseers and cushy defense-industry jobs for their retired brass.)
As well as the rational solutions you proposed, I'd add that we can cut at least three horrendously expensive carrier battle groups (that will still leave us with seven); cut the F-35 all-service fighter jet (upgraded F/A-18s, F-117s, F-15s and F-16s can do the same job much cheaper); get rid of the useless B-2 bomber that can't fly when it rains; close at least half of our overseas bases, (most of which 'protect' nations from a threat that no longer exists); and hold defense contractors to their original contract estimates on what a system will cost -- no more paying millions in cost overruns. I'd also add that we still have to eliminate the overpriced hammers and toilets, etc., that the military seem so fond of -- let them buy those mundane items at the local hardware store when they're on sale. One more thing: Let's stop using our taxpayer-funded military to protect the interests of private corporations, such as our soldiers risking their lives to guard trucks owned by KBR or another corporation.
Along with getting out of two wars, the savings on just what we've proposed here would be enough to bail us out of debt, and I'll expect this to happen the same day Dick Cheney submits to waterboarding on live TV to prove it isn't torture.
I was amazed when I was in the Army how much open theft there was. When I was on KP, food would be delivered to the (aptly named) Mess Hall and we KPs would carry a big bunch of it out and help load it into the trunk of the Mess Sergeant's car. The civilian in charge of ordering supplies had a heart attack and one of us took his place. We all ordered a bunch of photo supplies. One person got enough 16mm film to start a successful freelance filmmaking career when he was released from active duty. I remember thinking that if this much pilfering was going on at this one stateside base, if you extrapolate that to all the bases in the world, how much is that? This was just the small stuff. No one seemed to mind. It wasn't a conspiracy, just the way things were. There were no checks to keep it from happening.
Sometimes they would give us a list and have us check the contents of a warehouse room against the list. Anything found that wasn't on the list was up for grabs -- physical reality was made to conform to what was on paper, not the other way around. Anything extra was there for the taking.
So in other words Paranoid...we are all getting ripped off by somebody somewhere. Maybe it's time people started to have a little more respect for THEMSELVES.
Famously (I hope), Rumsfield told Congress that the Pentagon had "lost" 2.3 TRILLION and it would take years to figure out where it went. Still waiting for the conclusion to this quandary. That was September 10, 2001.
When an organizations purpose is to kill people, it's not hard to see that plunder would be acceptable behavior.
RSJ,
Actually, the Pentagon "lost" $2.3 TRILLION in the last 50 years, not "merely" 1 trillion. Rumsfeld made the announcement, conveniently, on September 10, 2001. And no, there was never any accountability for the "lost" taxpayer funds. This is beyond grand larceny, it is mega-grand larceny. This nation is not broke. It is simply being perpetually swindled by the Military Industrial Complex. The only solution is for taxpayers to simply refuse to pay the $1 trillion annually that the war machine now costs. We need a new party: the No Empire party. Most Americans would, I believe, endorse the idea of major cuts in "defense" being channeled into another New Deal jobs program to fix our crumbling infrastructure and develop the alternative energies necessary to stave off a climate catastrophe.
http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2002/01/29/eveningnews/main325985.shtml
I dream of the day when I see "Boxtops for Bombers"...
Rep Schrader sent me an email saying "I strongly believe we must withdraw our troops from Afghanistan as soon as possible," and then voted against this bill that would do just that. I replied and called him a liar.
Liar and hypocrite. But then, that's normal in Washington. How these people can call themselves our "representatives" when they are clearly in the pockets of the pentagon and weapons manufacturers is obscene. Corruption is rampant in America and the people have yet to wake up and clean the scum from their government.
donna, "and the people have yet to wake up". If and when they do they might find the next war being fought in a large country between Canada and Mexico. The pentagon et al have just been practicing.
stoopid double post!
Keep doing that karlof1 and you may start having lots of bad luck like I experienced several years ago - illegally busted and detained at the US-Canadian border, trouble getting a passport renewed (I travel a lot), never returned phone calls, letters, emails from my senators' offices (I supported my congressman) - which according to a well-placed friend who told me it was because of the things I told my senators and their staffs.
Why would anyone expect Pelosi to vote yes? Her husband is an active stock trader/venture capitalist, and has invested in firms who profit from war. Endless war is in the interest of her family.
A little late there but thanks Kucinich and Nichols.
the words of a politician are as money drawn with a crayon...
Kucinich doesn't get it; the business that drives America is war.
Indeed, it is the only American export left. Now that the Corporations have taken 100% control of our former democracy, and their pawns in Congress have given them more tax cuts, more subsidies even when profitable, and incentives to outsouce the last decent American manufacturing job overseas, the ONLY thing America exports any longer is death, destruction, and military adventurism. If we cut our military expenditures, we cut America's throat, quite literally, economically.
The sooner the better, i say.
That's because, in this NWO of global corporate/financier EMPIRE, america is only the "security department" of global empire. Empire is always anti-nation, anti-tribal, anti-anything resembling a humane organization of ordinary people. When America has been exhausted as a "security asset", global empire will utilize some other asset (perhaps China will be used, and used up, next). That's how these smiling & waving global empirists think, but their plans are doomed to failure. They're already "dead men walking", awaiting rigor mortis & putrefaction to set in.
America IS war. War and guns and death and hate. War since around 1778. Killing with guns and killing with laws. Chewing the world with blood-dripping jaws. Killing with impunity and without apology. Killing with science: murderology. There's a war on the poor and a war on the sick. A war on the black and a war on the "spics". There's a war at home and a war abroad. War with a wink and war with a nod. We can only hope that America will fail, that its leaders will land at the Hague or in jail. With bankruptcy looming, it may yet come soon; if you can't pay the piper, you can't call the tune.
You'll have to go back a wee bit farther than that, commenter. 'In fourteen-hundred-and-ninety-two, Columbus sailed the ocean blue." The theft, cruelty, brutality, slavery, murder, genocide, and various other autrocities committed by this deviant, are well documented, and well known by historians. Yet he is lauded and celebrated in history books, as are many of history's murdering empire builders. Why? Brainwashing. A numbing and dumbing down. It makes it a much easier sell to lead the flouridated, vaccinated, hypnotised, propagandised, masses to slaughter (war) when they believe it is for some glorious cause (insert waving flag of choice here), rather than for the ongoing rape and pillaging of other countries resources, and the enslavement of their people to ensure cheap sources of labour (insert corporate logo of choice here).
BTW - it is not America that will fail, it is capitalism that is in its death throes, here. We are at (and surpassed, in some areas already) peak EVERYTHING. The myth of continual economic growth - what capitalism thrives on - has come to an end. RIP. (Though it is not going to go down easy. Hang on for a bumpy ride!)
So true.
Doesn't it make you want to wave your flag and bow down to the American military complex, send our sons and daughters to learn how to kill and die?
There is money to be made by perpetuating war and selling weapons of war.
Who is America's greatest enemy?
How many members of congress have children in the service?
As Randolph Bourne once accurately noted:
War is the Health of the State
So we pull out of Afghanistan, does that mean every single over-paid contractor leave as well? The black hole that is the Pentagon budget needs huge oversight and transparency.
John Nichols is "disappointed" when Nancy Pelosi votes against the anti-war resolution? John, you must be joking. That's like Charlie Brown being disappointed when Lucy yanks the football away for the 400th time, before he tries to kick it, thusly ending up on his ass. Class interest and imperial prerogatives trump party unity and voter opinion every time. What's disappointing is that a guy in Nichols's position, so obviously doesn't understand who he is dealing with. But then Nichols supported Biden for President in 2007...
"“The U.S. Congress continues to lag far behind American public opinion on the war in Afghanistan."
There is two things wrong with this statement.
First, the congress is not behind but way out in front; but alias not for the interests of the US public. The Congress is acting as a "Front Man" for the corporate interests, as usual.
Second, the tax payer is put out the money and personal for the war, but we get no benefit. We won Iraq, but we got only the bill. We should have gotten free oil until the Iraqis paid back the US Treasury plus interest. Oil should be cheaper than water, until we get every penny for the invasion and new government.
Excuse me? Your country invaded and occupies Iraq illegally and now they owe you free oil? There was no war between the US And Iraq so you didn't win anything. The only purpose was to privatize their oil so your big ass corporations sell you - the consumer - gas while they make handsome profits. You are delusional if you think Americans own the world. You become more irrelevant everyday except when it comes to war and death.
Well said, and right on the nose. There isn't a single, solitary military "conflict" that the US has been involved in since World War II that has been legal under the Constitution of the United States, which declares that only the Congress can declare War. No war has been declared by the U.S. Congress since World War II. Thus, every "war" we are involved in - pick one, God knows there are plenty, Iraq, Afghanistan, Pakistan, soon to be Libya, etc - are all being illegally participated in by the U.S. under our own laws. And add to that the illegality of our invasion of other countries under the U.N. Charter, which states that it is a war crime to invade any other country except in imminent self-defense, that simply adds even more illegality to our military conflicts.
The U.S. is the biggest rogue, terrorist nation on the face of the earth, flaunting our own and all other laws as we see fit.
The U.N. is a tool of the American empire. It was born after WWII from its American mother. It has always done what the empire has wanted. It was supported by American money.
It never passes a resolution which means anything except giving the empire the cover of international law.
BRAVO Demonstorm!
You are making my point well. The American public only got the bill. If you remember, most Americans were against the invasion. We know and appreciate that it was an illegal action.
The oil is not ours, but neither does it belong to the multinational oil interests. The oil interested used American arms to steal the oil, but they failed to "share" the spoils.
Like you, I am only pointing out the cruel self interests of the oil companies, against the interests of the American people.
And don't you think that those same Texas oil interests are involved in the attack on Lybia? Of course, those interests are the ones who win big by restricting the flow of oil and gas from Lybia.
Don't kill the messenger.
RIGHT ON!
You've got to be kidding! Right?
Dennis, you're behind the curve and you've missed the point of 21st-century AmeriKKKa. There is rational for war (including the third front in Libya) and that rational is called the military industrial komplex. War profiteers like GE (that, by the way, builds nuclear reactors and is the propaganda ministry for Barry's administration), Halliburton, Black Water and an incalculable number of other hangers-on that benefit from endless war.
Barry and Hillary are posturing in front of the corporate media's cameras and are barely able to control their glee at the prospect of hundreds of millions of dollars in campaign bribes.
God damn AmeriKKKa!
Yeah, but what about the dangers of Obama Sinladen ?
Everyone focuses on cutting spending because of right wing propaganda pounding home the ludicrous message that the rich "earned" their money and should therefore not be taxed heavily.
The problem is that money flows around a system which is in fact a closed system. In a system designed to enrich the few and pauperize the many, like ours, the money is systematically drained from the pockets of everyone except the rich. More and more money accumulates in their pockets. The idea that they then use that money to make jobs is PURE fantasy. No, the majority of the money is "invested" in the stock market casinos. This "investment" does not produce jobs. Venture capitalists and initial stock offerings fund startups, not buying and selling pieces of paper.
So, as the laws become increasingly favorable to the wealthy and as they give themselves increasingly lucrative tax-breaks, the money piles up in the pockets of the rich, further impoverishing the poor. That money is effectively out of circulation. So, if you cut more "government" by either giving the rich more tax breaks (more opportunity to hoover up the loose cash) or cutting services which would have resulted in money circulating through the hands of the non-rich, it all leads to more and more money being locked up the hands of the rich. This is a downward cycle.
Therefore, the answer is to unlock that money from the death grip of the rich and get it back into circulation. That means taxing the rich. A lot!!
Now, before you get all weepy-eyed and lamenting that these people have "earned" this money, be sure to ask for their time card. Who ACTUALLY earned this money? Thousands of people, if not tens of thousand of people who do actual work who then are TAXED by the rich through "PROFITS." In other words, all profits are actually taxes levied without representation.
If we are going to tolerate leeches on society, we must insist that some mechanism exist that extricates money that has accumulated and become stuck in the smelly folds of the corpulent rich and return it into circulation deep into the economy. We will, of course, have to wash the money to remove the stench of their owners.
Imperial warfare only benefits the imperium if there is profit - treasure. The ancients almost understood this, until after spending the booty of conquest they were left with the governance. I mean here Rome: it prospered when conquest brought home gold, but once the rich civilized world had been incorporated all that was left was forest and angry brutes who wanted some of Rome's gold, and safety actually, but I won't make this complicated. Rome bankrupted itself with maintaining outlying fiefdoms, it became too comfortable and relied on mercenaries to defend itself and foreigners to grow its food and make its luxury goods, and it lost vigour.
The slight difference today is that America's senatorial class has not, yet, succumbed to mercenary armies, but it has given up the business of work. A new industrial latifundia has outsourced profitable industry and the consequence is that the USA is functionally bankrupt.
It would be wise to bring the troops home from Afghanistan because nobody on earth knows why they are there and what they are supposed to be doing. If the US was gone tomorrow nothing would change, except that America would be vastly richer and the Afghans would be less dead.
This would be a start to creating a new United States, unfortunately too many of those pulling the levers of power profit from the present polity and none of them truly loves America the Res Publica, except for the cameras.
The Empire uses a LOT of mercenaries in Iraq and Af-Pak - the media - whores for the MIC - refer to them as "contractors." On second thought, refering to the liars and propagandists in the media as "whores" is a gross insult to prostitutes everywhere.
Your analogy to the Roman Empire is apt, Ulpian. The late historian Barbara Tuchman in her great book, "The March of Folly," uses several different examples, including the Vietnam War, to posit that every large government or institution eventually works against its own best interest. I think we are seeing that today with the Pax America bogged down in asinine, needless wars, and global corporations destroying their own best markets in North America with nothing to replace them overseas. Once the spiral of stupidity begins, it's hard to stop until it hits bottom.
Poll to get our troops out of AfPak:
The people -- 2/3 in favor
The Congress --2/3 against
This is why representative government does not work.
Direct democracy now.
This gradual numerical growth of progressive and clear thinkers in opposition to a crazy war is following about the same curve as opposition to the Vietnam war.
The qualitative difference is that we have an ex president who must be careful about foreign travel and the risk of arrest for war crimes and torture, as-well-as a current president who will very likely have the same problem after the next election.
Nicely written, John, though Nancy's vote didn't surprise me either.
I think we all hit the mark that these wars are ridiculous and we are always leading the fight. We spend a zillion dollars on wars and then complain we do not have any money for domestic programs. Also how much do we loan to foreign countries and never get the money back.
It's one thing to have the information and extrapolate the theory which seems accurate to me that exporting weapons and death is our chief export now. Its another to provide some sort of proposition that somehow addresses in a real world way how this profiteering can be slowed or even in the case of Afghanistan, halted completely. I see people railing against the "ignorance" of Kucinich using words almost identical to what I've heard him say years and years ago. In utter disspointment perhaps by some who still look to elected officials as some way out of this mess of war and corporate plunder which we now are only slowly waking to. We who are expected to bear the costs of the plunderers, you know wha they are, while they reap the profits. We have lost our political representation a long time ago. The wealthy corporations aren't on our side. Their guns are vastly larger than ours. There is no UN to step in to help us if we picked up our water pistol equivalents in a fight for freedom. The big THEY dominate that narrative. What does that leave us with? Us people, and only us. Mostly what I see is everybody putting out their answer for everything. I see very very few people posing any questions at all. Much less having the courage to stand in front of their questions for any length of time.
I put myself at the top of the list in reference to the above. After the longest war in our history, 93 to 321 is discouragement that goes beyond the pale.
I suppose we are going to continue hearing Nicols and The Nation tout the Democrats right through next November's elections.
Kucinich sold out the public to support Obama (Kucinich's argument for supporting a health care bill Kucinich called a sell-out to insurance companies). Kucinich just finished voting for extending and broadening "Bush's" tax cuts which the country can't afford and now he acts suprised that with the loss of revenue that the Republicans want to cut domestic spending. Kucinch's anti-war rhetoric is now a circus side show as Kucinich can't support Obama and oppose the war at the same time.
As far as Pelosi, the previous CD commentators got it right. Nichols has no reason to be dissappointed in her as she is a hawk when it comes to foreign policy. Nichols is just scraping together whatever he can to try and write a positive article about the Democrats.
Prog101- Good points. I think I am as leary of the Dems and many redneckers are now leary of Repubs...guess we better find a common man to suit us both.
Progressive101 my butt, I'm wondering if you are Reichtie in disguise.....The wolf in sheep's clothing!
Not mentioned is that "terrorism" is a law enforcement problem, the "war on terror" being just a pretense for military spending that enriches many Americans in the MIC. Let's identify the profiteers to make it clear who's manipulating the MIC to perpetuate the myth that we're in real wars.
Yes!!! Identify the profiteers! Boeing Corp. I live in Seattle. Dem Patti Murray is an outrageously successful senator at procuring military contracts for our maleficient winged wing of the MIC, military aircraft and missle systems. How swiftly this moves straight to Wall Street.
Dem Repug...all blind puppets to the MIC
Actually 'war on terror' is an odd oxymoron. How can you have war on something that it is?