How Many Teachers' Salaries or Years of Funding NPR Does Launching a Tomahawk Missile Cost Us?
I guess now that we've decided we can afford to help with air strikes against another country that has a lot of oil that we might be concerned about, we can continue to tell the tax payers that we're broke and cannot afford to pay for those horrible entitlement programs that you working slugs were expecting like your Social Security and your Medicaid programs. And never mind raising taxes on the "job creators" because their needs must be met at all times whether they're creating jobs overseas for slave wages or anywhere for that matter. If you're a corporation that does business in the United States, you must be coddled to.
And you stinking low life union thugs must STFU if you don't like any of this, because you of course are the source of all of our problems and draining the taxpayers in America of their hard earned money. And if you're a dirty f-king hippie organization like NPR, you must be defunded because we can't have our taxpayer dollars being spent on any evil liberal ideology being spread around to the rural areas of the country.
And of course we can afford this -- it never means raising taxes on the rich. From my buddy Scarce who helps me here and shared this with our group.
Deep Thought -- U.S. fires 110 tomahawk missiles, each costs $569,000. That's more than 5 years of NPR federal funding in less than an hour.
We've got to have our priorities, don't you know.
I am really disgusted with what's been going on in Libya and Gadhafi's actions, but am also really cynical about our decision to go in there. We're supporting dictators that are as bad as Gadhaifi and treating their citizens just as badly, but we're not doing anything about that or helping to overturn those regimes.
If the uprisings in the Middle East and Africa don't start a conversation about what's wrong with our foreign policy and what we can and cannot afford to pay for at home and what we should and should not be supporting, I don't know what will.
The interview with Fawaz Gerges is available at CNN's website.
Don't forget the sale of weapons to rebels:
Of course, where does Saudi Arabia get it's weapons?
But, don't worry, this won't come back to bite us in the ass like all the other times we've armed rebel groups in the region.
The circle of life - War Profiteer style.
Hopefully humanity will one day learn to be humane.
http://www.stwr.org/united-states-of-america/...
http://www.progressinaction.com/george-bush/b...
Thanks. Really good info.
Bush also sold to Libya - over $50 million worth including incendiary explosives.
Hopefully humanity will one day learn to be humane.
whatever they are defined as but when the military has to hold a bake sale, let me know.
..........ok ,teabaggers,take the funding from npr....you win,no more fed. money...what we talking ?2.5 million? in a country with what ,at least 150 million people who aren't foxbots? so,the 'p' in npr we turn into 'people' national people radio.......nation wide,hundreds of stations,democrat progressive radio....half the country(i think much more)hungers for radio that speaks for them,to them .....this would work.......the floor is now open for discussion.......
....the fools do not realize,a population that can ,..... not paticipate .............in the 'economy'...,can not keep it viable!..........."we are listening,.......and we're not blind.,......this is your life....this is your time."
Back when Clinton committed war crimes by firing of a bunch of cruise missiles at Afghanistan and Somalia they cost $1.2M.
Is today's price lower because the US buys them in bulk from Wal-Mart?
Clinton used those cruise missiles because they were just a few weeks away from 'retirement'. They were going to be taken out of service anyway, why not use them?
Obama has to appease the War Profiteers that control the Executive Branch or they'll treat him like Jack Kennedy.
America has a bottomless reserve of cash for War Profiteering, but no money for millions of starving Americans.
This is the right thing to do. Since when is war cheap?
This is a true coalition, unlike IRAQ. We have this one chance to get rid of Qadafi and save thousands of lives and save many more from being tortured and having families torn apart.
GET OVER IT. WTF, we need to stand behind the president. You know the republicans are drooling and snarling over this, and now we have the spineless dems, YES I SAID IT, you guys who bring up the money issue have no balls.
We need to be like the republicans and take a side. We are fighting a just war. Either our president has no backing or he can have his parties backing. Jeez sometimes I envy the republicans at least they stand together when its most important.
We? We bitch and whine and thats why we keep losing every debate. We lost unions collective bargaining, we lost the house, we lost senate seats because we think marching is more important then voting.
If supporting this action makes me a republican, (I dunno if they support this or not, I bet they dont) Then I will be a republican.
Thanks to those tomahawks we saved the city of Bengazi and gave the resistance a chance to fight back. How much money is your town worth saving? Those people you see in your neighborhood? We saved a city. We have a chance to bring democracy into Libya and we need to take the chance while its here.
then go to congress, get a declaration of war, go in, occupy the country, disarm the populace, sort the good guys from the bad guys, hold elections.....oh wait, we tried that in where was it? iraq? except for the disarming the populace and declaring war. what? too much trouble to do the job right? well then, fuhgeddaboudit. much easier to do it by remote control.
just exactly "who" the "rebels" are who are trying to overthrow Qaddafi??
It seems that even The New York Times can't seem to answer that question.
I've read that there are factions within the rebels who hate the United States.
Won't it be a riot when we get rid of Qaddafi and the rebel leaders turn out to NOT support U.S. foreign policy??
BTW Heather, this thread you wrote is just about the best piece of writing I've ever read from you.
Great job!
"The US has an army of 90,000 soldiers in Afghanistan and is spending $100bn a year, but has still been unable to defeat 20,000-25,000 Taliban who receive no pay at all." - Patrick Cockburn
Funny, I haven't heard Wilford Brimly weigh in yet.
Corruption favors the wealthy.
If we (the West) let the uprising in Libya fail, think what that would signal to other protesters in the region. Countries are being transformed without putting US boots on the ground. Democratic Revolutions are best when they're organic. Supporting the resolution with cruise missiles is the cheapest way to go. A small price if it helps bring down a murderer like Gadhafi. We should have dealt with him stronger after Lockerbie.
Republicans support their leaders in a time of crisis. Liberals are never satisfied. 3 million voters stayed home in 2010. If y'all had voted like ya did in '08, we wouldn't have to put up with distraction politics like defunding NPR and Planned Parenthood, two organizations i support.
Stop making perfect enemy of the good. And btw, As tragic as Darfur is. it will require nation building beyond our efforts in Afghanistan. The whole world's to blame on the atrocities in the Sudan.
Either support the President and those Pols trying to fight for all of us, or lets hand over the keys now to Mitt Haley HuckaRomPaliani and VP Bachman Santorium OverNewt.
America. So much promise, it's a damn shame.
But what about the "signal" the US has sent to "other protesters in the region" by supporting each and every dictator they are protesting against including Qaddafi?
Corruption favors the wealthy.
It sucks. Most of that was before Obama, though. That's why we need to get off oil as soon as possible. But we won't because Big Oil, Big Banks, and Big Auto would lose out if we "Greened" too soon. I say let OPEC keep the stuff. We got the know-how, and the labor force to do better. Unfortunately we lack the political will.
Yes I agree. There are more "Right things to Do" in the world. We can't do them all, and we can't do them alone. But lets not bash our Country for doing something at least.
Conservatives outnumber Liberals in the US. Make the better argument. Meet those people who think different where they are and be sincere in your persuasion.
If ya think Obama's phoning it in, then he's a failure. If you believe he's trying to make sense of what he's got, then give the administration a chance and stop peeling off.
America. So much promise, it's a damn shame.
My problem is that they are merely the excuse.
And this administration has had over two years - more than half a term and perhaps half a presidency - and the folks seeming to benefit the most are the bankers, the insurance companies, the Defense contractors, and the police state.
Corruption favors the wealthy.
Nothing seemed to matter much when a half million people in Darfur were slaughtered....on nightly TV, no less.
I just can't WAIT for the U.S. to send cruise missiles into Saudi Arabia when all the "royal" (cough) Abdullah's send their goons into the streets to murder protesters there. Or to hack their heads/hands off with swords.
Maybe while we're at it we should send some cruise missiles into Tel Aviv for the way Netanyahu has committed war crimes against the Palestinians. White phosphorus bombs blowing up hospitals in Gaza, the Goldstone Report on war crimes committed by Israel and so on.
We are seeing ZERO objectivity in our foreign policy. What's good for the goose apparently is NOT good for the gander.
"The US has an army of 90,000 soldiers in Afghanistan and is spending $100bn a year, but has still been unable to defeat 20,000-25,000 Taliban who receive no pay at all." - Patrick Cockburn
Don't they need the protesters to show up in the street first before they shoot them?
Saudi has had limited protests only in the eastern, Shi'ite areas. Seems like they don't really need to shoot anyone to keep them suppressed.
Basing site of the navy's 5th fleet. Sunni minority ruling over a shiite majority
The people of Libya are both ethnically Arab and African representing a fair smorgasbord of "colors" across the spectrum.
Not sure what color has to do with it here.
Only count if they're blackened because of oil.
to help with air strikes against another country that has a lot of oil."
amen!!!!! tell it, sister, tell it!!!!!!!!!! can i get an amen????????
and hallelujia
not all martyrs see divinity
Ahkbar
audit-prosecute-incarcerate
that is "allahu akbar", which means "god is great", or something along those lines. now which god is great is rather unclear, but i think you get the drift.
"ALLAH"LUJAH
http://www.topix.com/forum/religion/islam/T46...
audit-prosecute-incarcerate
spelled wrong,but you get the gist 'o it(my last irish reference till next year,maybe)
....the fools do not realize,a population that can ,..... not paticipate .............in the 'economy'...,can not keep it viable!..........."we are listening,.......and we're not blind.,......this is your life....this is your time."
If we are going involve ourselves in a civil war, we should involve ourselves in all civil wars. We need to stop this foreign policy of picking and choosing where we will get involved and where we won't.
Election 2012: Be Educated! Be Active! Vote!
www.PhoenixJustice.com
Before you start making snarky comments about union "thugs" being the cause of everything that is wrong in the context of complaining about the cost of cruise missiles, you might want to look at the workers that assemble them. I believe that many of them are probably union workers, probably members of the Machinist's Union. Each one of them probably struggling just like the rest of us. So would you put them out of work?
i would put them to work building wind turbines, hot water solar stills, old timey plows and such, so we can start growing food the natural way and not deplete our topsoil.
Great minds, etc. VV
after the ussr collapsed, couldn't get tractor parts, started plowing with oxen, they were down to 1800 calories per day. interesting case study, the oxen replenish the fields and don't harm the earth as badly; they don't require fossil fuels, and productivity was greater per acre....
speaking of the old soviet union, you know you just couldn't win,
show up to work early, you're a saboteur
show up to work late, you are undermining the socialist system
show up to work on time?
everybody wants to know where you got the watch.
(anybody remember THAT???!!), plus a major chunk of the Pentagon's budget and divert it to the production of renewable energy equipment.
We need to build things that HELP people in the world and will aid in saving the planet for future generations. We need to take a LEADERSHIP ROLE in the world, create a Manhattan Project for renewable energy, de-salinization projects for fresh water production and on and on and then EXPORT what we build!
Instead we continue to busy ourselves killing people in foreign lands and destroying everything we can get our hands on.
I am so over our tax dollars being squandered by the military industrial complex!!!!!
"The US has an army of 90,000 soldiers in Afghanistan and is spending $100bn a year, but has still been unable to defeat 20,000-25,000 Taliban who receive no pay at all." - Patrick Cockburn
Couldn't agree with you more abbywood. Unfortunately we need some big changes. No company is going to build that stuff here out of patriotism or anything else. So called free trade is the corporatocracys way of bringing us down to the level they want us to be at. They obviously are more enamored more with the Chinese business model than the American one. Otherwise they wouldn't be going there. Until we quit giving the corprotocracy everything they want they will give you what they want to give you when they decide it's time.
No, just in a different line of work. Building solar panels, wind generators, etc.
You also might want to adjust the settings on your Snark-O-Meter, they seem a bit off.
are also hard at work....
Matching Principle determines at this point that Bomb Expense is debited, and Bomb Inventory is credited.
Off the Balance Sheet and on to the Income Statement!
To continue on the Matching Principle, what Revenue account corresponds to "Bomb Expense"?
'People having jobs' is no reason to make weaponry. Once the weaponry is made it has to be used, in order to keep up the demand. So in order for people to have jobs, other people must be killed by the product they make. Stellar argument you've crafted there, Einstein..
'People having jobs' is an empty bullshit canard to excuse taxpayer funded arenas the rich make loads of money off of, for ruining the environment, for making war machines.
PeopleCorporations need those kind of excuses to brainwash people like you to carry out those kinds of wrong.me-oww!
Those tomahawks require specialized electronic components MADE IN CHINA
We need chinese help to bully the world
beware of who is helping you.
(If your not careful) ...your saviors will install a puppet leader similar to Hamid Karzai or Ahmed Chalabi
audit-prosecute-incarcerate
maybe the bomb makers will give the taxpayers (purchasers) a 10% discount coupon.....
Tomahawk missiles cost $569,000 apiece. The US fired four of them (the Brits fired the rest) so, 21/4 million dollars = 34 teachers annual salaries.
has been bailing out English banks and putting it on the taxpayer tab...
http://www.larouchepac.com/node/16714
....so add a few more "teachers annual salaries" to you list.
audit-prosecute-incarcerate
That's fucking classic!
Don't try to confuse the issue with half-truths and gorilla dust.
How does that work?
Isn't firing 4/5 of a cruise missile kinda dangerous?
Corruption favors the wealthy.
Seems like it would be. I figured that out last night; earliest reports said 110 or 112 missiles fired, a later one said only four from US ships. Your source is probably more recent.
In any case it's 8 and a half teachers per missile, plus support.
.
We already get it that Republicans cut NPR for ideological reasons and not fiscal ones.
So what's the problem? Try telling that to a Republican voter. They would rather anything in the budget be cut but the military. Despite the lop-sided numbers. The dollar amount of government spending is not what bothers Republicans, but who the money is spent on most certainly does.
After all, George W. Bush was the only U.S. President to go to war and cut taxes at the same time, and we all know how different Barack Obama is. Oops, this is current war number three now, right?
Never mind.
Corruption favors the wealthy.
war # 5 if you count the war on drugs and Pakistan
(all of them undeclared)
audit-prosecute-incarcerate
That just might only be 'foot in the door' shit, but there's a war on critical thinking. And the wars on human and civil rights. The War on the Middle Class. War on the Poor. The War on the Environment, The War on common sense. the War on Health Care.
I'm sure there are others.
me-oww!
Unfortunately from reading these comment pages, it seems like the war on critical thinking has already had its effect on the left as well.
Every fricken thing we do is a stab in our children's future we borrow from, because we love them you know.
Goodnight, Frau Blücher
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=C4zBkGVrb0w
audit-prosecute-incarcerate
They'll be paying for it all right.
And not just financially.
They'll be paying for it with ill health, poor housing, worsening environments, poorer educational opportunities and lots of tears, hate, fear and anger.
I can't wait for any of the presidential candidates to try to ask that age old question: "Don't we want to leave our children with lives that were BETTER than ours?!"
Pfftt!
"The US has an army of 90,000 soldiers in Afghanistan and is spending $100bn a year, but has still been unable to defeat 20,000-25,000 Taliban who receive no pay at all." - Patrick Cockburn
They must be new. What with all their challenging followup questions they were almost behaving there as actual journalists--or should I say comedians (Jon Stewart and Stephen Colbert)?
MARCH 19, 2011
OBAMA: 'Today we are part of a broad coalition. We are answering the calls of a threatened people. And we are acting in the interests of the United States and the world'...
MARCH 19, 2003
BUSH: 'American and coalition forces are in the early stages of military operations to disarm Iraq, to free its people and to defend the world from grave danger'...
"The US has an army of 90,000 soldiers in Afghanistan and is spending $100bn a year, but has still been unable to defeat 20,000-25,000 Taliban who receive no pay at all." - Patrick Cockburn
Bush: "go shopping"
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lfs6wpjlu28
Obama: "go swimming"
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=b-3r6O9u190
audit-prosecute-incarcerate
http://www.commondreams.org/headline/2011/03/...
http://www.commondreams.org/view/2011/03/20-0
"The US has an army of 90,000 soldiers in Afghanistan and is spending $100bn a year, but has still been unable to defeat 20,000-25,000 Taliban who receive no pay at all." - Patrick Cockburn
We will surely fight to save these people if and when Big Oil feels it is profitable to do so.
Corruption favors the wealthy.
Maybe it is about oil but just where does Qadaffee sell his oil? And where would he sell it if he didn't sell it to who he sells it to now?
Is it true that the Arab league is now saying that they didn't really want a no fly zone now that they got one?
I guess we should just stay out and watch but I still don't know. we didn't do anything in Rwanda. We didn't do anything in Darfur. And of course we didn't do anything in Egypt or Gaza or wherever. And the Republicans trip over themselves trying to figure out how to blame Obama but then again there seem to be a lot of people here coming down on Obama too.
Does anybody else find all this difficult to figure out?
Or, more importantly: Which oil companies stand to lose or make money depending on whether Qaddafi is removed?
From Bloomberg:
The companies affected include major oil interests from the US, Britain, and France - the same countries dropping the bombs.
Corruption favors the wealthy.
1/2 of them hit their targets, so double the price to get true effectiveness of the weapons.
The cost per flight-hour of fighter-bombers should also be kept in mind, because these costs add up every time the plane takes off for a sortie, regardless of whether it fires any missiles. The costs are hard to find, because lot of the reports are self-serving. However, the following represents the general consensus of what I've found:
That info is all irrelevant, as no US planes are flying. Cost per hour of the warships firing would be more accurate.
From the NYT:
Corruption favors the wealthy.
I stand corrected. I was thinking only of the Saturday attacks. Cheers.
Things are happening fast. Cheers.
Corruption favors the wealthy.
Playing monday morning quarterback.....When the Bush League made a great deal about establishing diplomatic ties with Libya under Qauddafi, my first thought was: what do we get out of it?
When Quaddafi arrived in the US with his amazon security detail, I had to ask: How do these images (on our soil), square with what we knew about the Lockerbie bombing?
Saying I told you so about Bush League mistakes in judgment is the equivalent of shooting fish in a barrel,but there must have been a huge number of R-Wingers that were also dismayed by what has turned out to have a huge mistake by the Bush League.
I honestly do not know if launching missiles against yet another Muslim country will be a mistake, but to all of those R-W nutjobs that were screaming that Obama should get involved, are they sooooo stupid that they do not know that these types of decisions take time to articulate?
To owe Obama an apology for lack of patience would have to allow that the decision to send missiles into Libya was the correct thing to do, and that is a BIG unknown at this time.
As I have stated, I do not know if striking targets in Libya was a wise or unwise idea, my gut feeling is that it was a mistake, but time could prove all of us doubters wrong.
Another point is that citizens of the United States and from all over the world should be petitioning Barack Obama to return the Nobel Peace Prize. He said at acceptance that there were many that were more qualified than he, and he has been stellar in proving that indeed there are many who are better qualified to adhere to the precepts of the Nobel.
'Talk to the hand'
...but you've got to remember that the families (most of them, anyway) of the Lockerbie victims were pushing hard to get money out of the Libyan government, and normalizing diplomatic relations was required to get that money.
ETA: This was, of course, meant as a reply to Radically Moderate ad infinitum.
Don't try to confuse the issue with half-truths and gorilla dust.
.....and that decision seems to have come back to bite us on the backside.....eh?
'Talk to the hand'
I don't think that anyone has offered the opinion that Libya has sponsored any terrorist acts in the interim between normalization and and the intervention of the west in this civil war. In that way, normalization of diplomatic relations hasn't exactly come back to bite the West in the ass.
This is a war of choice, if you believe that there are choices when it comes to a situation where a dictator has pretty much promised bloody revenge against those who began their protests peacefully and only took up arms after the dictator tried to crush the protests violently.
Don't try to confuse the issue with half-truths and gorilla dust.
I'm glad for you that you have already decided that our action was justified, I cannot come to such a conclusion based on the action we have taken. if it had been my decision, we would not have struck Libya. I think the brief period of human time that we could intervene in the troubles of other countries have passed.
'Talk to the hand'
What's the problem? Only a little domestic collateral damage on the way to imperial bliss and capitalist profits!
We need to stop using the term "collateral damage", it was a term created by the big shots to cover their own asses, and by using the term we become implicit in the covering of those gi-normous,bulbulous and festering asses.
'Talk to the hand'
"We are all collateral damage now"
That's an excellent point.
BTW I meant complicit, rather than implicit......hanging head in shame.....sniff!
'Talk to the hand'
This headline is deceptive. Of course taking down a dictator will cost more than hosting a news show. The difference between Libya and Iraq is that there was no social movement in Iraq, that Bush lied about MMDs to get us in. In the case of Libya, Quaddafi is killing his own people who are protesting against him. We need to be on the right side of history and support those who are fighting for their freedom. France helped us defeat the British, and they took a financial hit, but would you rather they didn't help the anti-colonialists defeat the British army? If there is one thing we need to realize, it is that we need to switch to solar energy, wind power, algae fuel and other alternatives (minus nuclear and "clean" coal) so that we no longer support oil-rich dictators. We say that we are reshaping the Middle East, but we have been ever since oil was discovered in the region. The democratically elected president of Iran was removed by the CIA in 1953, and the Shah took over and oppressed the people. We have supported Quaddafi for years because he provides us with oil. It is clear now that people are rising up that oil is not cheap, that oil causes us to turn a blind eye to human rights violations. After Rwanda, we said "never again." Imagine if we had intervened in Darfur, how many lives and how much time, money and energy would have been saved. Now Quaddafi supporters are calling rebels "germs". In Rwanda, people were called "cockroaches" and a horrible genocide ensued. We must help those fighting for their freedom, and NOT occupy the country for its oil reserves. What will the headlines look like tomorrow if we do nothing and watch the atrocities continue? Never again.
Meaning the last (almost) ten years? He nationalized the petroleum industry when he ousted
the pro-West King Idris in 1969, ya know.
Don't try to confuse the issue with half-truths and gorilla dust.
Less money for education and unemployment. How about before we go bringing weapons and money to other countries, we fix the problems at home?
NOBODY 2012
We are very concerned that Libya's so-called 'leader' is using Libyans as shields to help protect himself during air raids. Also, his declarations of how he intends to massacre the Libyan population determined the resolve of the UN to deal with this dictator in the only way we seem to know how: with force and bombs and bombardments
Now, we also know that the demonstrations and troubles in Libya started (I am being generous here) about two months ago.
So, my mind drifts and I think, "How long has Robert Mugabe been at war with Zimbabweans?" Quite a number of years, and what have we (through the UN or otherwise) done to get rid of that horrible, maniacal tyrant? Next to nothing! Some limits on international travel by Mugabe and his officials - which they have managed to circumvent on many occasions.
Of course, although a beautiful land with a very functional government when Mugabe took power on 31 December 1987, he and his corrupt cronies have managed to bring that country and it's economy to it's knees with what we know have been disastrous consequences to Zimbabweans - on all fronts: Health care, education, well being and a trained, child mortality, life expectancy and a motivated work force. I can go on.
My question is simple: When are we, as members of the international community, going to say to Mugabe: Enough is enough? And back that up with some actions.
Mugabe, by the way is 87 years old. Surely it is time he is stripped of his dictatorial powers so that he can enjoy his retiring years.
http://ausbullion.blogspot.com/2011/03/1650kg...
There is only so much silver to go around
BUY BUY BUY Silver
So they can't bomb bomb bomb
Fight the bankster occupation buy silver
Comments are closed on this entry