Alternet gives us real numbers on the cost of endless warmongering:
President Obama and Senator John McCain, who have clashed on almost every conceivable issue, do agree on one thing: the Pentagon needs more money. Obama wants to raise the Pentagon’s budget for fiscal year 2016 by $35 billion more than the caps that exist under current law allow. McCain wants to see Obama his $35 billion and raise him $17 billion more. Last week, the House and Senate Budget Committees attempted to meet Obama’s demands by pressing to pour tens of billions of additional dollars into the uncapped supplemental war budget.
What will this new avalanche of cash be used for? A major ground war in Iraq? Bombing the Assad regime in Syria? A permanent troop presence in Afghanistan? More likely, the bulk of the funds will be wielded simply to take pressure off the Pentagon’s base budget so it can continue to pay for staggeringly expensive projects like the F-35 combat aircraft and a new generation of ballistic missile submarines. Whether the enthusiastic budgeteers in the end succeed in this particular maneuver to create a massive Pentagon slush fund, the effort represents a troubling development for anyone who thinks that Pentagon spending is already out of hand.
I heard a disturbing statistic on NPR this morning. They reported that Walmart is the third largest employer on the planet. But that wasn’t what I found disturbing. The disturbing part was when they announced the Number 1 largest employer on the planet: the U.S. Defense Department. Number 2 is the Chinese People’s Liberation Army. But, apparently, if you ask D.C. politicians what to do about it they will say, “It’s too small. We must make it bigger!”