http://www.cnn.com/2008/US/03/06/southwest.planes/index.html
No wonder they're so cheap.Thursday, March 6, 2008
The Left-Wing Looniness of Your Measured Humanitarian Peace Keeping Force
Sometime in 2004 I signed up for email updates from the Bush-Cheney Campaign. It was just to see whose candidate-to-supporter dialogue was more vacuous, Bush's or Kerry's. They were about even, but Bush got serious cred for including so many photos of him in a bomber jacket or flightsuit.
Anyways, since then I've had my name and email address sold or given to about fifty right-wing extremist organizations. They send me regular updates on threats to liberty from gays and terrorists across our great land. But an email I received today from townhall.com struck me as particularly relevant to our debate on bringing the
Here's the email:
Dear GOPUSA Family of Activists!
Please find below a special message from Townhall.com. They have some important information to share with you.
Keep up the fight,
GOPUSA.com
Dear Friends,
I am outraged and you should be too.
Our troops are being forced to withdraw not from
The most recent example is the city council of
I guess we shouldn't be shocked anymore by the Left. They can't seem to stop themselves from undermining our troops showing there utter complete disrespect for our Armed Services.
They try to hide it but they simply have nothing but contempt for our nation's military and the brave men and women who serve. Time after time, they show us just how much they distrust, dislike and outright despise our troops.
Senate Majority Leader called our troops failures and proclaimed that the 'war is lost.' Never wasting a chance to snatch defeat from the grasp of victory, Senator Reid ruled the surge a failed effort before a single additional soldier's boots had hit the ground.
On college campuses across the nation, including some of the most prestigious universities, ROTC students face a hostile anti-military environment. Many universities including
It doesn't just show a lack of support for the troops but an passionate contempt for the men and woman overseas putting their lives on the line for our freedom and safety back here at home.
As a further insult to our men and women in uniform, the City Council encouraged residents of Berkeley to impede Marine recruiters attempting to go about their work, and awarded a reserved parking spot outside the Marine recruiting station to Code Pink, the extreme-left anti-war group.
The liberal City Council and Code Pink must not be allowed to disgrace our serving men and women.
It is not enough for liberals to slander courageous Americans as war criminals any more, they are turning hateful words into un-American action! The anti-war left is proving that they do not support the troops and in fact actively engage in anti-military behavior.
We must stand together with our military to prove that the majority of Americans disapprove of the Left's shameful behavior!
Senator Jim DeMint has introduced the Semper Fi Act of 2008 in the United States Senate. The legislation would rescind over $2 million previously allocated to
Click here to condemn the City Council's actions and support the Semper Fi Act of 2008, which would revoke all federal funds allocated to
These strong defenders of American values need your support in condemning
We need your help to send a message to Harry Reid, Nancy Pelosi, academia and the city of
Townhall needs your help to defend the honor of our troops in harms way and our honorable recruiters here at home.
Because the Left consistently denigrates the service of our armed forces, we need to make it clear to the
Sincerely,
Editor-in-Chief,
Townhall.com
Two Retorts
I generally want to use this blog mostly to focus on affirmative policy suggestions rather than rebuttals of conservative views. But two factual claims came up in a class of mine today that I can't resist responding to.
I. Most poor people do not work and the U.S. is more or less a "meritocracy."
Whether the first part of this is strictly true or not depends on how exactly you define "poor." But I think it's hard to look at all the facts and say it's really true in any meaningful sense.
Most low income families in the U.S., or families making less than 200% of the federal poverty guideline (which is not regionally adjusted), do work (where a "family" is a couple or a single parent with at least one child under 18, and a "working family" is a family where each family member 15 and older either has a combined work effort of 39 weeks or more in the prior 12 months OR all family members age 15 and over each has a combined work effort of 26 to 39 weeks in the prior twelve months and one currently unemployed parent looked for work in the prior 4 weeks). 71%, in fact (9,658,195 out of 13,622,425; this means 29% of all U.S. familes are "low income") See http://www.workingpoorfamilies.org/xls/WPFP_Conditions_Low-Income_Working_Families.xls Table 1.A.1a. The people who did the study obviously have an agenda (http://www.workingpoorfamilies.org/) but they base their data on Census and BLS data. I think that their definitions are reasonable and their figures are legit.
Bear in mind that 200% of the poverty rate was only $38,700 for a family of four in 2005 (the poverty threshold was an unbelievably paltry $19,350 for a family of four - sounds way too low to me). See http://aspe.hhs.gov/poverty/05poverty.shtml. 200% of the poverty threshold is not much at all, but it's too much to qualify for Medicaid in Illinois and most other states. See http://www.illinois.gov/PressReleases/ShowPressRelease.cfm?RecNum=3355&SubjectID=47.
On the other hand, a narrow majority of families that make less than 100% of the federal poverty threshold are not "working families" (2,825,230 out of 5,982,095, or 47% do work). See http://www.workingpoorfamilies.org/xls/WPFP_Conditions_Low-Income_Working_Families.xls. But in 2004, a majority of all individuals living below the poverty line (37 million people, or about 12.5% of the population) were either children (13.5 million) or working adults (7.8 million people). See http://www.nccp.org/publications/pdf/text_672.pdf p. 3 and http://www.bls.gov/cps/cpswp2004.pdf p. 1. And of course all of this is to say nothing of mental illness, crippling drug addiction, other medical disability, the lack of employment opportunities in economically depressed regions, simple faultless unemployability, or a whole host of other really good reasons why a poor person may not be able to work.
As to the second (implicit) part of the claim, I'd like to throw out a few more references to give some broader perspective. The U.S. has the lowest rate of social mobility (as measured by how strongly your parents income determines your own) in the First World. See http://www.suttontrust.com/reports/IntergenerationalMobility.pdf p. 6 Table 2. We have a very poor UN Human Poverty Index (HPI) rating compare to our peers (17th out of 19 among "highly developed" countries). See http://hdr.undp.org/en/media/hdr_20072008_table_4.pdf. We have the worst income and wealth inequality in the First World. See https://www.cia.gov/library/publications/the-world-factbook/fields/2172.html and http://multinationalmonitor.org/mm2003/03may/may03interviewswolff.html. And of course we have the third to lowest tax as a share of GDP percentage of all OECD countries (a close third behind Mexico and South Korea). See http://www.oecd.org/dataoecd/44/41/39494985.pdf p.1. I see these facts as part of a pretty clear story. Others may disagree.
Additional Note: While I'm pointing out things we're not very good at, I might as well round out the set:
1. We have a ridiculously high homicide rate and gun homicide rate.
2. We have the highest infant mortality rate in the First World.
3. We have the highest per capita incarceration rate in the world (the entire world, that is).
Perhaps it is no coincidence that, in a addition to being a very low tax country, we have extremely low private sector unionization rates.
http://www.nber.org/papers/w3342.pdf?new_window=1 p. 43, Table 2.
The figures are somewhat dated but I'm sure things haven't changed very much.
II. The U.S. is at the point on the "Laffer Curve" where lower tax rates will produce higher government revenues.
In a rare moment of clarity, George Bush Sr. called this theory "voodoo economics." Obviously, at some unbelievably extreme tax rate (say 95%), government revenues would go up if you decreased the tax rate. But we are nowhere near this point. Remember that ~$860 billion in Bush tax cuts (that went disproportionately to the very wealthy, I might add)? They have significantly decreased federal government revenues and increased gross national debt. See http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/10/16/AR2006101601121_pf.html; http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Image:USDebt.png; and http://www.treasurydirect.gov/govt/reports/pd/histdebt/histdebt_histo5.htm. So, no, tax cuts do not pay for themselves.
I. Most poor people do not work and the U.S. is more or less a "meritocracy."
Whether the first part of this is strictly true or not depends on how exactly you define "poor." But I think it's hard to look at all the facts and say it's really true in any meaningful sense.
Most low income families in the U.S., or families making less than 200% of the federal poverty guideline (which is not regionally adjusted), do work (where a "family" is a couple or a single parent with at least one child under 18, and a "working family" is a family where each family member 15 and older either has a combined work effort of 39 weeks or more in the prior 12 months OR all family members age 15 and over each has a combined work effort of 26 to 39 weeks in the prior twelve months and one currently unemployed parent looked for work in the prior 4 weeks). 71%, in fact (9,658,195 out of 13,622,425; this means 29% of all U.S. familes are "low income") See http://www.workingpoorfamilies.org/xls/WPFP_Conditions_Low-Income_Working_Families.xls Table 1.A.1a. The people who did the study obviously have an agenda (http://www.workingpoorfamilies.org/) but they base their data on Census and BLS data. I think that their definitions are reasonable and their figures are legit.
Bear in mind that 200% of the poverty rate was only $38,700 for a family of four in 2005 (the poverty threshold was an unbelievably paltry $19,350 for a family of four - sounds way too low to me). See http://aspe.hhs.gov/poverty/05poverty.shtml. 200% of the poverty threshold is not much at all, but it's too much to qualify for Medicaid in Illinois and most other states. See http://www.illinois.gov/PressReleases/ShowPressRelease.cfm?RecNum=3355&SubjectID=47.
On the other hand, a narrow majority of families that make less than 100% of the federal poverty threshold are not "working families" (2,825,230 out of 5,982,095, or 47% do work). See http://www.workingpoorfamilies.org/xls/WPFP_Conditions_Low-Income_Working_Families.xls. But in 2004, a majority of all individuals living below the poverty line (37 million people, or about 12.5% of the population) were either children (13.5 million) or working adults (7.8 million people). See http://www.nccp.org/publications/pdf/text_672.pdf p. 3 and http://www.bls.gov/cps/cpswp2004.pdf p. 1. And of course all of this is to say nothing of mental illness, crippling drug addiction, other medical disability, the lack of employment opportunities in economically depressed regions, simple faultless unemployability, or a whole host of other really good reasons why a poor person may not be able to work.
As to the second (implicit) part of the claim, I'd like to throw out a few more references to give some broader perspective. The U.S. has the lowest rate of social mobility (as measured by how strongly your parents income determines your own) in the First World. See http://www.suttontrust.com/reports/IntergenerationalMobility.pdf p. 6 Table 2. We have a very poor UN Human Poverty Index (HPI) rating compare to our peers (17th out of 19 among "highly developed" countries). See http://hdr.undp.org/en/media/hdr_20072008_table_4.pdf. We have the worst income and wealth inequality in the First World. See https://www.cia.gov/library/publications/the-world-factbook/fields/2172.html and http://multinationalmonitor.org/mm2003/03may/may03interviewswolff.html. And of course we have the third to lowest tax as a share of GDP percentage of all OECD countries (a close third behind Mexico and South Korea). See http://www.oecd.org/dataoecd/44/41/39494985.pdf p.1. I see these facts as part of a pretty clear story. Others may disagree.
Additional Note: While I'm pointing out things we're not very good at, I might as well round out the set:
1. We have a ridiculously high homicide rate and gun homicide rate.
http://www.guncite.com/gun_control_gcgvinco.html
Note that these figures are from the late '90's when our crime rates were historically low.2. We have the highest infant mortality rate in the First World.
https://www.cia.gov/library/publications/the-world-factbook/rankorder/2091rank.html
Note that we have a higher infant mortality rate than Cuba.3. We have the highest per capita incarceration rate in the world (the entire world, that is).
http://www.cnn.com/2008/CRIME/02/28/prison.population.ap/
4. We have the highest per capital spending on health care in the world but the 37th ranked health care system in the world.http://www.who.int/entity/whr/2000/en/annex01_en.pdf
These figures are for 2000, the last time the rankings we're done. I'm sure we wouldn't be doing any better now.Perhaps it is no coincidence that, in a addition to being a very low tax country, we have extremely low private sector unionization rates.
http://www.nber.org/papers/w3342.pdf?new_window=1 p. 43, Table 2.
The figures are somewhat dated but I'm sure things haven't changed very much.
II. The U.S. is at the point on the "Laffer Curve" where lower tax rates will produce higher government revenues.
In a rare moment of clarity, George Bush Sr. called this theory "voodoo economics." Obviously, at some unbelievably extreme tax rate (say 95%), government revenues would go up if you decreased the tax rate. But we are nowhere near this point. Remember that ~$860 billion in Bush tax cuts (that went disproportionately to the very wealthy, I might add)? They have significantly decreased federal government revenues and increased gross national debt. See http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/10/16/AR2006101601121_pf.html; http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Image:USDebt.png; and http://www.treasurydirect.gov/govt/reports/pd/histdebt/histdebt_histo5.htm. So, no, tax cuts do not pay for themselves.
Wednesday, March 5, 2008
Musings on the Legal System
I haven't contributed much as of yet and for that I apologize. This paragraph or two hopefully will ease people into my later posts where I become nearly intolerable.
The legal system in my mind is broken. It functions, but serves few interests outside those who use it the most, the wealthy (in civil contexts, at least). There are probably thousands of small things that could be done to rectify small points of injustice, but I'm not terribly interested in those reforms. I think that there are systemic issues that must be tackled first, otherwise we'll burn out on the small stuff.
The biggest problem in my mind is money. Those who have it, get better treatment, better lawyers, and better law. The lawmaking side should be reformed to eliminate some of this bias, but that's a topic for another day. Solely within the judicial system we can eliminate some of the worst problems with money. The first of these reforms would be to eliminate private lawyers from courtrooms.
The expense of private litigation lawyers creates a disparity in the quality of argument and the time exerted on legal thought. Pay great lawyers enough and they can conjure up some very well done (although morally reprehensible) arguments for you. This mercenary system should be replaced by public litigators (both criminal and civil) who are assigned cases on first come, first served basis with exceptions. For example, lawyers should be able to turn down cases for lack of merit, provided that the court agrees that there are no meritorious arguments available (although the plaintiff could still proceed pro se). Likewise, lawyers should have the opportunity to decline to take a certain number of these cases for personal reasons. Otherwise, some sort of conflict rule should remain to make sure that lawyers aren't invested personally in the case they receive.
Secondly, as part of the public litigator set up, lawyers' assignments should be rotated from plaintiff to defendant (or prosecutor to defendant in criminal cases). This measure would help to eliminate structural biases in the way clients are represented. No more hardened attorneys who have ceased to see all sides of an issue. I am most familiar with this problem in the criminal setting, but I imagine that civil attorneys that only represent certain industries or advocacy-based groups have similar problems with tunnel-vision.
Other problems I'd like to propose for discussion are the following:
undoing the complexity of the law (and thus making lawyers less necessary);
challenging the individual bias in legal thought by including
communities and other group interests as actionable;
eliminating the adversarial nature of our legal system in favor of other ways of resolving differences;
making all of the judiciary accountable through elections and perhaps
impeachment processes.
Finally, I would like to suggest that criminal law in particular needs attention. As a post mentioned earlier, we have more people in prisons here than any other western industrialized country. Two changes which I will quickly propose and then leave on the table are to eliminate prisons except for the most heinous crimes and the eventual elimination of a distinct criminal system.
Punishment has little use in a utilitarian sense (a philosophy to which I do not ascribe). It neither efficiently prevents future wrongdoing nor deters others from similar conduct. My main concern, however, is with its moral implications. For most actions which we label "crime," I would prefer restoration for the victim (or society if no individual person or persons are harmed), rehabilitation of the criminal, and a program where the criminal would assist in the elimination of similar behaviors. This last point is important. Whether the causes of crime are psychological, environmental (like poverty), or otherwise attributable, those who do not commit them are less likely to understand how to prevent them without input and assistance.
As to the elimination of the criminal system, as such, I see very little reason why a system that is not based on punishment, but on restoration and rehabilitation, would need rules that are distinct from what we term civil law. Perhaps others do, though, and I would love to hear why.
The legal system in my mind is broken. It functions, but serves few interests outside those who use it the most, the wealthy (in civil contexts, at least). There are probably thousands of small things that could be done to rectify small points of injustice, but I'm not terribly interested in those reforms. I think that there are systemic issues that must be tackled first, otherwise we'll burn out on the small stuff.
The biggest problem in my mind is money. Those who have it, get better treatment, better lawyers, and better law. The lawmaking side should be reformed to eliminate some of this bias, but that's a topic for another day. Solely within the judicial system we can eliminate some of the worst problems with money. The first of these reforms would be to eliminate private lawyers from courtrooms.
The expense of private litigation lawyers creates a disparity in the quality of argument and the time exerted on legal thought. Pay great lawyers enough and they can conjure up some very well done (although morally reprehensible) arguments for you. This mercenary system should be replaced by public litigators (both criminal and civil) who are assigned cases on first come, first served basis with exceptions. For example, lawyers should be able to turn down cases for lack of merit, provided that the court agrees that there are no meritorious arguments available (although the plaintiff could still proceed pro se). Likewise, lawyers should have the opportunity to decline to take a certain number of these cases for personal reasons. Otherwise, some sort of conflict rule should remain to make sure that lawyers aren't invested personally in the case they receive.
Secondly, as part of the public litigator set up, lawyers' assignments should be rotated from plaintiff to defendant (or prosecutor to defendant in criminal cases). This measure would help to eliminate structural biases in the way clients are represented. No more hardened attorneys who have ceased to see all sides of an issue. I am most familiar with this problem in the criminal setting, but I imagine that civil attorneys that only represent certain industries or advocacy-based groups have similar problems with tunnel-vision.
Other problems I'd like to propose for discussion are the following:
undoing the complexity of the law (and thus making lawyers less necessary);
challenging the individual bias in legal thought by including
communities and other group interests as actionable;
eliminating the adversarial nature of our legal system in favor of other ways of resolving differences;
making all of the judiciary accountable through elections and perhaps
impeachment processes.
Finally, I would like to suggest that criminal law in particular needs attention. As a post mentioned earlier, we have more people in prisons here than any other western industrialized country. Two changes which I will quickly propose and then leave on the table are to eliminate prisons except for the most heinous crimes and the eventual elimination of a distinct criminal system.
Punishment has little use in a utilitarian sense (a philosophy to which I do not ascribe). It neither efficiently prevents future wrongdoing nor deters others from similar conduct. My main concern, however, is with its moral implications. For most actions which we label "crime," I would prefer restoration for the victim (or society if no individual person or persons are harmed), rehabilitation of the criminal, and a program where the criminal would assist in the elimination of similar behaviors. This last point is important. Whether the causes of crime are psychological, environmental (like poverty), or otherwise attributable, those who do not commit them are less likely to understand how to prevent them without input and assistance.
As to the elimination of the criminal system, as such, I see very little reason why a system that is not based on punishment, but on restoration and rehabilitation, would need rules that are distinct from what we term civil law. Perhaps others do, though, and I would love to hear why.
An Open Invitation to People Who Are Wrong
This blog has turned into an agreement-fest. We need some radical leftists and right-wingers to disagree with us. I plead with you all to roam the Earth to find people who disagree to read and comment.
Tuesday, March 4, 2008
Chavez and the FARC
What do you guys think of all this nonsense in Venezuela/Colombia/Ecuador?
http://www.cnn.com/2008/WORLD/americas/03/03/ecuador.colombia/index.html?eref=rss_world
As a measured sympathizer (with some significant misgivings) of Chavez, I find this development troubling. His actions seem to represent more than a mere technical assertion of Ecuador's terriorial integrity; they seem to amount to substantive, if implicit, support for the FARC. Now the FARC has been classified as a terrorist organization by the EU (in addition to the U.S. and Colombia) and has been accused of "flagrant disregard for lives of civilians" by Human Rights Watch. And of course it funds its activities through kindappings, cocaine production and trafficking, and extortion. So I'm not sure the FARC is really anything besides a (very powerful) organized crime syndicate with a token ideological agenda.
Anyway, my guess is that this, from Venezuela's point of view, is a case of "the enemy of my enemy's friend is my friend." But supporting paramilitary groups that try to advance compatible ideologies through highly objectionable methods is something that the U.S. has been rightly and roundly criticized for (say, for example, supporting fascist death squads in Latin America or anti-communist terrorists in Cuba). I don't think the analysis changes for left-wing groups that resort to terroristic tactics. Your ideological goals may be commendable but if you indiscriminantly attack civilians or engage in international drug trafficking to advance these goals, you should not enjoy the support of sensible leftists. Besides, I have to question the sincerity of anyone's socialist convictions who condones extorting, kidnapping, and killing civilians.
Anyway my guess is that this is probably all posturing, and it will fizzle out in time. But Chavez should probably exercise more discretion in terms of who he associates with, and he shouldn't go out of his way to provoke a military response from the U.S. That could jeopardize his highly laudable domestic agenda.
http://www.cnn.com/2008/WORLD/americas/03/03/ecuador.colombia/index.html?eref=rss_world
As a measured sympathizer (with some significant misgivings) of Chavez, I find this development troubling. His actions seem to represent more than a mere technical assertion of Ecuador's terriorial integrity; they seem to amount to substantive, if implicit, support for the FARC. Now the FARC has been classified as a terrorist organization by the EU (in addition to the U.S. and Colombia) and has been accused of "flagrant disregard for lives of civilians" by Human Rights Watch. And of course it funds its activities through kindappings, cocaine production and trafficking, and extortion. So I'm not sure the FARC is really anything besides a (very powerful) organized crime syndicate with a token ideological agenda.
Anyway, my guess is that this, from Venezuela's point of view, is a case of "the enemy of my enemy's friend is my friend." But supporting paramilitary groups that try to advance compatible ideologies through highly objectionable methods is something that the U.S. has been rightly and roundly criticized for (say, for example, supporting fascist death squads in Latin America or anti-communist terrorists in Cuba). I don't think the analysis changes for left-wing groups that resort to terroristic tactics. Your ideological goals may be commendable but if you indiscriminantly attack civilians or engage in international drug trafficking to advance these goals, you should not enjoy the support of sensible leftists. Besides, I have to question the sincerity of anyone's socialist convictions who condones extorting, kidnapping, and killing civilians.
Anyway my guess is that this is probably all posturing, and it will fizzle out in time. But Chavez should probably exercise more discretion in terms of who he associates with, and he shouldn't go out of his way to provoke a military response from the U.S. That could jeopardize his highly laudable domestic agenda.
How Many Militaries Does One Man Need?
Try this one on for size, Internet Populace: we need to get rid of the gaping divisions between the branches of the armed forces.
First of all, there are all kinds of redundant systems we can probably live without. I don't know that we really need air force helicopters and navy helicopters and army helicopters and marine helicopters; air force special forces and navy special forces and army special forces and aquatic mammal special forces (http://usmilitary.about.com/cs/navy/a/navydolphin.htm).
Now, I get that specialization is a good thing, let's us do all sorts of fancy killing where meat and potatoes killing won't cut it, but there is no way that Navy Seals aren't learning a lot of the same things that Airborne Rangers are picking up. Don't they all have their own training bases? Is there any way we can't throw all these guys into a lecture hall, consolidate all the different Advanced Knife Kills: Negotiating the Brachial Plexus subsections? How negatively will increasing class size affect our U.S. News & World Report rankings of national special ops forces? And can't we make up that difference with a higher percent participation in alumni donations?
How swollen is military spending with redundant projects? Is there seriously any doubt in anyone's mind that the air force and the navy both have extremely expensive projects in development for a next generation fighter plane? And is there any doubt that those planes are not the same? And probably couldn't be serviced with the same parts? And probably one takes unleaded and the other takes premium? If you're out there, then you've got a more generous soul than yours truly, because I just assume that we've got billions of dollars being flushed down nearly identical but incompatible toilets.
And these redundancies aren't doing us any favors on the business end of the business either, I can't imagine. How many lieutenants do you need to navigate to get an inter-branch mission rolling? How many different requisition forms? I seem to vaguely recall stories have of there being problems at one point because different branches operated on different radio frequencies or something equally trivial. This game of military telephone can't be making life any easier.
Which brings me (sort of) to the problem of inter-branch competition. I like to imagine a world where all the people in the U.S. armed forces see themselves as being on the same side. As it is, you can't raise the air force's budget without raising the navy's budget, which means that the army will hold it's breath until it passes out unless it gets a bump also, and now here we are again, the marines locked in the bathroom and refusing to come out because they always knew we loved the others best.
This is no way to raise a family.
First of all, there are all kinds of redundant systems we can probably live without. I don't know that we really need air force helicopters and navy helicopters and army helicopters and marine helicopters; air force special forces and navy special forces and army special forces and aquatic mammal special forces (http://usmilitary.about.com/cs/navy/a/navydolphin.htm).
Now, I get that specialization is a good thing, let's us do all sorts of fancy killing where meat and potatoes killing won't cut it, but there is no way that Navy Seals aren't learning a lot of the same things that Airborne Rangers are picking up. Don't they all have their own training bases? Is there any way we can't throw all these guys into a lecture hall, consolidate all the different Advanced Knife Kills: Negotiating the Brachial Plexus subsections? How negatively will increasing class size affect our U.S. News & World Report rankings of national special ops forces? And can't we make up that difference with a higher percent participation in alumni donations?
How swollen is military spending with redundant projects? Is there seriously any doubt in anyone's mind that the air force and the navy both have extremely expensive projects in development for a next generation fighter plane? And is there any doubt that those planes are not the same? And probably couldn't be serviced with the same parts? And probably one takes unleaded and the other takes premium? If you're out there, then you've got a more generous soul than yours truly, because I just assume that we've got billions of dollars being flushed down nearly identical but incompatible toilets.
And these redundancies aren't doing us any favors on the business end of the business either, I can't imagine. How many lieutenants do you need to navigate to get an inter-branch mission rolling? How many different requisition forms? I seem to vaguely recall stories have of there being problems at one point because different branches operated on different radio frequencies or something equally trivial. This game of military telephone can't be making life any easier.
Which brings me (sort of) to the problem of inter-branch competition. I like to imagine a world where all the people in the U.S. armed forces see themselves as being on the same side. As it is, you can't raise the air force's budget without raising the navy's budget, which means that the army will hold it's breath until it passes out unless it gets a bump also, and now here we are again, the marines locked in the bathroom and refusing to come out because they always knew we loved the others best.
This is no way to raise a family.
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