Defense Industry Launches Propaganda Campaign

Read: After the Deficit Committee, A New Propaganda Push from the War Profiteers

Now that the deficit committee failed, war profiteer CEOs are launching an all-out propaganda campaign to protect their profit margins. They and their allies in Washington are working to protect the massive, corruption-filled war budget by slashing social safety nets that help create jobs. This would be a disaster for our economy.

With the failure of the deficit committee, Congress must act to cut the bloated, corruption-filled war budget. War Costs' latest video shows that military spending actually costs jobs compared to other ways of spending the same money. Yet, incredibly, many elected officials are publicly contemplating shielding the military from cuts while slashing other programs far better at job creation. This is absolutely unacceptable.

Now is the time to make budget changes to put the most people back to work. The cuts to the military budget have to be your top priority. Use our tool to send Congress War Costs' latest video to make sure they understand the consequences of failing to make real cuts to the military budget: Send our petition to Congress: http://warcosts.com 

One Nation, Under Arms - by Todd S. Purdum

The private papers of the late George F. Kennan: Military spending had become a national addiction. “We could not now break ourselves of this habit,” Kennan wrote, “without the most serious of withdrawal symptoms. Millions of people, in addition to those other millions that are in uniform, have become accustomed to deriving their livelihood from the military-industrial complex. Thousands of firms have become dependent on it, not to mention labor unions and communities.”

American military spending accounts for 43 percent of all defense spending worldwide, 6 times the share of China, 12 times that of Russia. The U.S. Navy is larger than the next 13 navies combined. Overall, defense spending increased about 70 percent under George W. Bush.

That does not include what is spent by related agencies, such as the Department of Homeland Security, or by the myriad intelligence services. Despite the winding down of the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, and recent talk in Washington about reining in military spending, the trend shows every evidence of continuing. Last spring, the Pentagon identified some $178 billion in potential savings and efficiencies through fiscal year 2016, but then proposed to keep $100 billion of it and redirect it to other programs.

The amorphous bogeyman of global terrorism has made the notion of significant adjustments in defense spending off limits. Officials who should know better—including Defense Secretary Leon Panetta, an old deficit hawk in his days as a congressman from California—warn of the dire consequences of potential cuts.

FULL ARTICLE:
http://www.vanityfair.com/politics/2012/01/Todd-Purdum-on-National-Security

Read my post: Defense Spending, Bogus Parts, Transnational Mergers