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Edited by Mrph1 on Nov 30th 2023 at 11:03:59 AM

Rationalinsanity from Halifax, Canada Since: Aug, 2010 Relationship Status: It's complicated
#131401: Jul 21st 2016 at 8:51:32 PM

...Is there a chance that what's left of the war hawks/neo-cons are going to go to Hillary or stay home? Are there enough of them to make a difference.

Politics is the skilled use of blunt objects.
Rationalinsanity from Halifax, Canada Since: Aug, 2010 Relationship Status: It's complicated
#131402: Jul 21st 2016 at 8:59:46 PM

AP is already fact checking Trump's speech, surprise surprise its full of horse shit.

http://www.metronews.ca/news/world/2016/07/21/ap-fact-check-trump-resurfaces-debunked-claims-in-speech.html?platform=hootsuite

Politics is the skilled use of blunt objects.
Elle Since: Jan, 2001
#131403: Jul 21st 2016 at 9:00:08 PM

Some of them might be going to Johnson, which, well, splitting the Republican vote is better than splitting the Dem vote.

Eschaton Since: Jul, 2010
#131404: Jul 21st 2016 at 9:00:16 PM

[up][up][up]I suppose it depends on how willing they are to cozy up/go to war with Russia, given Trump's recent statements.

[up]Isn't Johnson a non-interventionist? As in, an actual non-interventionist, and not whatever Trump's pretending to be.

edited 21st Jul '16 9:03:00 PM by Eschaton

Rationalinsanity from Halifax, Canada Since: Aug, 2010 Relationship Status: It's complicated
#131405: Jul 21st 2016 at 9:03:07 PM

Neo-cons and Cold Warriors have a heavy overlap, those guys live to distrust Moscow.

Politics is the skilled use of blunt objects.
carbon-mantis Collector Of Fine Oddities from Trumpland Since: Mar, 2010 Relationship Status: Married to my murderer
Collector Of Fine Oddities
#131406: Jul 21st 2016 at 9:04:51 PM

[up][up]Non-interventionist to the point of cutting the military down to a limited self-defense force.

Rationalinsanity from Halifax, Canada Since: Aug, 2010 Relationship Status: It's complicated
#131407: Jul 21st 2016 at 9:06:57 PM

And such a reduction in military spending would damage the American economy. Fucking up Boeing, Lockheed, Northrop, etc is the last thing your manufacturing sector needs right now.

Also, the end of the RNC has coincided with a uptick in the number of Americans googling 3rd party candidates.

http://www.ctvnews.ca/world/as-rnc-wraps-americans-google-third-party-candidates-1.2997524

edited 21st Jul '16 9:13:14 PM by Rationalinsanity

Politics is the skilled use of blunt objects.
Medinoc from France (Before Recorded History)
#131408: Jul 21st 2016 at 9:34:55 PM

[up]So, for all the ranting against the Military-Industrial Complex, no one can do anything about it because it's become Too Big To Fail?

"And as long as a sack of shit is not a good thing to be, chivalry will never die."
Krieger22 Causing freakouts over sourcing since 2018 from Malaysia Since: Mar, 2014 Relationship Status: I'm in love with my car
Causing freakouts over sourcing since 2018
#131409: Jul 21st 2016 at 9:42:52 PM

[up]Too Big To Fail without ruining several state economies. Some defense projects are filled with pork barrel spending to keep some representatives' constituents employed. If they fail, they aren't getting reelected and there will be quite the unemployment crisis.

I have disagreed with her a lot, but comparing her to republicans and propagandists of dictatorships is really low. - An idiot
Discar Since: Jun, 2009
#131410: Jul 21st 2016 at 9:49:08 PM

While I'm fully in favor of taking half of the military's budget and giving it to NASA, damn the consequences, there are less disruptive options. One of the problems people have with the military is a number of dead-end projects. Taking money from there and putting it into improved basic equipment would improve things without any real economic upsets.

Ultimately, a lot of politicians forget that everything disrupts the economy. The question is whether the disruption is worth the gain.

Writing a post-post apocalypse LitRPG on RR. Also fanfic stuff.
Rationalinsanity from Halifax, Canada Since: Aug, 2010 Relationship Status: It's complicated
#131411: Jul 21st 2016 at 9:52:19 PM

Space would actually be one of the few viable alternatives for defense spending, but it would have to be done gradually and correctly. And that's not getting into the the foreign policy side of the issue.

Politics is the skilled use of blunt objects.
Protagonist506 from Oregon Since: Dec, 2013 Relationship Status: Chocolate!
#131412: Jul 21st 2016 at 9:58:57 PM

I don't think giving half the military budget to NASA is a good idea. NASA does just fine with quite a bit less money-NASA requires less people to do what it does.

Leviticus 19:34
TerminusEst from the Land of Winter and Stars Since: Feb, 2010
Rationalinsanity from Halifax, Canada Since: Aug, 2010 Relationship Status: It's complicated
#131414: Jul 21st 2016 at 10:06:40 PM

[up][up]Is the new Space Launch System overbudget? Some estimates put that (awesome) monster in the tens of billions range.

Obviously a 50% reduction would be more than NASA could ever need, short of humanity finding ways to colonize space.

Politics is the skilled use of blunt objects.
NativeJovian Jupiterian Local from Orlando, FL Since: Mar, 2014 Relationship Status: Maxing my social links
Jupiterian Local
#131415: Jul 21st 2016 at 10:10:17 PM

One of the problems people have with the military is a number of dead-end projects. Taking money from there and putting it into improved basic equipment would improve things without any real economic upsets.
You say that like it's simple, but it's very much not. Often you can only identify something as a dead-end project in hindsight, and sometimes things go wrong because research and development is legitimately difficult, not just because of incompetence and malice. Here's an excellent example of one of those projects. (tldr, a good idea — using software-defined radio technology so that you can carry one radio that does everything you need instead of having to carry different radios for every type of communication you need to do — spends six billion dollars over 15 years and still fails to produce useable hardware because doing that is actually really hard, and they didn't realize how hard it would be until they were already trying to do it.)

Really from Jupiter, but not an alien.
Elle Since: Jan, 2001
#131416: Jul 21st 2016 at 10:19:14 PM

NASA spending in context (I think I got this from Phil Plait, @badastronomer): NASA's entire budget would fit comfortable inside what a single military project costs (I wanna say single missiles but not sure about it.)

FFShinra Since: Jan, 2001
#131417: Jul 21st 2016 at 10:22:09 PM

You gotta get Americans to care about Space again. That can only happen if you sell it to them. And how you sell it to them is very much an open question. Only then does NASA get any funding increases worth a damn.

edited 21st Jul '16 10:22:26 PM by FFShinra

Memers Since: Aug, 2013
#131418: Jul 21st 2016 at 10:34:00 PM

[up] I think it should be more about promoting how much NASA has invented that is currently used in every day life, more NASA budget means potentially better for us.

From modern insulation and scratch resistant lenses to the Super Soaker, inventions for space have filtered down to every day life. Hell smoke detectors, cat scans, and work out machines are a NASA inventions.

TacticalFox88 from USA Since: Nov, 2010 Relationship Status: Dating the Doctor
#131419: Jul 21st 2016 at 10:35:10 PM

https://twitter.com/BernieSanders/status/756316512814718976

Probably the most savage tweet he's ever put out.

New Survey coming this weekend!
AlleyOop Since: Oct, 2010
#131421: Jul 22nd 2016 at 1:59:03 AM

[up][up][up]

The military itself also does decent investment into the sciences of its own. My lab actually gets a significant amount of medical funding from them, which really helps when you consider the NIH's recurring budget woes. I'm legally not allowed to say much about the research other than that it's aimed towards disaster relief and other important things like that, but if the research bears fruit it has civilian benefits as well. The Epipen is another example of that. As is ARPAnet.

edited 22nd Jul '16 1:59:43 AM by AlleyOop

940131 Since: Feb, 2014
#131422: Jul 22nd 2016 at 2:11:04 AM

In regards to Russia, I agree with Ron Paul. America shouldn't be expected or play the role of the world policemen. It would be much wiser, to pull out and leave the defense of Eastern Europe to the major European powers. If you look at the Big 4 in Europe, their GDP combined is significantly larger than China's. Russia is in decline and they have a population over twice as large. America shouldn't have to stay in Europe and certainly shouldn't stay in the Middle East. They don't have the money for it anymore.

TerminusEst from the Land of Winter and Stars Since: Feb, 2010
#131423: Jul 22nd 2016 at 2:19:02 AM

The Big 4 have no ability to defend Eastern Europe. Nobody does. They're a buffer zone.

Si Vis Pacem, Para Perkele
LeGarcon Blowout soon fellow Stalker from Skadovsk Since: Aug, 2013 Relationship Status: Gay for Big Boss
Blowout soon fellow Stalker
#131424: Jul 22nd 2016 at 3:35:05 AM

The Russians aren't in decline anymore, they've rearmed and rebuilt at frankly terrifying speeds. The improvements to their economy and military from even just the South Ossetian conflict have been immense and that was only eight years ago.

Oh really when?
Greenmantle V from Greater Wessex, Britannia Since: Feb, 2010 Relationship Status: Hiding
V
#131425: Jul 22nd 2016 at 3:51:56 AM

[up][up] Indeed, that is part of the point of NATO.

Keep Rolling On

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