President Eisenhower warned the US public of the ‘military-industrial complex’. The coining of this term seemed better suited to a pinko than the standing GOP president. His caveat went unheeded for decades, as America expanded its global reach to every continent. The Pentagon never saw a weapon they didn’t want and Congress always voted the money. Very few programs have been squashed as was the Air Force’s missile-eluding F-22 Raptor fighter jets in favor of the smaller and less expensive F-35s preferred by President Obama. Air-to-air losing to air-to-ground.
Senators in key defense states are crying that jobs will be lost at a critical time by the cancellation of the F-22. A down payment on a single f-22 is over $60 million. Not to complete, but to insure the production process is greased with the right amount of federal money.
$60 million is the cost of 120,000 teaching jobs, however that doesn’t even come close to what the entire defense budget could buy if it were trimmed by the White House.
$630 billion for 2009.
Or $2000 for every American man woman or child.
I could use the money, except I don’t really pay too much taxes so I guess I can say much about how the Pentagon allocates its funds and that is the price of freedom.
The defense bill authorizes $550 billion for defense programs and $130 billion for military operations in Iraq and Afghanistan and for other anti-terrorist operations.