Sequester'd Defense

The  United States of America out spends Russia , China  on
military defense. Has more military bases than any
nation combined world wide. Is it a sign of militarism ?

For the most of part debt ceiling has the nation pandering as usual .  Just were to cut . In simple terms . ## Our nation can not sustain the same spending as it did in the last decade . The part of the problem is that America has been crippled  for the most part by it's massive military spending . Two wars and  two occupations have made the nations government on the verge of collapse. Former president Dwight Eisenhower warned his fellow Americans of the potential for the military industrial complex growing out of control.  His fear was it becoming too strong a political force in America such that it would indulge in maintaining its size and influence at the expense of other needs of society. . Now  lawmakers in the U.S. Congress will be at each other’s throats again as they continue playing a favorite Washington parlor game: governing by crisis. This time around, though, it is the military and the safety of the nation that will be at the forefront of those decisions, as sequestration -- the capital's buzzword for automatic spending cuts -- is due to begin taking effect March 1. Last Year the nation face similar circumstances . On November 14, 2011, Secretary of Defense Leon Panetta wrote a letter to Sens. John McCain and Lindsey Graham explaining the ramifications of the full sequestration defense cuts. Should these cuts take place over the next 10 years, he said, the United States would be left with its smallest ground force since World War II; the smallest Navy since 1915; the smallest fighter force in the history of the Air Force; and the smallest civilian work force in the Defense Department's history. Big spending , and over spending in the American military has not been this extravagant  even in President Reagan's time  20 years, and saw non-discretionary spending, i.e. personnel, health care and maintenance and operations, swallowing up the entire budget. Traditionally, the Defense Department spent 32 percent of its budget on modernization What's even more comical is that this whole sequestration business was the republican's condition for raising the debt ceiling.  They got what they bargained for, with a credit downgrade to top it off.   And now they are bitterly regretting, and all of a sudden it's the president's problem. We've been decimating Al Qaeda leadership for the last 3 years without endangering a single pilot or billion dollar aircraft. Despite all this, people like Bennett and Cheney insist that we need the same kind of military that we had during the Cold War. Why? Defense Secretary Leon Panetta warned Thursday.The United States is at risk of becoming a second-rate power if automatic budget cuts go into effect, plunging the U.S. armed forces into the most significant readiness crisis they’ve faced in more than a decade . At a ceremony honoring departing Defense Secretary Leon Panetta today, President Obama said there is "no reason" we cannot avoid the automatic defense cuts contained in the so-called sequester, cuts that he said will have a "severe impact on our military preparedness."  The president called on Democrats and Republicans "to come together" to avert the cuts "for the sake of our prosperity." Nevertheless, sequestration is poised to strike. Stripped of $492 billion, or nearly 10 percent of its budget, over fiscal years 2013–2021, the already reduced defense budget would be hit disproportionately. Meanwhile, entitlement programs—the greatest drivers of spending and future deficits—would be virtually left off limits.

NOTES AND COMMENTS:

 ## Below is an infographic courtesy of militaryeducation.org in showing what this cost meant as an opportunity cost to American society.  

Romney accused Obama of allowing the military to be cut to historically low levels through $1 trillion in cuts set to occur over the next decade because of last year’s Budget Control Act and sequestration.“Our Navy is smaller now than any time since 1916,” Romney said. “The Navy said it needed 313 ships, now it’s down to 285, and it’s headed down to the low 200s if we go through sequestration. That’s unacceptable to me.”

Obama responded by saying that sequestration happened because of Congress, not through his administration, and that it would not happen."First of all, the sequester is not something that I've proposed. It is something that Congress has proposed. It will not happen," Obama said.  Sequester was something created by Boehner and Obama to avoid the default..  Boehner demanding domestic cuts and Obama demanded Military cuts.  Ofcourse, it was voted and approved by the congress and signed by our President.