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"All In All It Appears That Eisenhower’s Worst Fears Have Been Realized And His Remarkable And Unique Warnings Given For Naught"
President Eisenhower's warned us about the growing threat from the powerful military-industrial complex - and it's threat to our prosperity - 50 years ago.
As NPR notes:
On
Jan. 17, 1961, President Dwight Eisenhower gave the nation a dire
warning about what he described as a threat to democratic government. He
called it the military-industrial complex, a formidable union of
defense contractors and the armed forces.
Eisenhower,
a retired five-star Army general, the man who led the allies on D-Day,
made the remarks in his farewell speech from the White House.
***
Eisenhower
used the speech to warn about "the immense military establishment" that
had joined with "a large arms industry."
Here's an excerpt:
"In
the councils of government, we must guard against the acquisition of
unwarranted influence, whether sought or unsought, by the
military-industrial complex. The potential for the disastrous rise of
misplaced power exists, and will persist."***
Eisenhower
was worried about the costs of an arms race with the Soviet Union, and
the resources it would take from other areas — such as building
hospitals and schools.
***
Another concern ... was the
possibility that as the military and the arms industry gained power,
they would be a threat to democracy, with civilians losing control of
the military-industrial complex.
Eisenhower said:
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.
As James Ledbetter wrote in the New York Times last month:
It is not a stretch to believe that this armaments industry — which
profits not only from domestic sales but also from tens of billions of
dollars in annual exports — manipulates public policy to perpetuate
itself. But Eisenhower was concerned about more than just the
military’s size; he also worried about its relationship to the American
economy and society, and that the economy risked becoming a subsidiary
of the military.
***
Eisenhower warned that the
influence of the military-industrial complex was “economic, political,
even spiritual” and that it was “felt in every city, every statehouse,
every office of the federal government.” He exhorted Americans to break
away from our reliance on military might as a guarantor of liberty and
“use our power in the interests of world peace and human betterment.”
On this score, Eisenhower may well have seen today’s
America as losing the battle against the darker aspects of the
military-industrial complex. He was no pacifist, but he was a lifelong
opponent of what he called a “garrison state,” in which policy and
rights are defined by the shadowy needs of an all-powerful military
elite.
The United States isn’t quite a garrison state
today. But Eisenhower would likely have been deeply troubled, in the
past decade, by the torture at Abu Ghraib, the use of martial authority
to wiretap Americans without warrants and the multiyear detention of
suspects at Guantánamo Bay without due process.
Finally,
even if the economy can bear the immediate costs of the military,
Eisenhower would be shocked at its mounting long-term costs. Most of
the Iraq war expenses were paid for by borrowing, and Americans will
shoulder those costs, plus interest, for many years to come.
A strong believer in a balanced budget, Eisenhower in his farewell
address also told Americans to “avoid the impulse to live only for
today, plundering for our own ease and convenience the precious
resources of tomorrow.” Too many of today’s so-called fiscal
conservatives conveniently overlook the budgetary consequences of
military spending.
The Independent pointed out Monday:
If you doubt, half a century on, that Dwight
Eisenhower had it right, then consider the advertisements on WTOP, the
Washington region's all-news radio station. Every big metro area in the
US has one, where car dealerships tout their bargains, and fast food
chains promote a new special offer.WTOP has all that. But it boasts other advertisers too, with names such as
Boeing, Lockheed Martin and General Dynamics.
***
These almost otherworldly ads, with patriotic music playing
softly in the background, are aimed at a very restricted audience: the
government that is their only customer for such wares. For the rest of us,
they are proof that in the capital of the world's richest democracy, the
defence industry is a very big player indeed.
***
Adjusted
for inflation, US national security spending has more than doubled
since Eisenhower left office. Year after year, the defence budget seems
to rise – irrespective of whether the country is actually fighting
major wars, regardless of the fact that the Soviet Union, the
country's former global adversary, has ceased to be, and no matter
which party controls the White House and Congress.
One common thread however exists: the military-industrial complex, or
perhaps (as Eisenhower himself described it in a draft of his speech
that was later amended) the military-industrial-congressional
complex. Others have referred to the beast as the "Iron Triangle".
In one corner of the triangle stands the arms industry. The second is
constituted by the government, or more precisely the Pentagon, the
end-consumer of the industry's output. In a totalitarian state, such as
the Soviet Union, that combination would be sufficient. The US
however is a democracy, and a third corner is required – an elected
legislature to vote funds to pay for the arms. This is Congress, made
up of members who rely on the defence industry for many jobs in
their states and districts, and for money to help finance their every
more expensive re-election campaigns.
***
A
treasure trove of old documents, covered with dirt and pine needles and
discovered last year at a cabin in Minnesota once owned by
Eisenhower's chief speechwriter Malcolm Moos, reveals that the 34th
president had been working on the speech since mid-1959. It went
through at least 21 drafts; in a later one, the "congressional"
reference was struck out because, it is supposed, Ike did not want to
upset old friends on Capitol Hill. But the "military" part was there
from the outset.
***
In
reality, the dangers of Eisenhower's "military-industrial complex"
are not new; from the earliest days of the Republic, political leaders
have warned of them. "Overgrown military establishments," George Washington said in his own farewell address of 1796, "are under any form of government inauspicious to liberty."
***
Once again, one might note, Eisenhower hit the mark in January 1961.
Back then, budgets were more or less balanced, and the possibilities
of the future seemingly boundless. Even so he urged his countrymen to
"avoid the impulse to live only for today, plundering for our own ease and convenience the precious resources of tomorrow".
That of course is what has happened with the "credit card" wars of
Iraq and Afghanistan, whose costs will burden American taxpayers for
years to come.
And investment legend Jeremy Grantham’s most recent newsletter
argues that President Eisenhower's worst fear have come true, and makes
some hard-hitting points about finance and government as well:
Historians may well look back on this period, say, from 1960 on, as the "Selfish Era" - a time when individualism and materialism steadily took precedence over social responsibility. (To be fair, in the period from 1960 to 1980, the deterioration was slow, and the social contract dating back to the mid-1930s was more or less intact.) Personal debt grew slowly at first but steadily accelerated, even though it can be easily demonstrated that consumers collectively are better off saving to buy and that the only beneficiary of a heavy debt society is the financial industry, whose growth throughout this period was massive, multiplying its share of a growing pie by a remarkable 2.2 times…
The financial industry, with its incestuous relationships with government agencies, runs a close second to the energy industry. In the last 10 years or so, their machine, led by the famously failed economic consultant Alan Greenspan – one of the few businessmen ever to be laughed out of business – seemed perhaps the most effective. It lacks, though, the multi-decadal attitude-changing propaganda of the oil industry. Still, in finance they had the "regulators", deregulating up a storm, to the enormous profit of their industry. Even with the biggest-ever financial fiasco, entirely brought on by the collective incompetence they produced "they" being the financial regulators and the financial industry leaders working together in some strange, would-be symbiotic relationship), reform is still difficult. Even with everyone hating them, the financial industry comes out smelling like a rose with less competition, profits higher than ever, and not just too big to fail, but bigger still.
Other industries, to be sure, are in there swinging: insurance and health care come to mind, but they seem like pikers in comparison. No, it's energy and finance in coequal first place, military-related companies an honorable third, and the rest of the field not even in contention. And now, adding the icing to the corporate cake, we have the Supreme Court. Formerly the jewel in the American Crown, they have managed to find five Justices capable of making Eisenhower's worst nightmare come true. They have put the seal of approval on corporate domination of politics, and done so in a way that can be kept secret. The swing-vote Senator can now be sand-bagged by a vicious advertising program on television, financed by unknown parties, and approved by no stockholders at all!
All in all it appears that Eisenhower’s worst fears have been realized and his remarkable and unique warnings given for naught. From now on, we should tread more carefully. Honoring President Eisenhower’s unique warnings, we should perhaps not take this 50-year slide lying down. Squawking loudly seems preferable.
»
- advertisements -
Ike didn't even have the perspective to see the complex that was, has been, and perhaps is still above the military-industrial complex:
The finance-intelligence-oil complex.
My bet is that the military-industrial complex is starting to get pissed at the finance-intelligence-oil complex that has been misleading and controlling it for all these years, and they are about to murder the men behind the curtain.
I read somewhere that in the draft of the farewell speech Ike referred to the MICC (Military Industrial Congressional Complex) instead of the MIC.
Chickened out in final delivery. No link available.
http://vodpod.com/watch/5319217-watch-george-galloway-comment-show-on-06-jan-2011
Watch George Galloway Comment Show on 06 Jan 2011Fuck off, troll.
@"Fuck off, troll."
"Causes
Possible causes of unintended consequences include the world's inherent complexity (parts of a system responding to changes in the environment), perverse incentives, human stupidity, self-deception, failure to account for human nature or other cognitive or emotional biases."
.
from link above
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3GxodI1zAYE&feature=autoplay&list=MLGxdCwVVULXd5-CKKy5Ub3hFfH4giglXT&index=11&playnext=7
John Jackson - Live 1984
Or as Ron Paul says: Health Care Industrial Complex, Pharamceutical Industrial Complex, Prison Industrial Complex etc.
Use your imagination, you can probably come up with a few more. LOL.
Now you're giving me a complex !
Which one will come after me, directly or indirectly, for posting here ?
they are all leaving it up to you to take care of that.
As I read somewhere recently. The military spending of this country over the last several decades has been one long stimulus package. In fact, all debt is stimulus. Driving up costs of goods and services and devaluing currency. I wonder what a car would cost if everyone had to pay cash??
gh
http://www.democracynow.org/2011/1/20/fifty_years_after_eisenhowers_farewell_address
50 Years After Eisenhower’s Farewell Address, A Look at "Prophets of War: Lockheed Martin and the Making of the Military-Industrial Complex" ...JUAN GONZALEZ: This week marks the 50th anniversary of President Dwight D. Eisenhower’s famous farewell speech to the nation. It was January 17th, 1961.
JUAN GONZALEZ: President Eisenhower’s farewell address on January 17th, 1961, excerpt from the documentary Why We Fight. Fifty years after that speech, many argue that the military-industrial complex is stronger than ever.
AMY GOODMAN: Our next guest traces the rise of the military-industrial complex through the story of the nation’s largest weapons contractor, Lockheed Martin. As a full-service weapons contractor, Lockheed Martin receives over $29 billion per year in Pentagon contracts, or roughly one out of every 10 dollars the Defense Department doles out to private contractors.
William Hartung is the director of the Arms and Security Initiative at the New America Foundation—his book is called Prophets of War: Lockheed Martin and the Making of the Military-Industrial Complex—joining us here in our studio.
Welcome to Democracy Now!
WILLIAM HARTUNG: Thanks.
AMY GOODMAN: The significance of this massive weapons manufacturer in the United States and why you chose to write a book on it?
WILLIAM HARTUNG: Well, I think they’re the largest, they’re the most corrupt, and they have the most political influence. So, for example, they make cluster bombs, which are used in the Middle East. They design nuclear weapons. They make fighter planes. They make combat ships. So they have the full gamut of weapons. But they also have branched out. They work for the CIA, the FBI. They work for the IRS, the Census Bureau. So they’ve become this full-service government contractor, which really is involved in every aspects of our lives. Every time we interact with the government, Lockheed Martin is likely to be there.
JUAN GONZALEZ: I was struck, some of the ones you talked about. The Census Bureau—what does the Lockheed Martin do for the Census Bureau?
WILLIAM HARTUNG: Well, they help count the census. They have these people in little Lockheed Martin, you know, polo shirts who are—they have truckloads of data that they’re processing. They also helped design it. So they’re really in the middle of it. They’re running it, in some sense.
AMY GOODMAN: How did Lockheed get so big?
WILLIAM HARTUNG: Well, the mergers of the '90s were one of the big things. I mean, World War II was the first. Then, when Norm Augustine engineered the Lockheed-Martin Marietta merger, that's when they really became by far the biggest company, and they didn’t have a real competitor at that point.
AMY GOODMAN: Lockheed and Martin Marietta.
WILLIAM HARTUNG: Became one company, yes.
JUAN GONZALEZ: They also branched out, as you note, into services to local governments. For instance, here in New York City, Lockheed Martin had the contract with the Metropolitan Transportation Authority to basically develop a surveillance system in the subways.
WILLIAM HARTUNG: Yes.
JUAN GONZALEZ: And so, they increasingly got into this intelligence gathering or in information systems for local governments. Could you talk about how that developed?
WILLIAM HARTUNG: Well, they bought a company that had been involved in a New York City parking violations scandal. And then they branched out into social services in Florida. They tried to get the welfare contract in Texas. As you said, they worked on the New York City subway surveillance system, which was a disaster. They were fired after a $212 million contract. So they went into that for about five years, and they had contracts in 44 states. But they just couldn’t get the job done. Finally, they were fired from so many places, they decided to get out of the business.
AMY GOODMAN: Talk about the significance of President Eisenhower’s speech, what he meant by the "military-industrial complex" 50 years ago.
WILLIAM HARTUNG: Well, he was concerned not just about the size, not just about the budget, but that it was going to undermine our democracy. And I think that’s what Lockheed Martin is about in many ways. I mean, they were involved with the Pentagon in doing surveillance on antiwar protesters. They build biometric identification systems for the FBI. The fact that they’re in the IRS makes me kind of nervous. It’s sort of creepy in a way. They’ve got so many kinds of data about us. I’m not sure, you know, a military contractor should really be in that position.
JUAN GONZALEZ: They were the firm that was involved in Total Information Awareness?
WILLIAM HARTUNG: The Counterintelligence Field Activity, which was closely related to that.
AMY GOODMAN: You say that Lockheed Martin makes foreign policy, has its own foreign policy.
WILLIAM HARTUNG: In many ways. I mean, not only were they involved in lobbying for the war in Iraq, but they have people in Liberia helping rebuild the justice system. They’re building refugee camps. They helped run elections in the Ukraine. They helped write the Afghan constitution. So, all kinds of things that you would think of as sort of the soft side of foreign policy, they’re making money from.
AMY GOODMAN: And its role in elections?
WILLIAM HARTUNG: Well, they recruit the monitors who monitor the elections in places like Bosnia.
AMY GOODMAN: I mean here.
WILLIAM HARTUNG: Oh.
AMY GOODMAN: The money that they pour into elections at home.
WILLIAM HARTUNG: Oh, they spend about $12 million per election cycle, either on lobbying or on candidates. And they have people like Buck McKeon, who runs the Armed Services Committee now. They’re the biggest donor to him. They’re the biggest donor to Daniel Inouye, who runs the Appropriations Committee in the Senate.
AMY GOODMAN: So, they get money from the Pentagon, from the U.S. taxpayer, and then decide who they want to elect.
WILLIAM HARTUNG: Essentially, they recycle our money into the political system, yes.
In military news, seven retired admirals and generals have resigned from advisory roles with the Pentagon rather than comply with new rules on reporting outside income to avoid a conflict of interest. The former officers were among a group of 158 Pentagon officials identified in an investigation by the newspaper USA Today. Eighty percent of the so-called "mentors" were found to have ties to military contractors that they previously were not required to publicly disclose. A Boston Globe study early this month found that 80 percent of retiring three- and four-star officers went to work as consultants or defense executives from 2004 to 2008.
New figures show a major increase in suicides among members of the U.S. Army National Guard and Reserve. According to the military, suicides by reserve and National Guard soldiers almost doubled to 145, from 80 deaths the year before. For active-duty troops, the number to take their own lives fell slightly to 156 from 162 in 2009.
http://www.infowars.com/doping-up-the-troops/
EconomicPolicyJournal.com
January 19, 2011
U.S. Central Command policy allows troops a 90- or 180-day supply of highly addictive psychotropic drugs before they deploy to combat, reports Nextgov.
The CENTCOM approved drug list is a mixture that includes drugs like Valium and Xanax, used to treat depression, as well as the antipsychotic Seroquel, originally developed to treat schizophrenia, bipolar disorders, mania and depression.
CENTCOM policy does not permit the use of Seroquel to treat deploying troops with these conditions, but it does allow its use as a sleep aid, and allows deployed troops to be provided with a 180-day supply.
..
( the story continues at the link ) (there at the top).
And during the fall of France, during WW2, the German forces were often doped up with speed so they could keep pushing.
Nobody can deny the truth of Eisenhower's admonishment, and much like Wilson,s "I have unwittingly destroyed......." statement, is probably a CYA manoeuver for posterity.
Bring the Balance back: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=e9y687l-fwY&feature=related
eisenhower was only half right - if he had included george orwell he have been closer to the mark.....the plutocrats - e.g. rockefeller / rothschild axis of evil - have used the cia to fully enslave america to their despotism....
fuck the cia, military, and plutocrats....there is a cancer on nation and it will not be excised...
LMT up 14% during last 30 days...being the only SELL on Goldman's conviction list for 2011 sure helps...
how 'bout that gold and silver bitchez!?
Lew Rockwell would beg to differ with your assessment, GW, and I can't say as I blame him:
Eisenhower’s farewell speech was a long and nearly hysterical argument for the Cold War. He presented it as more than a military policy against Russia, but rather as a grand metaphysical struggle that should take over our minds and souls, as bizarre as that must sound to the current generation.
His words were Wilsonian, even messianic. The job of U.S. military policy is to “foster progress in human achievement” and enhance “dignity and integrity” the world over. That’s a rather expansive role for government by any standard. But he went further. An enemy stands in the way of achieving this dream, and this enemy is “global in scope, atheistic in character, ruthless in purpose, and insidious in method.” This great struggle “commands our whole attention, absorbs our very beings.”
Because some crusty apparatchiks are imposing every manner of economic control over Russia and a few satellites, U.S. foreign policy must absorb the whole of our beings? So much for limited government.
http://www.amconmag.com/blog/ikes-last-stand/i-dont-like-ike
His "Defense Highways" program alone is enough to condemn him for his devotion to military-industrialism, what with its destruction of the nation's national passenger rail system and the freeway free-for-all that would literally pave the way for WalMart and everything else that America's subsidized "love affair with the automobile" has wrought.
Talk about unintended consequences:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Unintended_consequences
Eisenhower's warning is eloquent, and definitely worth remembering, even as the likelihood of a "Caesarist" coup in the US--once nearly unthinkable--becomes a real possibility, given the tyrannical chaos rendered unto us by the clowns in DC.
Two caveats:
1) Eisenhower initially wrote "military-industrial-congressional complex" (which is of course better) but was moved by urgent advice to omit "congressional." We can see that the omission was not warranted.
2) Eisenhower would be unlikely to care about our torture policies--he would no doubt be appalled that the word has gotten out so much. Eisenhower was responsible for the deaths of over a million German POW's after the war ended--see the definitive works by James Bacque.
Otherwise, keep 'em coming, GW.
Things have evolved (or more properly devolved) since Eisenhower's time enough so that the MIC has agglomerated in Borg hive fashion control over the spheres of banking (PE), media (e.g. GE) and logistics and accordingly would probably be more accurately described now as McBIG
Military-Corporatist-Banking-Industrial-Gulagplex
http://www.bizjournals.com/washington/stories/2010/04/19/story20.html
http://www.privatemilitary.org/defense_sector.html
http://www.ibtimes.com/articles/71507/20101013/lockheed-martin-to-sell-m...
http://www.naomiklein.org/shock-doctrine/reviews/profiting-disaster-capi...
This is growth that is consistent with making the US military a primary weapons platform (along with China) for pre-meditated Globalist neofeudal consolidation.
----> Little Georgie’s Blog
I’m against all war. Every war ever fought has been the result of “false flag“ attacks. No nation in history has ever actually attacked another nation, except of course the U.S.A. Because I said so in my blog. (See this.) Also, war costs a lot of money, which would be better spent on stuff like “Cash-for-golf carts” programs and more frisbees for prison inmates.
I’m a “Truther”, and we “Truthers” have a monopoly on the truth. Because I said so. (See here.) And to prove it, I will use any flimsy crap -- printed or spoken in any venue by any dubious entity -- if it fits the pre-ordained template of my open mind. And if you disagree, it’s because you’re closed-minded or brainwashed or a CIA plant or in denial or something. (See this and that.)
Also, you should realize that I’m telling the truth because all of my sources are either “prominent”, or “legendary“, or “leading“, or “noted”, or “experts” in their respective fields. Because I always say so in my blog. (See here, there, and everywhere.)
The U.S.A., and especially Bush/Cheney, are evil. Corporations are evil too, because they‘re always making a mess of the environment and stuff. Intentionally. Because all they care about is making profits by screwing people. And because they hate people and the Earth. All other entities are OK; or, at least, less evil than corporations and George Bush and Dick Cheney, whose real name is “Dick Planet Raper Cheney The Master Of Torture.”
The financial world is full of crooks (duh) and the economy can’t recover until they are all in jail being savagely sodomized by a very large, heavily tattooed inmate named “Big Hector“. If I keep repeating this notion in my blog -- and if I hold my breath until my face turns red -- this fantasy will magically come to pass. Then I’ll be almost happy; but not quite, because I know at least one of them will get away scot-free without being sodomized by Big Hector. And because it’s unlikely that I would get any sodomy video footage to link to. (Not here.)
The “left/right paradigm” is obsolete. There is no more “left” or “right“. Because I said so. (See this and that and there.) So take that, you right-wing scum. However, my usual “sources” (like the Guardian, New York Times, Huffington Post, Daily Kos, FireDogLake, Salon, Der Spiegel, The Nation, Mother Jones, NPR, Bill Moyers, Noam Chomsky, Dennis Kucinich, Michael Moore, MSNBC, Keith Olbermann, The Libtard Gazette, The Hammer and Sickle Herald, and on and on and on…) are as yet oblivious to this new non-ideological reality. Probably because they haven’t read my blog, in which I said so. (See this and that and the other thing again.) Anyway, whatever I copy-and-paste from these unbiased, objective sources is absolute gospel, because they have no agenda except the truth, just like me.
Furthermore, I agree with my fellow liberals and lefties that there are no such things as liberals and lefties.
As you can see, my name is “George Washington“, not “George Soros”; even though all the sources where I camp out are media organs for Nazi collaborator George Soros. That’s just a coincidence you should disregard. Because I say so. (See here.) Therefore, I am not a KGB/FSB agent, even though I might as well be.
It is also just a coincidence that America-haters, Marxists, “Truthers”, “Birthers”, Holocaust deniers, Stalin apologists, anti-Semites, Christian haters, racists and other bigots, paranoid schizophrenics, illiterates, frauds, plagiarists, liars and drug dealers… are drawn to me like buzzards on a gut wagon. This has nothing to do with me. It’s not my fault that my fans are so high-class. They read my blog so they can learn from me, because I’m so much smarter and better informed than they are. If they didn’t have me, just think how wretched they would be! (See somewhere.)
Because I have the mind of a child, I can’t repeat myself often enough. Because I have the mind of a child, I can’t repeat myself often enough. Because I have the mind of a child, I can’t repeat myself often enough. Because I have the mind of a child, I can’t repeat myself often enough… (See this and that.)
Do svidaniya,
Georgie One Note
:) amusing
Dick Cheney actually IS evil though.
...see my blog
While I do not entirely agree with your scathing judgment of GW, this is brilliant satire!
+1. Great comment
FYI
http://www.prospectmagazine.co.uk/2010/01/words-that-think-for-us-3/
+1
That was very funny (See over yonder).
copy paste copy paste copy paste...and virtually no original content.
GW's formula for a blog post to ZH.
I think the reference to the speech is disingenious...
Was not Eisenhower part of the Culture that created this?
does anyone have a no-hassle link to a pdf of grantham's piece?
http://www.zerohedge.com/article/jeremy-grantham-ignoring-eisenhowers-wa...
PDF link does not work....the piece is still there.
Thanks! I didn't realize that Tyler had posted that. I'll add to the main post.
Welcome. Please excuse the haterz in here, I always read your posts in detail.
Lots and lots of trolls lately.
"The Politician" by Robert Welch....Ike was a turd who helped established everything he then "warned" the American people about. Typical forked silver tongued devil!
Google Operation Keelhaul!
Welcome To The Reservationhttp://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-LA-S64QY3o&feature=player_embedded
The author does not get it.
The military in the US is a huge group. Walking in a bar and asking for whom has a first order/second order relative in the military returns always a large number of people.
It has nothing to do with internal or external threats: simply an aggregate of common interests as all people linked to the military in the US want the military to thrive so they get their externalities.
And that is a lot of people.
The military industrial complex is the expression of the US popular will. It is not done by the elite, but rather shows that the US elite listens to the US people who is the issuer of the demand for that mammoth like military sector.
Going against the US military is going against the interests of a vast majority of US citizens.
AnAn, are you always wrong?
"The military industrial complex is the expression of the US popular will. It is not done by the elite, but rather shows that the US elite listens to the US people who is the issuer of the demand for that mammoth like military sector."
~ to me this is incredibly naive...any popular will is only ginned up by the MSM and fearmongers in the Mil Indust Complex, let alone the fact that so much of the budget is black and can't possibly be in the 'will of the people'.
Or simply realistic.
What could be naive though is to claim that the US citizens are unable to discriminate MSM propaganda.
Duplicity is a key in the US. It means that people can pretend not understanding or believe something as long as it helps to cover for their actions.
Fearmongering: a number of new recruits have been enlisting on the ground the Iraqis or the Afghans are easy. That is not fear. Picturing a weak opponent as fearful is a convenient means to hide one is committed into cruelty. Very few people in the US actually fear Iraqis, Afghans or Somalis in the US. No matter how much fearmongering MSM is pushing forward.
I strongly suggest that people start to grow aware of their environment.
Depicting US citizens as sheeple is a nice for the ego and flatters a sense of superiority. But US citizens are people who know the situation and prefer to lie over their real motives. People pretending to ignoring, or not understanding a situation are a totally different stock from people who are ignorant of or dont understand a situation.
right. hardly anything is the expression of the US popular will.
Wrong. The vast majority of Americans do not know who the Secretary of Defense is, let alone how expensive the above sheet pentagon bill is every year. Therefore, how can it be an expression of US will when the public is clueless?
That is pretty weak. Never been mandated to provide something no matter the cost?
Ignorance is bliss. What the vast majority of US citizens, all those linked to the military, donot want to hear is how much they cost. They dont care about that. All they want is to be enabled in their way of life, which is derived from a thriving military.
The very day they know the name of the Secretary of defense, you can be sure that would be because their life style is endangered. As long as the job is performed well, who cares about who performs the job?
The military is the largest direct and indirect group in the US. Good luck in finding one US citizen who has no relation to the military in the US.
There aren't 100 million people in or associated with the military or defense contractors; 100 million is how many voters it will take to keep a ridiculously bloated military budget in place once enough people start going without daily needs (see Gasoline, Food, Medicine, Jobs)(see also Roman Empire). In the short run you may be right (see American Idol)(also see Campaign Contributions to House and Senate Members by Defense Contractors), but when the money to pay for the defense budget is substantially borrowed from China, in the long run, it's probably unsustainable (see Soviet Union). And why, really, do we need huge standing armies, bases, and equipment stockpiles when we we have submarines roaming the planet right now that pack enough gigatonnage to turn an aggressor nation into a parking lot (see Dirty Glass).
Maybe you come from some hillbilly state where the career choices are limited (see Farmer/Rancher, Military, Meth Cook), but the "vast majority" that you talk about does not exist.
Three Cheers for Ike AND Jeremy Grantham (see "Night of the Living Fed"). Where are the patriots in this country?
And why, really, do we need huge standing armies, bases, and equipment stockpiles when we we have submarines roaming the planet right now that pack enough gigatonnage to turn an aggressor nation into a parking lot (see Dirty Glass).
It has nothing to do with external or internal threats. All with perpetuating the conditions of existence of a group.And you need standing armies to satisfy the needs of that group.
The group associated with the US military is the largest group in the US. As it, it is large enough to influence the conditions to perpetuate itself as a group. You dont need a majority of voters to influence the outcome of an election.
Check the data in the US, candidates can get elected by 19 to 30 pc of the total voters poll (total is the key word as it also includes people are enfranchised but do not cast a ballot)
The Secretary of Defence is Ben Bernanke, right ?
No, he's an offensive secretary for TPTB.
The military problem is but one head of a two headed beast with the other head being the banking system. You can also find ample warnings about takeovers by the banks in the founding literature. In Eisenhower's day the banks were not a problem as bankers were still deposit takers under the Rossevelt era reforms and "investment banking" was disctinct from "commercial banking." Not so anymore. Now they are risk takers and the best and the brightest and all other forms of hogwash.
Now they are risk takers"
criminals
much to much history has been forgotten. the big danger here is that if the govt turns against we the people with that type of weaponry, then we will have a hard time indeed.
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