Tuesday, November 4, 2014

November, 2014, Part 3, Political Class Insanity: Screwing Up The Army, Arming The Middle East Crazies, and More

It is the start of another month which means it is time again to review the latest political class insanity that has been dumped on us by the worst set of politicians to ever hold office in the history of this country. From wasteful spending to bad priorities to general ineffectiveness, the insanity rolling out of Washington and other political centers and governments around the country seems to be accelerating as the idiocy of our political times increases.

Last month we set a record by needing almost two full weeks of posts to get all of the insanity documented and discussed. Given what I see today, we will be hard pressed not to get close to or exceed that record of insanity this month. It keeps getting worse and worse and the effectiveness of the political class gets less and less.

1) The U.S. Army has a proud tradition of fighting and winning land wars over the centuries. It is the main component of any “boots on the ground” facet of American foreign policy. Which brings to the latest insanity out of the Pentagon, namely right out of the mouth of Secretary of Defense Chuck Hagel. At a recent conference he suggested that part of the U.S. Army be repurposed as “a coastal defense force.

Say what? A coastal defense force against who? ISIS is marching through the Middle East, Russia is busy annexing parts of Europe, our southern border is being overrun with illegal immigrants and the top ranking person in charge of our armed forces thinks that the Army should be used to protect our coasts? From who?

Now, if he had said to protect our land borders with Mexico, that may have made at least a little sense. But no, he very specifically talked about coastal defense, a non-existent threat today if there ever was one. Insanity.

2) The October 31, 2014 issue of The Week magazine had a summary of an article from MarketWatch.com. The main thrust of the article is that from 1995 through 2012, American taxpayers paid out $11.3 million in farm subsidies to billionaire-owned farms and agribusinesses. Thus, non-millionaires were paying millions to billionaires, that is how upside down and illogical our political class and Federal government have become.

How many homeless and hungry Americans could have been taking care of with $11.3 million without having any trace of downside to billionaires? How many veterans would get much needed medical help without crimping a billionaire’s lifestyle? Shameful.

3) Very few people would disagree that the Middle East is a mess. Shiites fighting Sunni, religious minorities fleeing or fighting for their lives, Iran trying to go nuclear, Israelis fighting Palestinians, etc. A lot of different entities get blamed for the turmoil including ISIS, religious terrorists, poverty, and dictators.

But perhaps the worst element in the whole mess is not over there but right here in this country. According to an article from VOX.com, that was summarized in the October 10, 2014 issue of The Week magazine, in just the first seven months of this year, the U.S. exported $557 million worth of guided missile technology to more than twenty countries around the world. And more troubling,  Middle East countries were six of the top ten buyers.

This is just guided missile technology. This does not include the other arms and weapons that have been sold or given by the U.S. to various ground forces in the countries throughout the region. So maybe, just maybe, we are the ones causing a lot of the turmoil, using American taxpayer dollars, to make the Middle East more of a violent mess than it otherwise would be.

4) The Obama administration recently tried to make points with the fact that this year’s Federal budget deficit will dip below half a TRILLION dollars for the first time since Obama took office. Of course, they failed to point out the insanity that this lower annual deficit number is still higher than ANY deficit put forth by ANY previous Presidential administration.

They also failed to point out a recent analysis from the Mercatus Center at George Mason University which shows that Federal government spending will outpace tax revenue by $9 trillion from 2014-2024. The details of their analysis are highlighted in the following chart:















If this estimate comes true, it will add $9 TRILLION onto our already obscene $18 TRILLION national debt burden, resulting in a total national debt load of about $27 TRILLION or over $200,000 for every household in America. As you can see, unless the political class grows some backbone and finds a way to truly reform Social Security, Medicare, and Medicaid, the main drivers of this ever growing national debt, the debt load will likely collapse the economy and our democracy long before ten years are up.

5) One last piece of insanity for today. The Heritage Foundation recently ran a nice summary of President Obama’s campaign fundraising activities (see chart below). While his administration has accomplished very little in the first six years of its run, one cannot deny that the President has been very busy doing political fundraising.

While he has been hopping around the country on strictly political junkets and activities, Americans are suffering through the worst economic recovery of recent history, the Middle East is spinning out of control, Russia is aggressively expanding its influence in Europe, the Chinese economy continues to outgrow ours, Iran and North Korea advance their nuclear weapons programs, etc., etc., etc. I think it can safely be said that when Presidential leadership was required, this President was more often out of town doing political fundraising or on the golf course.

According to the Heritage count, in less than six years in office, Obama has attended 426 political fundraisers or about 74 a year, an amazing 1.4 fund raisers a WEEK since he has been in office. Bush attended a total of 318 political fund raisers in his eight years in office, an average of less than 40 a year, a rate that is 46% less than Obama’s.

Add in Obama’s 200 plus rounds of golf and we see that this President has been out of the White House raising political funds or playing golf more than twice a week during his term. An insane focus on bad priorities in the face of a country with so many problems.



















That will do it for today. A clueless Secretary of Defense, enriching billionaires, arming the Middle East crazies, exploding the national debt upwards, and an absentee President. So much insanity in such varied ways, and more to come tomorrow.

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Please visit the following sites for freedom:

Term Limits Now: http://www.howmuchworsecoulditget.com
http://www.reason.com
http://www.cato.org
http://www.robertringer.com/
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=08j0sYUOb5w







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