OT Bush calls Lebanon A new front for global war on terror

[Kodama]

And how does that mean that we subsidize the entire medical industry in Sweden for instance?


I think there is a disconnect in communication here, I am talking about the working poor working 40-80 hours a week, some times hard labor not being able to make it.

Not because they are stupid or because they aren't "Going for the gold", etc...

I'm not even advocating that we spend much (if any) more in taxes, I just want our money to go back to the good of the PEOPLE who WORK to make our country.

I'm not so sympathetic to people who can work who don't , but once again, that amount of money is NOTHING compared to the amount of charity that Defense Contractors, for instance will be granted this year.

[djadonis206]

I'm not so sympathetic to people who can work who don't , but once again, that amount of money is NOTHING compared to the amount of charity that Boeing, for instance will be granted this year.

How much are they being given, I'm curious?

[Kodama]

This is millitary spending from 2002 (it's gone up)

Country Budget
(in Billions)
USA 329.00
United Kingdom 38.40
France 29.50
Germany 24.90
Italy 19.40
Spain 8.40
Canada 7.40
Netherlands 6.60
Turkey 5.80
Norway 3.80
Greece 3.50
Poland 3.50
Belgium 2.53
Denmark 2.40
Czech Republic 1.62
Portugal 1.30
Romania 1.15
Hungary 1.08
Slovakia 0.45
Bulgaria 0.43
Slovenia 0.31
Lithuania 0.23
Luxembourg 0.18
Estonia 0.13
Latvia 0.12
Iceland 0.03

[djadonis206]

that's interesting stuff but how much is Boeing getting?

Living in the NW Boeing is struggling to keep workers and even get defence contracts so when you say "once again, that amount of money is NOTHING compared to the amount of charity that Boeing, for instance will be granted this year."

i have to ask how much and where you get your facts from

[M. Bréqs]

Healthcare is a topic which constantly gets attention. Many people frequently point to European countries and cry: "They have national healthcare for everybody." Well, do you know why those countries have that? Because the USA subsidizes the world's healthcare.

Expand on this please.

Therefore, in the USA we pay more for the same drugs. Much more... effectively subsidizing the drugs for the whole world.

There's more to it than that. The United States' won the cold war by SPENDING the Soviet Union into the ground. They were able to do this with significant military investment.

The rest of NATO (most of West Europe and Canada) got a free ride on defence from the Americans, but consistently had higher taxes. So...

European social programs were subsidized by the USA. American military expenditures effectively checked further Soviet expansion into Europe, while the Europeans and Canadians shirked their (our) responsibilities to protect ourselves. If the rest of NATO had invested a fair ammount in their own defence and not forced Uncle Sam to shoulder their own neglected responsiblity, health care quality and availability would be much more equivalent.

Therefore, European social programs are significantly (though indirectly) paid for by Americans, who took (and continue to take up) the torch of protecting an ungrateful NATO from aggression... First from the Germans, then Soviets, now Jihadists.

Canadian and European pacifism is paid for in American blood (and in more than one way). Not only American soldiers pay this price. The family of every American citizen who dies while waiting for an operation to repair a heart valve because can't afford private medical insurance, can thank a Canadian or European pacifist for shit state of American social programs.

[ethios4]

OK yeah, but what am I? republican? democrat? Fascist? Do I have a strong set of ethical values based on not harming other people? None of those questions can be answered by whether your are atheist or not.

I wasn't meaning to imply that any of those questions are answered by knowing a person is atheist....just making the point (badly) that atheism does have a set of beliefs that have political ramifications. I'm not arguing for or against evolution, abortion, or anything else...I was just pointing out that an atheist very likely has a particular stand on evolution, for instance, that can be engaged politically....and you proved that in your reaction.

As for Bush proclaiming his belief in God...to me, he represents much of the very opposite of what a person who truly believes in Christ is. To me, the public proclamations of belief are simply political manipulation, and the fact that so many Christians buy into it is evidence of the deep corruption of American Christianity.

[M. Bréqs]

Canadian and European pacifism is paid for in American blood

Allow me to draw an analogy:
It's like living in a neighbourhood, and only one member of the neighbourhood association goes and spends money on maintaining the roads in good repair. Everybody else makes thier own houses look beautiful, replacing facades and planting gardens, but neglects the essentials... And then they get together, and ;

A: critizise the one guy for making noise and causing a disturbance when he's undertaking essential tasks for the good of all, and
B: deride him for not having as beautiful or orderly a home, since his efforts are spent covering their negligence.

A lot of American social problems can be blamed on high levels of US military expenditure - but they wouldn't have to spend this much if the rest of NATO pulled their weight.

[elemental]

A lot of American social problems can be blamed on high levels of US military expenditure - but they wouldn't have to spend this much if the rest of NATO pulled their weight.

That would depend on the rest of NATO agreeing to the (usually) twisted policies of the US military.

It is their choice to choose world domination over the health of their own people.

[Kodama]

that's interesting stuff but how much is Boeing getting?

Living in the NW Boeing is struggling to keep workers and even get defence contracts so when you say "once again, that amount of money is NOTHING compared to the amount of charity that Boeing, for instance will be granted this year."

i have to ask how much and where you get your facts from

Should have read defense contractors, my bad, I edited my original.

[mikemc]

Canadian and European pacifism is paid for in American blood

Allow me to draw an analogy:
It's like living in a neighbourhood, and only one member of the neighbourhood association goes and spends money on maintaining the roads in good repair. Everybody else makes thier own houses look beautiful, replacing facades and planting gardens, but neglects the essentials... And then they get together, and ;

A: critizise the one guy for making noise and causing a disturbance when he's undertaking essential tasks for the good of all, and
B: deride him for not having as beautiful or orderly a home, since his efforts are spent covering their negligence.

Well, I think it's fair to say that there are a lot of agendas behind a some of the aid that goes out from the US. It's kind of interesting what's happened recently. Throughout history, by default, all countries act entirely out of their own self interest and they would basically pummel any other folk they could get away with pummelling for whatever excuse, and there wasn't any real deterrent other than the neighbors might take the opportunity to get their shots in. A problem would arise when the opportunistic pummelling would cycle on and on -- 100 years war, etc.

But, understand I mean, measured througout history, that was the "norm".

Relatively recently, humanitarian aid being given by more prosperous countries to generally unrelated countries has been a method for building ties, as opposed to pummelling. It's not as decisive, but what with the big weapons out now, it's much less dangerous, cheaper and generally preferable all around.

Somewhat ironically, this sharing of prosperity (and of course, not all of it is sharing, a lot of it is loans) has given rise to a fair number of countries that would like to get a chance to do some pummelling on smaller neighbors, because they didn't have the wherewithal back when the whole pummelling cycle was in full vogue. On the other hand, the arms providers in the prosperous countries benefit from that tension, but on the other other hand, we now have a situation where that tension mixed with the big weapons available to these would-be-micro-pummellers is dangerous.

Again, given the overarching 'norm' of history, if we time-transported a successful leader from the pummelling era into the present, they'd see the solution as a no-brainer: pummel all those little troublemaker guys now, especially if they have stuff you want. But of course nobody nowadays wants that, and that is good. What's not good is that the countries who, given the historical norm, would otherwise be pummelled, depopulated and turned into theme parks so the eastern european kids who want to work in the summer don't have as far to go, don't realize what a break history has cut them. They have the opportunity to *build their own theme parks* and reap the rewards, but instead they want to perpetuate their own vicious pummel-fest.

[andydes]

Expand on this please.

Therefore, in the USA we pay more for the same drugs. Much more... effectively subsidizing the drugs for the whole world.

There's more to it than that. The United States' won the cold war by SPENDING the Soviet Union into the ground. They were able to do this with significant military investment.

The rest of NATO (most of West Europe and Canada) got a free ride on defence from the Americans, but consistently had higher taxes. So...

European social programs were subsidized by the USA. American military expenditures effectively checked further Soviet expansion into Europe, while the Europeans and Canadians shirked their (our) responsibilities to protect ourselves. If the rest of NATO had invested a fair ammount in their own defence and not forced Uncle Sam to shoulder their own neglected responsiblity, health care quality and availability would be much more equivalent.

Therefore, European social programs are significantly (though indirectly) paid for by Americans, who took (and continue to take up) the torch of protecting an ungrateful NATO from aggression... First from the Germans, then Soviets, now Jihadists.

Canadian and European pacifism is paid for in American blood (and in more than one way). Not only American soldiers pay this price. The family of every American citizen who dies while waiting for an operation to repair a heart valve because can't afford private medical insurance, can thank a Canadian or European pacifist for shit state of American social programs.

Now there's an interesting point. However, I'm not sure it's as simple as that. After all, pretty much all of the US's military spending goes into US companies. They pay workers, who pay taxes, buy goods and services from fellow americans, etc. Same for service personnel, the money stays in the US and keeps the ecconomy moving.

As was pointed out, Boeing has done very well out of it. They could then pile this money into making civilian aircraft, which they sold to just about every airline in the world.

Add to that the revinue from US arms sales to other countries, NATO, other allies (iraq- sorry, had to say it), etc. I can't remember what we paid the US for our trident nukes, but it was a fair few billion. And was money going directly from our ecconomy into the US's.

It's alway's been said that war is good for the ecconomy, so I don't think you can really lay the blame for underprivaliged US citizens on Europe.

Phew, for a second there, I thought my country was responsable for even more crap then I give it credit for.

[andydes]

Oops. Double post.

You may continue.

[deva]

actually, the way capitalism works is we all get rich together, not at the expense of one another. (the banker isn't taking money from the lawn care guy, instead, he's the only reason the lawn care guy has a business (no one pays for lawn care if they don't have money elsewhere); and the lawn care guy borrows money from the banker to buy a new truck or mower, which helps the banker and the lawn care guy.)

The way the U.S. has become rich is by having abundant natural resources (and of course due to the genocide of the people that were living here before the Europeans came, but that is another topic)

The way the U.S. has extended that wealth and power is by creating client states and impovershing them in order to maintain our wealth. Go talk to the people of Latin America in order to learn this.

[deva]

From what Deva said about Venezuela it sounds like the people there have much more power and control over their government than we do.
Guy

If what's being proposed is giving the government "more power" how long do you think it will be until the people lose control?

I hope it's not the case - but socialism eventually requires more government coercion to further enslave those that produce to keep producing even when it's not in the producers best interests.

- r

What is being proposed, and manifest, is giving people more power, not the government. And Gyu is correct. The people of Venezuela now have more control over their government than we do here in this country.

[andydes]

This is true in theory. Time will tell if it works or not, and to be honnest my hopes aren't that high in the long run. But the real point is that this is what the people have decided and does any other county have the right to interfere?

I doubt that US opposition to it has anything to do with whether they feel it's a fair system of government.