Trump / Musk (other than DOGE)

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ChileG said:
To be clear, I wasn’t just mocking the “make budget cuts by requiring everyone to work five instead of three days,” merely because it won’t move the needle in regards to the deficit.
It’s also because it is about the dumbest way possible to eliminate part of the workforce to save money. Instead of having department heads decide which 25% percent to cut, it’s only slightly less arbitrary than pulling names from a hat. How do they know the best, most productive people won’t be the ones to quit first? Usually, they are the ones that have the most options.

However, I agree that defense spending should be looked at. Not sure that leaving NATO (if that is the plan) is the best plan for that. Could be penny wise and pound foolish.
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Nonsense. When trying to reduce defense spending it is the best possible course to make sure that you alienate any possible allies so that you have to bear 100% of the burden of your own defense at all times.

That's just math.
 
finesse said:
Seriously, anything that Russia wants to do outside its borders is generally against our interests. Making it difficult for them there for less money than it costs to operate our carrier groups for a year is a win. Btw, at 27 billion to build and 3 billion to operate a year, why do we have so many?

You might want to get so recent information on NATO spending. Europe has picked up its spending and changed its spending focus, Germany in particular.
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The 2/3 number comes from this report which is collecting 2023 data.

SIPRI Military Expenditure Database

The SIPRI Military Expenditure Database contains consistent time series on the military spending of countries for the period 1949–2023. The database is updated annually, which may include updates to data for any of the years included in the database.
www.sipri.org www.sipri.org

The wide difference between the two numbers is the issue I mentioned earlier with the US spending money to protect its interest in South America and Asia but also a bit of an accounting gimmick. 14% is likely the money the US directly contributes to shared NATO operations but I suspect it doesn't include all of the budget that we dedicate at least nominally to European defense.

I don't think we need anywhere near that number of carrier groups. Those monkeys are expensive as heck. They do offer us a lot of flexibility but once again, flexibility to do what? Protect Israel from their own decisions? Protect US interests in Albania from a Russia that looks pretty anemic? Protect a few islands in the Philippines? Protect Taiwan who is the 14th richest country in the world and spends 30% less than us on a GDP basis on their military? That's a lot of money to spend.

To me the choices are we spend that money on our citizens' welfare programs, we spend it on defending some other country's interests, we go into debt or we raise taxes. We have chosen to go into debt but I think that's the wrong choice. I'd rather stop spending that money to protect the Estonias of the world and start spending it on Americans FDR and LBJ style.
 
Post on Bluesky:

"Twitter is extremely creepy these days because 90% of the responses are bots and it’s not exactly clear why. Usually it’s not even political, it’s not selling anything, it’s just bots pretending to be people. The vibe is like boarding a city bus and realizing none of the passengers have faces."
 
start spending it on Americans FDR and LBJ style.

Curiously, defense spending by percentage reached its peak under FDR (that WWII thing) dropped after the war but remained high until the end of Vietnam and been dropping fairly steadily since. Both of those had a greater % of defense spending than currently. That not to say we don't need to refocus but those aren't great examples.

Do you ever research things before you post? If you do, why don't you look at the change in corporate and farm subsidies? I suspect there's more serious fat there that can be trimmed than in overseas defense spending without harming the country.
 
05C40 said:
Post on Bluesky:

"Twitter is extremely creepy these days because 90% of the responses are bots and it’s not exactly clear why. Usually it’s not even political, it’s not selling anything, it’s just bots pretending to be people. The vibe is like boarding a city bus and realizing none of the passengers have faces."
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So glad I moved over to Bluesky and removed Xtter
 
I imagine a lot of us Trumpers are going to have a "Trump Christmas" with all the products he's selling. My guess is that I'm going to get a Trump watch, Golden sneakers, cologne and cuff links for my Christmas. My kids will think it's hilarious.
 
finesse said:
start spending it on Americans FDR and LBJ style.

Curiously, defense spending by percentage reached its peak under FDR (that WWII thing) dropped after the war but remained high until the end of Vietnam and been dropping fairly steadily since. Both of those had a greater % of defense spending than currently. That not to say we don't need to refocus but those aren't great examples.

Do you ever research things before you post? If you do, why don't you look at the change in corporate and farm subsidies? I suspect there's more serious fat there that can be trimmed than in overseas defense spending without harming the country.
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Yeah. I guess I didn't really need to research that defense spending went up under two major wars but maybe you can provide a link since that seems to be the go-to statement for everyone.

You are aware that FDR held office for a a few months before world war II started and during that time he was able to implement a number of social welfare programs? Of course you're also aware that LBJ tried to continue that legacy.

I specifically talked about social welfare spending LBJ and FDR style. I didn't advocate for defense spending FDR and LBJ style. I suspect you're aware what that implies. Do you bring up their defense spending just to win an argument or do you not really feel like those liberal social programs are worthwhile?
 
What's everybody's favorite W.C. Fields movie? I dither between You Can't Cheat an Honest Man and Never Give a Sucker an Even Break.
 
For a few years, actually.. I brought up their defense spending because you strongly implied that their social programs were at the expense of defense spending.

I don't think anyone goes to any particular effort to "win" an argument against you.
 
Ramrouser said:
I imagine a lot of us Trumpers are going to have a "Trump Christmas" with all the products he's selling. My guess is that I'm going to get a Trump watch, Golden sneakers, cologne and cuff links for my Christmas. My kids will think it's hilarious.
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Trump cologne smells like onions and bankruptcy.
 
finesse said:
For a few years, actually.. I brought up their defense spending because you strongly implied that their social programs were at the expense of defense spending.

I don't think anyone goes to any particular effort to "win" an argument against you.
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But when I say I want to "stop spending that money to protect the Estonias of the world and start spending it on Americans FDR and LBJ style" I'm implying that I want to spend it on social welfare for Americans. But if you think that somehow strongly implies that I want to increase defense spending like FDR and LBJ, I'm glad I could correct your misinterpretation.

So if you're done with your straw men, what choice do you think we should make? Do you want to decrease defense spending so that we could spend that money on other priorities, and if you do, where do you want to cut?
 
Ramrouser said:
I imagine a lot of us Trumpers are going to have a "Trump Christmas" with all the products he's selling. My guess is that I'm going to get a Trump watch, Golden sneakers, cologne and cuff links for my Christmas. My kids will think it's hilarious.
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I hope you enjoy the gifts and have a Merry Christmas.
 
gtyellowjacket said:
But when I say I want to "stop spending that money to protect the Estonias of the world and start spending it on Americans FDR and LBJ style" I'm implying that I want to spend it on social welfare for Americans. But if you think that somehow strongly implies that I want to increase defense spending like FDR and LBJ, I'm glad I could correct your misinterpretation.

So if you're done with your straw men, what choice do you think we should make? Do you want to decrease defense spending so that we could spend that money on other priorities, and if you do, where do you want to cut?
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The defense spending we most need to cut are damned near untouchable. That's those weapons systems and stuff that Congress designates to their constituents to justify their donations from defense contractors in their states. The international stuff? Most of it is a good investment. Israel? Not so much but damned near a political fact of life.

What really needs to be addressed is farm subsidies, corporate welfare and tax breaks for oil companies. There's a lot of bloat there that is not in the best interests of the nation.
 
Ramrouser said:
I imagine a lot of us Trumpers are going to have a "Trump Christmas" with all the products he's selling. My guess is that I'm going to get a Trump watch, Golden sneakers, cologne and cuff links for my Christmas. My kids will think it's hilarious.
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Cool—the billionaire needs your money.

Glad to hear your fam’s all doing well enough financially to spend lavishly on hilarious gifts—that damned Biden economy must be treating you all well. Joy to the world.
 
gtyellowjacket said:
To be clear, I'm not for leaving NATO. I am for shrinking our NATO commitments to the most important allies.

If Russian aggression threatens a place like Lithuania, an Ukraine style conflict funded by us and our allies serves our interests better than a commitment to put forces into combat.
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So (1) you would advocate essentially the same approach that the Biden Admin took with Ukraine but that most republicans including Trump criticized Biden for taking and (ii) Trump would not do this; he wouldn’t understand why Lithuania would be important to US interests.

Also, Ukraine is far more important than Lithuania and all other Eastern Europe states except for Poland. As a natural buffer state, and given its size and population, it is a clear and logical site for fighting Russian aggression.
 
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