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YOU are being played, Freepers.

Wake up!

1 posted on 03/20/2022 12:53:26 AM PDT by RandFan
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To: RandFan
Since the end of WWII, defense has either fallen or been flat as a % of the economy. Entitlements and education have skyrocketed:

Note that defense is the one category where you have an adversary trying to thwart you. That's not present in entitlements or education spending. And yet it's entitlements and education that have gone through the roof. When Eisenhower gave his speech about the military industrial complex, his scribe wrote about the risk of overspending on defense (then at 10% of the economy throughout his 2 terms), but also about the risk of overspending on entitlements:

A vital element in keeping the peace is our military establishment. Our arms must be mighty, ready for instant action, so that no potential aggressor may be tempted to risk his own destruction.

Our military organization today bears little relation to that known by any of my predecessors in peacetime, or indeed by the fighting men of World War II or Korea.

Until the latest of our world conflicts, the United States had no armaments industry. American makers of plowshares could, with time and as required, make swords as well. But now we can no longer risk emergency improvisation of national defense; we have been compelled to create a permanent armaments industry of vast proportions. Added to this, three and a half million men and women are directly engaged in the defense establishment. We annually spend on military security more than the net income of all United States corporations.

This conjunction of an immense military establishment and a large arms industry is new in the American experience. The total influence -- economic, political, even spiritual -- is felt in every city, every State house, every office of the Federal government. We recognize the imperative need for this development. Yet we must not fail to comprehend its grave implications. Our toil, resources and livelihood are all involved; so is the very structure of our society.

In the councils of government, we must guard against the acquisition of unwarranted influence, whether sought or unsought, by the militaryindustrial complex. The potential for the disastrous rise of misplaced power exists and will persist.

We must never let the weight of this combination endanger our liberties or democratic processes. We should take nothing for granted. Only an alert and knowledgeable citizenry can compel the proper meshing of the huge industrial and military machinery of defense with our peaceful methods and goals, so that security and liberty may prosper together.

Akin to, and largely responsible for the sweeping changes in our industrial-military posture, has been the technological revolution during recent decades.

In this revolution, research has become central; it also becomes more formalized, complex, and costly. A steadily increasing share is conducted for, by, or at the direction of, the Federal government.

Today, the solitary inventor, tinkering in his shop, has been overshadowed by task forces of scientists in laboratories and testing fields. In the same fashion, the free university, historically the fountainhead of free ideas and scientific discovery, has experienced a revolution in the conduct of research. Partly because of the huge costs involved, a government contract becomes virtually a substitute for intellectual curiosity. For every old blackboard there are now hundreds of new electronic computers.

The prospect of domination of the nation's scholars by Federal employment, project allocations, and the power of money is ever present

and is gravely to be regarded. Yet, in holding scientific research and discovery in respect, as we should, we must also be alert to the equal and opposite danger that public policy could itself become the captive of a scientifictechnological elite.

It is the task of statesmanship to mold, to balance, and to integrate these and other forces, new and old, within the principles of our democratic system -- ever aiming toward the supreme goals of our free society.

V.

Another factor in maintaining balance involves the element of time. As we peer into society's future, we -- you and I, and our government -- must avoid the impulse to live only for today, plundering, for our own ease and convenience, the precious resources of tomorrow. We cannot mortgage the material assets of our grandchildren without risking the loss also of their political and spiritual heritage. We want democracy to survive for all generations to come, not to become the insolvent phantom of tomorrow.


2 posted on 03/20/2022 1:36:40 AM PDT by Zhang Fei (My dad had a Delta 88. That was a car. It was like driving your living room.)
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To: RandFan

Another diversion.

It doesn’t matter if it is true that arms dealers want to make more money. It is the elected officials who make the decisions.

This is just to give cover to the politicians.


3 posted on 03/20/2022 2:27:52 AM PDT by Erik Latranyi (We are being played by forces most do not understand)
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To: RandFan

You didn’t have to go back to 1997. Remember America First? I hate to show my age but I’m old enough to remember when MAGA was cool around here. Regardless of how this ends (assuming we survive this), Russia will go on a Chinese financed arms building frenzy. We FReepers and our grandchildren will match every trillion Xi invests in this new arms race over the coming decades with our own borrowed trillions. I put the over under on General Dynamics tanks you and I will buy or subsidize at 3000 in the next five years. Please tell me Rand Paul isn’t supporting this madness.


5 posted on 03/20/2022 4:29:50 AM PDT by hardspunned (former GOP globalist stooge)
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To: RandFan

Don’t forget who will cash in when they are awarded the contract to “rebuild” Ukraine.
https://www.foxbusiness.com/politics/the-ties-that-biden


7 posted on 03/20/2022 4:45:23 AM PDT by hardspunned (former GOP globalist stooge)
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