People Believe NASA Funded As Well As US Military 320
QuantumG writes "An essay on the Space Review site is reporting that a just-completed study indicates the average citizen has no idea how much funding NASA gets. Respondents generally estimated NASA's allocation of the national budget to be approximately 24% (it's actually closer to 0.58%) and the Department of Defense budget to be approximately 33% (it's actually closer to 21%). In other words, respondents believed NASA's budget approaches that of the Department of Defense, which receives almost 38 times more money. Once informed of the actual allocations, they were almost uniformly surprised. One of the more vocal participants exclaimed, 'No wonder we haven't gone anywhere!'"
Increasing wouldn't necessarily be good (Score:2, Insightful)
Iraq War (Score:4, Insightful)
Military budget (Score:5, Insightful)
US military spending (Score:5, Insightful)
As I referenced in my
( here: http://slashdot.org/comments.pl?sid=352789&cid=21263533 [slashdot.org] )
The US spends almost 60% of all global military spending, not counting the 2 undeclared wars, Iraq and Afganistan. That is $623 Billion out of a total of about $1.1 Trillion. The Iraq war is estimated to cost over 1.2 Trillion(ish), with about 500B spent so far. Those are direct costs - cash spent, and does not count indirect costs or opportunity costs or the human toll.
Some details can be found here:
http://www.globalsecurity.org/military/world/spending.htm [globalsecurity.org]
and here
For me, I'm done keeping quiet. I'm done being polite. I'm done hoping that these wrongs will be corrected, eventually. I bring up the reality of what is happening in the US in common discussions with people. It makes people uncomfortable, as it should. Criminals are running the show, and no one has or will step to stop them. Now that the US has installed a chief lawman that is covering up past crimes, there is no more room for polite waiting and hoping things get better legally.
Re:Silly Humans (Score:2, Insightful)
I think they do that.
The post may be wrong. (Score:2, Insightful)
Military expenditures - percent of GDP: 4.06% (2005 est.).
Does this 4.06% (~530 billion dollars) of GDP (2006 est.) correspond to 21% of the federal budget?
If this is true, the federal budget represents ~2.524 trillion dollars, or ~19.3% of GDP... It seems a lot.
Re:Military budget (Score:1, Insightful)
Sadly, I think that you right correct on the "before long". The problem is that China is building as fast as possible. Combine that with Venezula, Cuba, Syria, Iran, North Korea, etc. and we are in for a rough time.
Re:Military budget (Score:4, Insightful)
Having said that, I do appreciate certain benefits that the US provides and, I have visited the states on several occasions (not recently, as I am disturbed by stories I have heard on border policy) and I have found that most Americans that I actually meet to be generally quite nice folks (with some exceptions, but no more than anywhere else in the world).
What irks me, and you do this in your post, is when actions made by the US are made out to be uniquely selfless and benevolent. This simply *does not happen*. No government is a charity, every penny spent must be demonstrated to serve a self interest. What tends to happen is that an action is taken that has some kind of positive secondary effect and that secondary effect is made to look like the primary motivation, but this is nothing more than a bank robber bringing statistcs on how many innocent people that the bank he robbed happened to forclose on in the previous year.
Iraq is a case in point. Weapons of mass destruction, The oppresion of Saddam, or oil revenue/security. One of these things was a primary motivation, the other two were secondary effects spun to look like a primary motivation. Perhaps I am being arrogant myself here, but I am sure that anyone sensible understands that Iraq was a war for resources. Hell, I can even say I understand that motivation (although, the cost has been far too high).
If you are going to praise the US work that goes into protecting trade routes, at least be honest and say that this is done primary to protect the interests of US corporations (and this is true even if the actual goods move between two other states) and that the whole world benefits from the secondary effect of more secure trade routes. For that, I salute you and your culture, but please don't try to make it sound like it is done from the goodness of your hearts.
Re:Military budget (Score:5, Insightful)
3. As a US citizen, I'm happy that the US has the best military in the world.
I take issue with this statement, because I know for a fact that the UK has the best military in the world.
More seriously though, everybody I know believes as a 'well known fact' that their own country's military is the worlds best. These are otherwise sensible and not particularly nationalisatic people usually capable of making objective judgements. That's a startlingly good piece of marketing however you look at it.
Re:US military spending (Score:2, Insightful)
If that is the case, what about the money that the USA spends on social programs?
Or worse yet, servicing federal debt?
Military spending in the USA isn't even the #2 item in the federal budget today, and if the Pentagon were to be demolished, every member of the armed forces discharged, all of the bases closed... or in effect the Department of Defense eliminated from the federal budget, there would be virtually no impact on overall federal spending.
I'm not saying that in many cases some huge mismanagement of funds spent toward the military is inappropriate, but comparisons in the way that you have made them are hugely inappropriate.
Furthermore, I would strongly question the figure of the USA spending 60% of all global military expenditures. While I have no doubt that you can find some source like some UN agency to proffer those numbers, there are so many things to account for actual defense spending that it is difficult at best to compare one country to another, much less every country in the world. Particularly when it comes to military spending, there are so many things that affect exchange rates, the amount of money spent on military pay, conscription rates, and more that have a huge influence on the actual "cost" of maintaining a military. The U.S. Department of Defense is pretty open (particularly in a democracy that requires public accountability for these expenditures), is staffed by an all-volunteer force, and has an exchange rate with other countries that is at best unfavorable. Compare that to China where there are conscripts, do not necessarily publish accurate figures about how much they spend on their military (and no real need to do so), and a deliberate manipulation of the exchange rates to encourage more trade imbalances going their way. Very few countries in the world even have a political climate to derive accurate figures for military spending that even attempting to generate those numbers is difficult at best, and for most a hopeless cause that is more of a pure guess.
America can easily afford military spending at its current levels, and by itself I don't think this is a reason to post such a "hate America" diatribe here. You can be critical of specific policies and perhaps of perceived political injustices due to being a political heavyweight in world politics. But otherwise you are being clueless about the topic you are writing about here. Far more countries have a much greater proportion of their economic capability getting dumped into military spending, and use their militaries not for fighting external aggressors but for oppression of their civilian populations.
Not even close. (Score:5, Insightful)
What ever happened to calling it "universal health care" or "socialized medicine". Calling it "national health care" almost makes it sound noble and patriotic. If it's a social program, what's so wrong with calling it what it is? Once we have it, it's more likely that we will refer to it with swear words anyway, just as we would any other government program or agency. Maybe we should just call it "bitch care" or "fucking shit" right now and get it over with.
Fun times will be had by all.
Re:Iraq War (Score:2, Insightful)
Re:US military spending (Score:3, Insightful)
yes "protection" (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:At this point, you are correct (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:I boldly post (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:At this point, you are correct (Score:5, Insightful)
Actually, the reason that worked out is that the US was the only industrialized nation that didn't have her infrastructure hosed by war or owed another nation (looking at you UK which did just finally pay off their WWII debt to the US just recently) and the only other nation that was comparable industrial capacity wise was the USSR which was in its Stalinist era which didn't need a real GDP to get things done (Need a public project done? Thats what millions of German Pows and Russian prisioners for! No need to pay anyone)
Anyways, the point being is that the reason the US could afford to have such big debts is that there was no other player in town when it came to currency. You might as well be trading in gold because the US dollar pretty much was the life blood of Marshall Plan postwar Germany and Japan.
Secondly, the US produced more oil than it consumed and exported more products than any other nation (actually back then the US was a major exporter in oil) so it could deal with such large debts.
The problem now is that we don't produce much in our factories, import massive amounts of energy from overseas, and our currency isn't valued as much on the international market.
I'm not predicting doom and gloom, but unless we actually do something about our foreign energy addiction, debt, and weakened dollar we will have problems economically. Big energy exporters like Russia and cheap goods manufacturers like China will be the winners of the 21st century.
I'm sure some of you are saying "But with a weakened dollar, it will make US goods more desirable on the foreign market!". Even if China completely floated the Yuan to a fair and free market value against the dollar their goods would still be cheaper. Secondly, America has burned a lot of its goodwill overseas and most foreigners are currently frowning on US good due to political reasons.
Again this of course leads to the issue with energy imports. If Chinese goods were more expensive and it pushed for more manufacturing in the US it would still be at weakened pace due to the fact that energy costs of production, transportation, and wage inflation due to the fact it now costs more to ship and have people drive to get to the stores will mean the economy will be up the creek with a paddle of a while.
Again, we'll live and it won't be a place of anarchy but until we do something about the strength of the dollar and energy costs then things will be rather troublesome for a while.
Re:I'm reminded of what Ike said: (Score:3, Insightful)
Not really. The Russian Su-27 and family are very close in capability to the F-15. Electronics-wise, they're a bit behind, but the airframes are about on par with current US aircraft. In exercises held recently, Indian Su-30s beat US F-15s pretty soundly.
The Typhoon, while a little smaller than the F-15, is just as (if not more) maneuverable, and has newer avionics and systems. It will eventually carry the Meteor, which outranges any current US missile.
The French Rafale is similar.
There's only so much an airframe can do for you. And even if everyone is still not caught up, what's to say that they won't in the next five or ten years? Do you wait till everyone's caught up with you before you start working on new technology? No, because everyone else will pass you in the time it takes to get everything rolling. You have to stay ahead of the game.
shrug (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:And that is the problem (Score:4, Insightful)
A slightly less gung-ho attitude towards world matters would probably be enough to restore confidence, love and trust with the US. In other words, don't start a war with Iran and North Korea right now. Try to fix Iraq by actually rebuilding infrastructure there instead of sending more soldiers. Even support *some *UN decisions perhaps?
Re:And that is the problem (Score:1, Insightful)
Re:Military budget (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:At this point, you are correct (Score:3, Insightful)
As for the weak dollar, the dollar is (mostly)falling against currencies of countries that fall into one of two classes (or in some case both classes), commodity(oil, for example) producers (Canada, for example), or higher central bank interest rates (Brazil and Canada, for example). The primary exception to this is the euro. However, the EU's central bank interest rates were lower than the US Fed interest rates until recently, when the Fed lowered interest rates and the EU central bank raised their's. We did not see a lot of "the sky is falling" talk about the euro when it dropped in value in 2005, why should we buy such talk when the U.S. dollar is falling in 2007?
The best evidence still suggests that the U.S. economy is the strongest in the world and will remain so for the foreseeable future. Which I would say is at best 5 years. However, considering that all of the current potential contenders to displace the U.S. as the number one economy have major demographic issues that start in about 10 years, I believe that the U.S. economy will remain the strongest in the world for at least the next 20.
Re:No, air superiority is not necessary. (Score:3, Insightful)
Air superiority will always be necessary, as is ocean superiority. You cannot control the land if you cannot defeat what comes from the air and sea.
The Army can hide under bunkers and buildings, hide amongst the population, camouflage its tanks and anti-air guns and artillery. The army can move and occupy land. Not the air force.
Mission objectives are not always to take land, sometime you just need a specific target neutralized. Sometimes that target is someone else's air power.
Bombing before landing is important but the navy can do that more easily than the air force so why the need for air superiority?
Yeah that navy is going to be doing that with a carrier battlegroup, which is arguably THE air-superiority force at sea. If you don't own the sky when the ships show up, your enemy can hit them from the air.
The only reason is to be able to use helicopters and cargo airplanes. They can make your grunts move faster and safer but that's pretty much it.
Truely, but lets not forget the ability to provide close-air support troops in trouble on the ground, or simply to make their fight easier. And medivac and C&C/intel birds too.
And don't forget that you can get air superiority thanks to anti-air guns and missile systems.
Only if you want to put your platforms at risk, easier and cheaper to send a bird than try to explain why a nuclear carrier is sinking because an enemy fighter got close enough for a lucky shot.
As a matter of fact, do you still believe there are dog fights in the sky?
If you ignore the basics, someone somewhere one day will seriously make you regret it.
Air planes are now airborn missile platforms to bomb and intercept. Small and stealthy pilotless aircrafts are the future.
Remote control is fine but nothing beats being AT the fight.
The air force is not obsolete but it is definitely not the most important part of the team. The ground troops are the most important. The others are just gravy.
Depends on the conflict. If you want to take and hold ground, sure, never gonna happen without a man in the mud. But if your mission objectives are to break a blockaded port, or destroy a weapons facility, etc its a different game. Oh and by the way, when you do put in the ground pounders, chances are they won't be "regular" Army, it'll be Rangers, paratroopers, air cavalry, and the Marines. Regular army is largely defensive and support these days.
The Top Gun era has ended. Time to move on.
Yeah that theory was behind the reason that we needed the Top Gun school in the first place.
Re:Iraq War (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:And? (Score:3, Insightful)
So while I'd agree that the current state is problematic, the general concept of a government space program is not without very old historical precedents. I think that SpaceX and the X-Prize guys will be instrumental to getting to the future we need, but it will be in partnership with the government, not in competition with it. From my conversations with various people on both sides this seems to be the general consensus, although of course the details are always up for debate.
Re:At this point, you are correct (Score:0, Insightful)
My debt is about 7% of my annual salary, and it's only that high because I recently took a pay cut for a cooler job; I'll pay it off by the end of the year. When I asked for a car loan, the bank would only give me $12,000, because I don't have enough "credit history". Not that it's bad, but that there simply isn't enough of it.
If my debt was anywhere near 65% of my salary, I'd be skipping meals and ebay-ing my old toys. That's insane.
leading to a budget balance some time by late 2009
I've heard that before. Any time people speak of a balanced budget in a future administration or congress, it never seems to work out.
America has practically infinite credit, and millions of people are willing to lend to us at a very reasonable rate.
Sure, if we keep printing more money to cover it. No wonder our money is worth so little now. When we print more money to cover expenses like this, who gets hurt? Well, everybody, but the poor people most of all, as always.
At the height of our debt-to-GDP ratio, after World War II, the federal debt was over 200% of our GDP, yet we survived.
Ah, right, "we spent more than this defeating Hitler". Except we're not in a world war right now. We're not technically in *any* war right now. Our enemies these days are armed with, what, an explosive shoe? Technology is going gangbusters -- we should be at a debt minimum, not a debt peak.
Don't trust anyone forecasting the imminent doom of America. [...] So far, all of these people whose predictions are not still in the future (I'm looking at you, 2012 cranks) have shown to be cranks.
I get it: people who predict problems in the future which never materialize are "cranks", but people who predict successes in the future which never materialize are just telling the truth. Uh-huh.
And what "America"? I sure did love it when we had a democratic republic. This new police state kind of sucks. Remember when you could fly from San Francisco to Los Angeles without having to hand over ihre papers and be strip-searched?
Re:Increasing wouldn't necessarily be good (Score:2, Insightful)
You do know that this is Slashdot, right? (Score:2, Insightful)
Here's the truth about this. Reporters report, if they see a US Soldier shooting a kid holding onto his mothers leg while crying, they take a picture of it and write up a story about it because its a strong visual and emotional image. If they see a suicide bomber running into a crowd of US Soldiers and passers-by, they take a picture and write up another story for the same reasoning. Its what they do, sometimes they'll shade a story because an editor thinks it plays better one way over another, hell, they've even been known to outright lie. But for the most part, the news is accurate enough that between a few conflicting accounts from the different outlets, you can usually figure out what is actually going on. Which brings us to the ugly truth of why the media hurts a war effort
Mothers and Fathers don't want to think about their sons and daughters shooting the child in the first scenario any more than they want, say.. to think about their child being blown up by the suicide bomber in the second . Nevermind thats what war is. Also nevermind that its how wars get won.
As the old saw goes: War is the continuation of Diplomatic Negotiations through Non-Diplomatic means. Everyone knows that adage, everyone has heard some form of it. But, no one wants it to be real to them. They don't want to think about how their family members may have to do things that aren't considered good, and just, and wholesome; just to break the other sides will or ability to fight. Nor do they want to think about what the other side tries to do to their family members to achieve the same goal.
Everyone wants to think that war is some god damn morality play. Good against evil, over-writing injustices, keeping the world safe for all mankind, and other such derivative bullshit non-sense. Well, guess what, its not. War is exactly what the old saying says it is; brutal, bloody, nightmarish, and yes, evil. The damnable thing about it is, its a necessary evil. Sure, I wish we could all live in a world singing kumbaya and put all of our differences behind us, thats an unreasonable request though.
And whether you want to believe it or not, its an unreasonable request to keep a group of people from trying to capitalize on the emotional backlash of the situation. You call them democrats, but there are a lot of republicans doing the same thing. Why? Because of another sad fact. That is how you get elected. You find an emotional charged issue, in this case; mothers, fathers, sisters, brothers, cousins, friends.. of people who are out on the front lines, and then speak about their fears.
You tell them its wrong that their loved ones have to face the things they do, when everyone knew damn well going in that it was wrong before the war started, if only everyone had stopped and treated at it as a real issue instead of relating it to a Sunday Matinee. You tell them that you understand their plight, and that you'll do everything in your power to put an end to it then you throw a few pieces of work out to prove that your serious about this, when everyone knows that if as many politicians truly gave a damn about it as they are saying.. the issue wouldn't exist anymore.
So please spare me your political crackpot theory about "Why Things Are The Way They Are". There are no grand conspiracies, no plot by one party or another to destroy us all. Just a self involved apathetic population, who doesn't have quite enough foresight to think about tomorrow; a news industry who wants to get paid, and move everyone to their way of thinking so they'll have an audience down the road; and some politicians who want to get re-elected, so they can continue to do whatever it is politicians do. Thats all, the same as it ever was, and the same as it will always be.