Posted on 03/27/2016 6:42:26 AM PDT by Kaslin
The next president will take office as this year’s $544 billion deficit pushes up the U. S. national debt to nearly $20 trillion. Scary, but mere chicken feed compared to the way more than one hundred trillion bucks in unfunded liabilities has already been racked up by our entitlement state.
And, on top of that, add our outrageous world policeman fees.
The Washington Post reports that, “thanks to various treaties and deals set up since 1945, the U.S. government might be legally obligated to defend countries containing 25 percent of the world’s population.”
And boy, has America, World Policeman, been active!
The U.S. military is well into a second decade of wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, and engaged in on-going armed conflict in Libya, Pakistan, Somalia, Syria and Yemen. Meanwhile, the Islamic State and its campaign of terror seems not to be degraded, but to be growing throughout the world.
No wonder, then, that the iconoclastic Donald J. Trump questioned — at a Washington Post editorial board meeting last week, just before the Brussels terrorist attacks — the wisdom of U.S. military commitments to NATO, South Korea and Japan.
“NATO was set up when we were a richer country,” Trump explained. “We’re not a rich country. We’re borrowing, we’re borrowing all of this money. We’re borrowing money from China . . .”
According to Mr. Trump, the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) is “a good thing to have,” but he argues: “Ukraine is a country that affects us far less than it affects other countries in NATO, and yet we are doing all of the lifting, they’re not doing anything. And I say, why is it that Germany is not dealing with NATO on Ukraine? Why is it that other countries that are in the vicinity of the Ukraine not dealing with — why are we always the one that’s leading, potentially the third world war, okay, with Russia?”
The United States spends six times as much on defense as the average NATO country, as a percentage of government spending overall.
“You know, South Korea is very rich,” Trump offered. “Great industrial country. And yet we’re not reimbursed fairly for what we do. We’re constantly, you know, sending our ships, sending our planes, doing our war games, doing other. We’re reimbursed a fraction of what this is all costing.”
For the record, that fraction which is reimbursed by South Korea and Japan happens to be one-half — but only of the non-personnel costs.
Trump contends that we must consider the cost effectiveness, the affordability of those bases and missions: “I think that we are not in the position that we used to be. I think we were a very powerful, very wealthy country. And we’re a poor country now. We’re a debtor nation.”
“How you going to get rid of that debt?” Trump asked the Post writers, who were obviously taken aback by his questioning of these long-standing military commitments. “We’re spending that to protect other countries. We’re not spending it on ourselves.”
Asked if “the United States gains anything by having bases” in Asia, Trump replied, “I personally don’t think so.”
“Well, if you look at Germany, if you look at Saudi Arabia, if you look at Japan, if you look at South Korea — I mean we spend billions of dollars on Saudi Arabia, and they have nothing but money,” complained Trump. “And I say, why?”
Why should we subsidize the defense of these wealthy countries?
“Certainly, we can’t afford to do it anymore,” answers Mr. Trump.
In news coverage of the editorial board meeting, the Post dismissively dubbed Trump’s foreign policy “unabashedly noninterventionist.”
As if that were a bad thing.
Lest I get my hopes up too high, it seems unlikely that Mr. Trump would actually change policy. Instead, as usual, he simply promises that he would make “a much different deal” with these countries, and “it would be a much better deal.”
Here’s the best deal of all — as our third president, Thomas Jefferson, articulated: “Peace, commerce, and honest friendship with all nations. Entangling alliances with none.”
It’s quite affordable.
This is an issue were I’m going to agree with Trump on.
We simply cannot afford this anymore. Period. Our fiscal situation is dire. When does this end?
Think about this. If Trump wins, and the US debt goes down to 10 trillion, he could brag he cut the debt in half
And what if he doesn’t?
And what if he doesn’t?
Then we’re screwed
$544 billion deficit pushes up the U. S. national debt to nearly $20 trillion. this we can thank the inexperienced, above his pay grade, nobel peace prize winning affirmative action president. Thank all the dopes who voted for this impostor too.
Obama was out dancing the last tango in Havana.
That will be the memory of him.
“He was dancing when he should have been working.”
Once again, Townhall drives off the nutty cliff.
TOWNHALL.COM DID NOT WRITE THE OP-ED.
PAUL JACOB IS THE AUTHOR OF THE OP-ED
TOWNHALL.COM PUBLISHED THE OP-ED
LEARN THE DIFFERENCE BETWEEN PUBLISHER AND AUTHOR OF AN OP-ED
STOP MAKING A FOOL OF YOURSELF WITH YOUR IGNORANCE
Caps and bold off
Townhall published it. That makes them the idiot for publishing such an idiotic story.
Sorry, but thanks for proving my point.
Townhall is reaching in every way and you post their crap. That makes YOU their useful idiot.
It should start with trials, convictions, and sentencing for those politicians who voted to permit this outrageous debt.
It should start with trials, convictions, and sentencing for those politicians who voted to permit this outrageous debt.
STOP MAKING A FOOL OF YOURSELF WITH YOUR IGNORANCE
Impossible for a Trumper. Yesterday, there was a post started by a Trumper were Jim Webb was endorsing Trump. The Trumpers couldn’t contain themselves with their glee. But, when you read the article and watched the interview in question, no such endorsement or commitment was given by Webb himself.
The deflation was epic. Which is what will happen when Trump either wins the nomination or the WH and starts being more comfortable going more to the left
Just to clarify, you want to criminalize opposition to Trump? Allowing and voting for measures that drastically increase our debt is political and ill advised but hardly criminal or almost every legislator since 1929 would be a criminal. It’s every dictator’s tactic to criminalize the opposition.
Such citizens are traitors like the politicians who betray the U.S. for their own personal gain. But the primary effort is to bring to justice those politicians who, as legislators, cast their votes to betray their country.
May those citizens, i.e., the Demonicrats and RINOs, endure sleepless nights wondering if a 3 AM pounding on their door will occur with a warrant for their arrest.
Just to clarify, I mentioned no specific political candidate.
The traitorous betrayal of the U.S. is in the legislative and executive branches voting for and approving an outrageous debt that can only crush the U.S. economy and destroy the freedoms of U.S. citizens.
GOT IT?
caps off
Such citizens are traitors like the politicians who betray the U.S. for their own personal gain. But the primary effort is to bring to justice those politicians who, as legislators, cast their votes to betray their country.
May those citizens, i.e., the Demonicrats and RINOs, endure sleepless nights wondering if a 3 AM pounding on their door will occur with a warrant for their arrest.
That is why originally the U.S. was set up as a constitutional republic, but has slowly been perverted into a popular democracy where the immediate gratification of the electorate determines policy.
Noah Webster (1758-1843) is known as the “Father of American Scholarship and Education” as well as his dictionary and The American Spelling Book, which introduced Americanized spellings of words. However, Webster also had much to say about our country and government, including this excerpt from his book, Letters to a Young Gentleman Commencing His Education to which is subjoined a Brief History of the United States (New Haven: S. Converse, 1823, p. 19):
When a citizen gives his suffrage [vote] to a man of known immorality, he abuses his trust and he sacrifices not only his interest but that of his neighbor. He betrays the interest of his country. Nor is it of slight importance, that men elected to office should be able men, men of talents equal to their stations, men of mature age, experience, and judgement; men of firmness and impartiality....
"Whenever a man is known to seek promotion by intrigue, by temporizing, or by resorting to the haunts of vulgarity and vice for support, it may be inferred, with moral certainty, that he is not a man of real respectability, nor is he entitled to public confidence."
That is why originally the U.S. was set up as a constitutional republic, but has slowly been perverted into a popular democracy where the immediate gratification of the electorate determines policy.
Exactly
So IMO, the mindset of the electorate needs to be changed first. If the current mindset continues amongst the population we could end up going full Pinochet
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