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CPT Jack Durish
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The most important component of any nation's defense system is its economy. Ours simply isn't up to the challenge anymore and our potential adversaries are more aware of it than many of us. We need to cut the size of government and government spending immediately. By half would be a good start. That would allow the economy to grow once again. Government spending does not invigorate the economy. Never has. Never will.
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Sgt Joe LaBranche
Sgt Joe LaBranche
8 y
Sad, but true, CPT Jack Durish!
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SSgt David Nace
SSgt David Nace
8 y
Very short term, government spending does invigorate the economy. It doesn't create a larger GDP, more jobs, better paying jobs, or any long term good. The infusion of money from the federal government though, does in fact help in the short term. It can give poor a little bit more purchasing power, if the money is given directly to them. This distorts the markets though, making goods more expensive and causing artificial events within the market system.

I think that it more depends on how the money is spent, rather than the fact that the money is spent. If the government were to not take the money they were giving to the poor to begin with, the poor would have more purchasing power. If the government spent money as if it were their own, rather than someone else's, they would probably get rid of corruption in the spending quicker and find more efficient ways of spending the money. There is way to much waste, because most politicians just think, if we can't afford it, we will take more in taxes. When does this trend stop? Politicians have long created programs, without having actual funding for it. Then they turn around and say, well we have this program and you guys (the taxpayer) have to pay for this new program I just created.
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SSG Program Control Manager
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Edited 8 y ago
How much of this is politics within the military? Keeping old planes flying isn't nearly as sexy as spending hundreds of Billions on building an F-35 that can launch vertically.

http://breakingdefense.com/2012/03/f-35-total-costs-soar-to-1-5-trillion-lockheed-defends-program/

Note that the 1.5 Trillion dollar price tag is now 4 years old... can't help but wonder how close we are to 2 Trillion dollars.

http://www.bing.com/videos/search?q=f-35+vertical+launch&qpvt=f-35+vertical+launch&view=detail&mid=90D7E4BB728157B4448790D7E4BB728157B44487&FORM=VRDGAR
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CSM Charles Hayden
CSM Charles Hayden
8 y
SSG (Join to see) Wait one - what can that F-35 do? We hear plenty about about what it cannot do and about what helmets and systems don't work!
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MAJ Bryan Zeski
MAJ Bryan Zeski
8 y
CSM Charles Hayden - It can do the same thing that every other fighter/bomber does - it's mediocre at pretty much everything. And it's stealthy. Like the F-22 and B-2, it'll pretty much be kept in a hanger somewhere and pulled out on rare occasions to drop a bomb or two in order to maintain some kind of statistic for having been used. Meanwhile, the F-15s, F-16s, F-18s, and B-52s that are thirty years (+) old will continue to maintain air superiority over everything else out there.
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CSM Charles Hayden
CSM Charles Hayden
8 y
MAJ Bryan Zeski Keeping the F-35 in a hanger will certainly maintain it's stealth reputation!
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SSG Program Control Manager
SSG (Join to see)
8 y
CSM Charles Hayden - It's supposed to be the Swiss army knife of the sky... able to do anything and everything at 10x the cost of it's predecessors.
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