Open Thread (10/30/2007)

Every gun that is made, every warship launched, every rocket fired signifies, in the final sense, a theft from those who hunger and are not fed, those who are cold and are not clothed.

This world in arms is not spending money alone. It is spending the sweat of its laborers, the genius of its scientists, the hopes of its children. The cost of one modern heavy bomber is this: a modern brick school in more than 30 cities. It is two electric power plants, each serving a town of 60,000 population. It is two fine, fully equipped hospitals.

It is some 50 miles of concrete highway. We pay for a single fighter with a half million bushels of wheat. We pay for a single destroyer with new homes that could have housed more than 8,000 people.

This, I repeat, is the best way of life to be found on the road the world has been taking.

This is not a way of life at all, in any true sense. Under the cloud of threatening war, it is humanity hanging from a cross of iron. These plain and cruel truths define the peril and point to the hope that comes with this spring of 1953.

• “Chance for Peace,” delivered by President Dwight D. Eisenhower, Apr. 16, 1953.

Whatever happened to that SCHIPs funding anyway?

I'd suggest that you are buying the White House's lines about "socialized" and "public" medicine a little too easily.  Expanding SCHIPs is hardly the death knell for privatized, for-profit medicine.  If anything it is similar to an iceberg breaking off from the Svartisen Glacier – not much to write home about.

But you are correct that the argument is about ideology.  Even if you are willing to disregard to potency of Eisenhower's message (and do I need to direct you to the Farewell Address?) by insisting on CONTEXT(!), surely you must concede that there is an ideological choice that you are making in choosing (or not choosing?) to defend the spending of hundreds of billions of dollars on weapons and wars over the health and well-being of this nation's children.  Forget for a minute the "small government" BS that we've been force fed by "conservatives" looking to line the pockets of their constituents.  This is really a choice between more fighting, more death, more spending on instruments (dare I say "weapons"?) of mass destruction ... OR ... spending a fraction of that amount on the healthcare of this nation's children.  We've seen where Republicans lay on this issue.

Context, indeed.

"Forget for a minute the "small government" BS that we've been force fed by "conservatives" looking to line the pockets of their constituents."

Bait not taken, sir.  Have a nice day.

I'll be happy to quit spending money on the military, as soon as you can guarantee that no one in the world will decide to invade a neighbor, kill all the Jews (or Christians, or Hindus, ...).  But that would be utopia, not the real world, now wouldn't it?

...it is and always shall be rooted in the control of resources.

I've never felt that this was a very convincing explanation.  If it were all about the oil, then our support for Israel would be about as counter-productive as you could imagine, and would eventually be dropped.  It's not like we just send them a bit of aid now and again, but they are our closest ally in the region and have been for years, presumably keeping us from controlling more oil resources in places like Saudi Arabia.  Also, if something like Iraq is all about the oil, why invade?  Saddam was more than willing to sell it - it was the inability to sell as much as he wanted, due to sanctions, that was a major problem.  It's not like he can drink it, so there's no reason for him to not sell it.  And before anyone says "well, he was going to let the Frenchies and Russians do all the exploration and selling" - so what?  It's not like we go to war with Nigeria or Indonesia because it's the Dutch doing the drilling.  It all gets sold on the international market as a largely fungible commodity.  That's why we don't even need Iraqi oil - we get ours domestically, and from Canada, Mexico, Venezuela, and Nigeria - ie from closer.  I think that the furthest one can go is to say that we use our power to keep shipping lanes open and oil flowing from the Gulf to our allies in Europe and Asia, because if it doesn't, then their economies tank and eventually ours does too.  It is more enlightened self interest than resource accumulation.

Well, glad to see I can be of service.  It was getting a bit dull around here.  :)

Bait not taken, sir.  Have a nice day.

fwiw – the quotes around conservatives were in deference to you.  You're welcome?

Actually, that's not the choice at all, that's just the choice that you are demanding people make.

I'm not demanding anyone do anything.  I was just reading up on some Ike stuff over the weekend and came upon this quote, which I found fairly striking for the modern debate on health care.  If folks want to assume that the continued funding of the War on Iraq (what is the current request – 200 billion?) is not in any way related to the failure to fund SCHIPs, that is fine with me.  I disagree, of course, but it is a free country.  I actually agree with the point that we could indeed fund both the War and children's health care.  But I don't think Mr. Bush and his so-called (IP - you're welcome!) conservative allies in DC agree.

I'll be happy to quit spending money on the military, as soon as you can guarantee that no one in the world will decide to invade a neighbor, kill all the Jews (or Christians, or Hindus, ...).

The logical extension of this point is that our military is designed to solve the world's problems, at the expense of American citizens (soldiers, healthcare for kids, etc.).  When did we sign up for that duty?  Also, why are we all so damned afraid of everything nowadays?  Iran, Al Qaeda, insurgents, the French.  WTF?  Why are we spending over HALF A TRILLION DOLLARS A YEAR figuring out ways to kill other people and/or solve their problems?  Just because we are afraid?  Afraid of what?  Another terrorist attack?  A nuclear bomb?

Yet most of us are probably afraid of losing our jobs, our homes, our cars.  We might be afraid of not being able to have enough at the end of the month to buy groceries.  Some of us might be afraid to walk down our streets at night, or even afraid of the people we live with.

Somebody out there wants to justify spending a HALF TRILLION DOLLARS in a year on wars in distant lands but we sure as Hell can't get some universal coverage up in this joint.  What is with that?  And, more to the point ... what is with the people who are expending mental energy trying to defend this hogwash?

THAT is what scares me the most.

On October 30th, 2007 at 03:36 PM, D. Boon said:   "I'd suggest that you are buying the White House's lines about "socialized" and "public" medicine a little too easily.  Expanding SCHIPs is hardly the death knell for privatized, for-profit medicine.  If anything it is similar to an iceberg breaking off from the Svartisen Glacier – not much to write home about."
 
 
I didn't say anything about "socialized" or "public" medicine.  Nor did I defend or mention any "White House lines" in regards to such a thing.  I neither suggested nor implied that SCHIP was a death knell for anything let alone any threat whatsoever to private/for-profit medicine.  As far as your glacier analogy, that was exactly what I was pointing out about the funding issue.  Between the two proposed increases the budget difference would have been quite small compared to the overall deficit/national debt.
 

"But you are correct that the argument is about ideology.  Even if you are willing to disregard to potency of Eisenhower's message (and do I need to direct you to the Farewell Address?) by insisting on CONTEXT(!), surely you must concede that there is an ideological choice that you are making in choosing (or not choosing?) to defend the spending of hundreds of billions of dollars on weapons and wars over the health and well-being of this nation's children.  Forget for a minute the "small government" BS that we've been force fed by "conservatives" looking to line the pockets of their constituents.  This is really a choice between more fighting, more death, more spending on instruments (dare I say "weapons"?) of mass destruction ... OR ... spending a fraction of that amount on the healthcare of this nation's children.  We've seen where Republicans lay on this issue.

Context, indeed."

I'm not disregarding the potency of Eisenhower's message, merely pointing out that his overall argument was a bit more pragmatic than this excerpt alone implies.   This excerpt does in fact point out a  truism: that conflict and its related expenses is truly a waste of lives, manpower, and resources.  But that wasn't the whole message and it was certainly not part of a suggestion that the US alone could or should disarm given the threats abroad.  His message was a call for international cooperation, in this case between the US and the Soviet Union, to limit the extent of that waste by limiting the threat each posed to the other.

I'm not sure you'll find too many people who imagine a utopian world with conflicts still raging and huge resource expenditures for dealing with them.  I'm also quite sure you'd be hard pressed to find too many reasonable people who believe that ignoring those conflicts will make them go away either or that all of them can be resolved diplomatically.  The real question comes down to what level of military resources are required to deal with current and or potential conflicts of our times, not whether we want those conflicts or related costs (which almost everyone would not).

The "real choice" you describe isn't the actual choice at all.  The SCHIP expansion bill was to add even more money to the amount we spend on healthcare for children by the Federal government in addition to the current programs on the Federal, State and local levels.  No matter what the level of funding increase it would have added more to the deficit and national debt.  The question was not whether it was possible, but whether it was necessary.  It may have enough public support to ensure its passage by the next Congress and President so the issue is hardly dead after the veto.  The Iraq War decision was separate and was also based primarily on necessity over whether we had the funds to pay for it (we didn't).  The expenditures for the war also added to the deficit and national debt because the funds simply were not available to do what was believed to be necessary.  The funding was a concern for both, but not the primary concern.  The choice was never strictly between one or the other.  Nor is that the choice faced today.  It would be an oversimplification to say it is, and Eisenhower's overall message made clear that wasn't the simple choice America faced at the time either.

My personal views on the Constitution and the proper roles of the various levels of government in our system leads me to support other solutions for funding, implementing, and holding government accountable for programs aimed at ensuring medical coverage for those in need and access to care for all.  I haven't seen a comprehensive proposal by either Republicans or Democrats that satisifies me yet, so I'm not sure why you are assuming that I'm somehow blindly toeing either party line or the current White House on the issue.

Perhaps the context you are missing is that I'm not a Republican, just a liberal Constitutionalist, a bit of a pragmatist, and too empathetic for my own good.  I don't support anything because someone else supports it, but rather because of verifiable facts and reasonable arguments.  False dichotomies just aren't very convincing to me.

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Glock21 Op/Ed

For our money spent on it, we have easily the worst health care system in the world. The fact that there are a few national health care systems somewhere that don't work well is not a logical response to this fact.

The argument that someone, somewhere might do bad if we don't contract our economy with the terrible economic policy of pouring our money into weaponry and deployment is not straight up wrong. But it's certainly not a conservative argument.

That's like saying that you are pro-child because you don't kill children between the time of 12:30 and 12:36 pm.

To go crazy debt ridden with interest payments dominating your budget to fight overseas wars is not conservative.

So if you say, "It's worth it to spend hugely on military conflicts!" I can respect that position even though I think it's incorrect and irresponsible.

But don't go off on left-wing "tax and spend" ideology--for the amount we are spending on your war, we could hire approximately 20 million teachers. I mean, I'm poor and don't know much about money, but a trillion dollars goes a long war, I mean way.

A lot--not everyone--on this site sound like the guy bragging about collecting pennies dropped on the street while dropping $1000 a day at the casino. For a trillion dollars, we could cut a check for $3000 to every man woman and child in the country. Or make a really dope memorial to Ronald Reagan.

I, for one, am not willing to pay to support those who refuse to take care of themselves.

So you are willing to support those that get cancer from, say, a mutated gene that they inherited?

Obviously, you never look for "root" causes.

I always look for root causes, I just come to a different conclusion about what those root causes are.