Dole wants more for defense

Submitted by bkrueger on December 10, 2007 - 12:18pm.
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U.S. Sen. Elizabeth Dole wants to spend more on defense.

Dole, a Salisbury Republican, has introduced a resolution calling on Congress to spend at least 4 percent of the country's gross domestic product on the defense budget.

Dole says that would require an additional $40 billion in fiscal year 2008. Otherwise, the resolution says, defense spending is on track to drop to 3.2 percent of GDP by 2012.

"Projected defense spending will fall considerably short of meeting many of our military’s needs, and if we do not remedy this situation now, there will be serious consequences for our national security," Dole said in a statement.

Correction: A previous version of this post misstated the year.

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Dumb

Submitted by Anglico on December 10, 2007 - 4:26pm.

Anybody who knows anything about business and investing knows that spending levels tagged to arbitrary percentages of anything are almost always Very Bad Ideas. And in the case of defense spending, the Republican proposal is egregiously bad. It reflects a world view distorted beyond recognition by the Global War on Terror, which by itself has already proven a stupendous failure.

In case anyone has any doubt, this is nothing but Republican fear-mongering and pandering, an irresponsible proposal for irresponsible public policy from an irresponsible Senator who has long-outlived whatever little usefulness she might once have had.

(Congress Critter Virginia Foxx sent out an email filled with the same kind of stupidity earlier today.)


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Re: Dole wants more for defense

Submitted by EdisonMcIntyre on December 10, 2007 - 2:22pm.

Imagine if a Senator -- especially a Democrat -- were to call upon Congress to spend at least 4 percent of GDP on the federal "social budget." He/She would immediately be denounced by the Right-Wing Choir as another "tax-and-spend" liberal looking for something to throw taxpayer dollars at.

Mrs. Dole is the Republican equivalent, except that her party now adheres to a "borrow and spend" philosophy that saddles our children and grandchildren for the cost of the security that we enjoy. (In some quarters, Republicans used to advocate "pay as you go," which sounds to me very much like "tax -- to raise the revenues to provide the services that the citizenry demands -- and spend the revenues efficiently on those services.")

The federal government should be assessing, frequently, our defense needs on a service-by-service, weapons system-by-weapons system, unit-by-unit basis, rather than looking to meet some semi-arbitrary spending goal. If Mrs. Dole has some concrete suggestions for improving our armed forces and providing the security we need, more power to her. But setting a price on our security ought to be balanced on just how much bang we're getting for the buck -- not on some number that sounds so nice and round. I can't help but think her resolution is aimed not so much at increased security for the average United States citizen but improving the bottom lines of any number of defense-related businesses.

Edison McIntyre
Durham

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