ACTUALLY, all those mentioned have “stolen” their military/stronger America ideas from the Kerry/Edwards 2004 platform and other rantings/ravings from the DNC going back into 2003. In the end, NONE of the positions on Iraq for Democrats or Republicans (Paul and Kucinich excluded) are really new or different or their own. The war is not being controlled by ANY politician other than the current President, and all he’s doing is monitoring it.
More troops? Man, even Pelosi was calling for that last December. Before her, it was Sen Clinton. Before her, it was the ISG. Before that, it was the DLC. Before them, it was Hagel, Biden, and other flippers. Before them, it was Clark, and before him it was Zinni and Shinseki. McCain was just one of the many along the progression of the call. However, at least McCain seems to have been consistent on it-unlike almost everyone else.
Bigger military? Again, 2004 DNC platform called for more special forces, bigger Army, etc.
Negotiate with Iran, Syria, and others? The idea of creating a broad coalition of neighboring nations goes back to before the war, and people still imagine that it’s workable. Seriously, I bet I can find a quote from Sen Kerry at the Spring 02 DLC conference calling for an international coalition of Iraq’s neighbors (4-6 months before Pres Bush began the military/diplomatic runup to war…a runup that took another 6 months).
These aren’t old ideas, or new ideas. They’re marketed, pandered ideas. What plays in the polls. Imagine if some candidate were to step up and say, “I’m proud of the military success in Iraq, I’m happy the withdrawal has begun, I hope it continues, and if elected I don’t expect I’ll have to pull troops from Iraq.” ie, imagine if some politician actually got intel briefs-even open sourced ones from FA-and told the truth. It’d sell best of all, disarm opponents, and shift the debate from the DNC crutch issue, but…
…who has time to keep up with all that, right? Certainly not any of the 10-20 Presidential candidates (does Cynthia count yet?).
The idea’s are stolen from no one. They are using the same failed, anti-american, anti-christian, advisers that said ‘don’t kill Osama’ several times in the 90′s and cost us 3,000 lives and billions of dollars. B Hussien Obama (Islamist in hiding) has bragged he’s using them. Are you ready for another attack to make 9-11 look tiny in comparision? Elect any of the current democrat weenies/cowards and you are sure to get it.
scrap, we’re sure to get it sometime anyway. The real question is will Dems become hawks if it happens on their watch, OR will they avoid the attacked area and drive around it as BC did the WTC in 93 rather than even open their eyes to it? These days, with the DNC the way it’s become…my money’s on turning hawkish, blaming Repubs instead of the enemy, and then doing nothing while threatening everything (all sizzle, no steak).
First rule of politics:
for everything, one can either do nothing or do something, but one can always CLAIM to have done anything.
The math isn’t there to balance the budget and increase the military without raising taxes (including eliminating the AMT creep). Even if The U.S. government ended paying into social security and medicare (for the money they took out) and ended all welfare (including farm subsidies and “pork”), that leaves just over $80 billion during the best of times. The plan Gates has for increased diplomacy has it down to a positive of $40 billion. The next pay increase, a recession or the next big natural disaster will just wipe even that out.
At about $50,000 a year per ground troop (troop pay+basic gear and support such as food and housing), 100,000 men would cost $5 billion, but they need at least humvees, vehicals to train in (if this force is just a reserve force with no main equipment for themselves), ammo, fuel etc.
So where is the money going to come from during the lean periods when that $40 billion isn’t there?
Eliminating:
Our presence in Iraq?
The war on drugs?
most if not all our foreign bases?
homeland security?
pay raises that year (possible wage cuts)?
infrastructure repairs?
NASA as a government organization?
major weapons programs?
At some the money isn’t going to be there even for an economically conservative dictator and even conservative priorities will have to be cut or taxes increased. But there are two parties that have monetarily expensive agendas that are bound to increase the deficit if no taxes are raised. Ending welfare yet paying back into the social security and medicare funds alone will still leave an estimated $250 billion deficit.
I would have to say that none of the candidates are fiscal conservatives (I have yet to see their planned graphs to end the deficit if they were a dictator, but I still see them wanting to spend spend spend), just slightly social conservatives (The Amish are more socially conservative, but not nearly as socially conservative as the Iranian leadership). Even there the candidates are missing the link that allows them to control the things they stand for. The federal government doesn’t control marriages (states do) and a president could probably only make abortions illegal in the U.S. is by martial law.
I would like to see more proof of their conservatism on the fiscal front. Remember earmarks and farm subsidies make up just $22 billion of the annual budget and ending just welfare will still leave $250 billion shortfall per year. Eliminating the AMT creep will take out about $51 billion from the budget. So if they do eliminate pork, farm subsidies and the AMT, they will actually be increasing the deficit. These candidates are going to have to dig deeper than what they have been saying and that’s just to stop the deficit and not the $800 billion needed for infrastructure updating, $9 trillion to cover the debt or the projected $52 trillion combined shortfall in Social Security and Medicare (some of it has to be paid back by the Federal Government because it borrowed against those funds).
Oh, and speaking of everyone having the same ideas: take a look sometime and see just how different Romney’s healthcare proposals are from Clinton’s. The differences just don’t amount to that much.
Huck is good on his feet, and knows hot to push the “I’m the real Christian” message, but as a deceiver overall he is not that good. Whoever he is aiming to impress with his half-brained pro-military comments will not be very impressed based on the “bunker mentality” stupidity. Luckily for everyone, he just isn’t strong enough to get to the nomination by being whatever he needs to be at the moment. He has faked sincerity which is the hardest trick of all, but he is just careless.
ACTUALLY, all those mentioned have “stolen” their military/stronger America ideas from the Kerry/Edwards 2004 platform and other rantings/ravings from the DNC going back into 2003. In the end, NONE of the positions on Iraq for Democrats or Republicans (Paul and Kucinich excluded) are really new or different or their own. The war is not being controlled by ANY politician other than the current President, and all he’s doing is monitoring it.
More troops? Man, even Pelosi was calling for that last December. Before her, it was Sen Clinton. Before her, it was the ISG. Before that, it was the DLC. Before them, it was Hagel, Biden, and other flippers. Before them, it was Clark, and before him it was Zinni and Shinseki. McCain was just one of the many along the progression of the call. However, at least McCain seems to have been consistent on it-unlike almost everyone else.
Bigger military? Again, 2004 DNC platform called for more special forces, bigger Army, etc.
Negotiate with Iran, Syria, and others? The idea of creating a broad coalition of neighboring nations goes back to before the war, and people still imagine that it’s workable. Seriously, I bet I can find a quote from Sen Kerry at the Spring 02 DLC conference calling for an international coalition of Iraq’s neighbors (4-6 months before Pres Bush began the military/diplomatic runup to war…a runup that took another 6 months).
These aren’t old ideas, or new ideas. They’re marketed, pandered ideas. What plays in the polls. Imagine if some candidate were to step up and say, “I’m proud of the military success in Iraq, I’m happy the withdrawal has begun, I hope it continues, and if elected I don’t expect I’ll have to pull troops from Iraq.” ie, imagine if some politician actually got intel briefs-even open sourced ones from FA-and told the truth. It’d sell best of all, disarm opponents, and shift the debate from the DNC crutch issue, but…
…who has time to keep up with all that, right? Certainly not any of the 10-20 Presidential candidates (does Cynthia count yet?).
The idea’s are stolen from no one. They are using the same failed, anti-american, anti-christian, advisers that said ‘don’t kill Osama’ several times in the 90′s and cost us 3,000 lives and billions of dollars. B Hussien Obama (Islamist in hiding) has bragged he’s using them. Are you ready for another attack to make 9-11 look tiny in comparision? Elect any of the current democrat weenies/cowards and you are sure to get it.
scrap, we’re sure to get it sometime anyway. The real question is will Dems become hawks if it happens on their watch, OR will they avoid the attacked area and drive around it as BC did the WTC in 93 rather than even open their eyes to it? These days, with the DNC the way it’s become…my money’s on turning hawkish, blaming Repubs instead of the enemy, and then doing nothing while threatening everything (all sizzle, no steak).
First rule of politics:
for everything, one can either do nothing or do something, but one can always CLAIM to have done anything.
Take a page from the Ron Paul
Some of Paul’s supporters complain that Huckabee’s sovereignty positions (opposition to LOST, for example) are cribbed from Paul.
The math isn’t there to balance the budget and increase the military without raising taxes (including eliminating the AMT creep). Even if The U.S. government ended paying into social security and medicare (for the money they took out) and ended all welfare (including farm subsidies and “pork”), that leaves just over $80 billion during the best of times. The plan Gates has for increased diplomacy has it down to a positive of $40 billion. The next pay increase, a recession or the next big natural disaster will just wipe even that out.
At about $50,000 a year per ground troop (troop pay+basic gear and support such as food and housing), 100,000 men would cost $5 billion, but they need at least humvees, vehicals to train in (if this force is just a reserve force with no main equipment for themselves), ammo, fuel etc.
So where is the money going to come from during the lean periods when that $40 billion isn’t there?
Eliminating:
Our presence in Iraq?
The war on drugs?
most if not all our foreign bases?
homeland security?
pay raises that year (possible wage cuts)?
infrastructure repairs?
NASA as a government organization?
major weapons programs?
At some the money isn’t going to be there even for an economically conservative dictator and even conservative priorities will have to be cut or taxes increased. But there are two parties that have monetarily expensive agendas that are bound to increase the deficit if no taxes are raised. Ending welfare yet paying back into the social security and medicare funds alone will still leave an estimated $250 billion deficit.
I would have to say that none of the candidates are fiscal conservatives (I have yet to see their planned graphs to end the deficit if they were a dictator, but I still see them wanting to spend spend spend), just slightly social conservatives (The Amish are more socially conservative, but not nearly as socially conservative as the Iranian leadership). Even there the candidates are missing the link that allows them to control the things they stand for. The federal government doesn’t control marriages (states do) and a president could probably only make abortions illegal in the U.S. is by martial law.
I would like to see more proof of their conservatism on the fiscal front. Remember earmarks and farm subsidies make up just $22 billion of the annual budget and ending just welfare will still leave $250 billion shortfall per year. Eliminating the AMT creep will take out about $51 billion from the budget. So if they do eliminate pork, farm subsidies and the AMT, they will actually be increasing the deficit. These candidates are going to have to dig deeper than what they have been saying and that’s just to stop the deficit and not the $800 billion needed for infrastructure updating, $9 trillion to cover the debt or the projected $52 trillion combined shortfall in Social Security and Medicare (some of it has to be paid back by the Federal Government because it borrowed against those funds).
Oh, and speaking of everyone having the same ideas: take a look sometime and see just how different Romney’s healthcare proposals are from Clinton’s. The differences just don’t amount to that much.
Huck is good on his feet, and knows hot to push the “I’m the real Christian” message, but as a deceiver overall he is not that good. Whoever he is aiming to impress with his half-brained pro-military comments will not be very impressed based on the “bunker mentality” stupidity. Luckily for everyone, he just isn’t strong enough to get to the nomination by being whatever he needs to be at the moment. He has faked sincerity which is the hardest trick of all, but he is just careless.
Scott wondered: “The real question is will Dems become hawks if it happens on their watch?”
You know the answer. Recall the letter from Carl Levin, Tom Daschole, John Kerry et. al. to Clinton demanding ACTION in Iraq in 1998.
The problem is that their “action” never resolves anything, but perpetuates a bad situation.
Bush got the job done and now Huckabee is pissing on VICTORY!
Not smart.