I love your writing. Have some disagreement with a lot of these takes.
I’ll take exception to your takes on Defense Spending. DoD sure can spend that, but they have made a recent concerted effort for “meaningful acquisition.” Trump didn’t invent it but he has continued and increased it. “Storing endless kit in warehouses?” Just stop, man. I could make pointed retorts, but I like you (seriously). So just stop the dumb statements.
“People will die.” Yes, yes they will. But the government’s job isn’t to “prevent all deaths”. As a comparison, Ford and Toyoya will “cause deaths” because they made trade offs between mass-affordable cars and safety. This admin is changing some of the trade offs. That isn’t Hitler-adjacent.
The cuts only look like they “own the libs” because they were done to politically focused carve-outs. A lot of these programs might have fared better had they not internally morphed into outright political theater. Ref A: NPR CEO.
Have you worked in defense? I have. The goal of an office with a line-item budget is to spend it all. Spend it all or you don’t get it next year. There are legions of colonels with pens and Excel in the Puzzle Palace whose job it is to take from those who don’t spend and give into those who do. Throwing a trillion dollars into that pit is not the answer unless you know we are going to war and who we are fighting and how we will fight them. Answer those questions and we can find out where to spend the money.
Late reply. But to answer your question, yes I do work in the defense sector. Is there acquisition that seems wasteful? Yes. In the recent years, predating current admin but clearly continuing, I have seen a wide-ranging effort to drop programs deemed less optimal, shift funds to “meaningful acquisition “ (term from a respected acquaintance).
Respect an opinion that defense funding should not increase, but claiming it is inevitably just to overstock warehouses with useless kit is a bad faith point to make.
I do not remember that type of spending pressure from my days in the military. But that was 60 years ago, and I was nowhere near the rank of colonel. I spent a little time with the Marine Corps signal officer at Camp Lejeune and was shocked at the outdated communications equipment they used. The Marine colonel told me it was what they used to win the Korean war, and it still worked for the relatively small fighting units.
I don't really know much about today's military, but it seems the Air Force and Navy are out of control. How the hell does a carrier manage to dump two fighter jets into the Red Sea. I'm afraid the Space Force will be worse.
Steven, wow, where to begin. Your bleeding heart doesn't impress me. Let's start here, I'm sure many billions could be cut out of defense, so we have some common ground there. Having said that, you might want to reread the 10th amendment. Many of these programs administered by the federal government are ones that should be handled by the states. The federal government shouldn't be involved, period. Charitable programs work best at the state and local levels anyway. And we can agree that churches need to step into any vacuums that might result. I believe that many of them have abrogated their responsibility to care for the poor and downtrodden. As well private citizens should become better Samaritans as well. After all, we should take care of our fellow man. Now, I say all that to say this, we, as Americans have allowed what should be on us to be pushed off on a federal government that we have seen over the years is completely ill-equipped to handle it. Maybe I can be persuaded that we shouldn't take a chain saw to everything. A scalpel perhaps?
We don't agree on much here, but I'm on-board with you on the States taking over these functions.
If this country is going to continue to elect geriatric dementia patients to run the country, the fewer things at their fingertips, the better!
It's too bad that instead of having an actual plan to orderly transfer people and resources to the States to take over these functions, they brought in a bunch of ignorant idiots who like to play with chainsaws.
Getting rid of programs you don’t like because of who’s running them while taking programs that actually help people at the same time, but giving no quarter to those harmed is not how any government should function. It’s not a case of “bleeding heart” it’s a case of having one in the first place. I’d trade the liberal abuses and inefficiencies for not having old people’s freeze or children go hungry.
A lot of "what ifs". Three caught my eye. NY spends enough on illegals to easily cover any shortfall in federal heating assistance. SNAP covers a lot more than school lunches and is abused. There is no excuse for not vaccinating children against diseases such as measles and polio. It should be a requirement not an option. Covid shots could have easily been optional for most children and many adults.
As for SNAP, there’s better ways to amend or enforce that law to remove abuses than to just shut it down. The point here is not efficiency, the way it’s being proposed.
School lunches will still be there under the administration's plan. The fraud riddled program that provides benefits on the order of $300/month for single individuals and much more for couples will be subject to increased controls.
Ah true. Except the infrastructure that the feds have (along with other infrastructure mentioned in the linked article) will go away. So what is the State of New York to fund? Even if the money exists, the program is what made it useful.
The comments have been fairly expected. Too many seem to be unaware that it was charities that lobbied for the Feds to start general welfare programs in the first place as they (charities) are typically not as efficient or as capable of serving everyone who needs assistance.
I love your writing. Have some disagreement with a lot of these takes.
I’ll take exception to your takes on Defense Spending. DoD sure can spend that, but they have made a recent concerted effort for “meaningful acquisition.” Trump didn’t invent it but he has continued and increased it. “Storing endless kit in warehouses?” Just stop, man. I could make pointed retorts, but I like you (seriously). So just stop the dumb statements.
“People will die.” Yes, yes they will. But the government’s job isn’t to “prevent all deaths”. As a comparison, Ford and Toyoya will “cause deaths” because they made trade offs between mass-affordable cars and safety. This admin is changing some of the trade offs. That isn’t Hitler-adjacent.
The cuts only look like they “own the libs” because they were done to politically focused carve-outs. A lot of these programs might have fared better had they not internally morphed into outright political theater. Ref A: NPR CEO.
Have you worked in defense? I have. The goal of an office with a line-item budget is to spend it all. Spend it all or you don’t get it next year. There are legions of colonels with pens and Excel in the Puzzle Palace whose job it is to take from those who don’t spend and give into those who do. Throwing a trillion dollars into that pit is not the answer unless you know we are going to war and who we are fighting and how we will fight them. Answer those questions and we can find out where to spend the money.
Late reply. But to answer your question, yes I do work in the defense sector. Is there acquisition that seems wasteful? Yes. In the recent years, predating current admin but clearly continuing, I have seen a wide-ranging effort to drop programs deemed less optimal, shift funds to “meaningful acquisition “ (term from a respected acquaintance).
Respect an opinion that defense funding should not increase, but claiming it is inevitably just to overstock warehouses with useless kit is a bad faith point to make.
I do not remember that type of spending pressure from my days in the military. But that was 60 years ago, and I was nowhere near the rank of colonel. I spent a little time with the Marine Corps signal officer at Camp Lejeune and was shocked at the outdated communications equipment they used. The Marine colonel told me it was what they used to win the Korean war, and it still worked for the relatively small fighting units.
I don't really know much about today's military, but it seems the Air Force and Navy are out of control. How the hell does a carrier manage to dump two fighter jets into the Red Sea. I'm afraid the Space Force will be worse.
Steven, wow, where to begin. Your bleeding heart doesn't impress me. Let's start here, I'm sure many billions could be cut out of defense, so we have some common ground there. Having said that, you might want to reread the 10th amendment. Many of these programs administered by the federal government are ones that should be handled by the states. The federal government shouldn't be involved, period. Charitable programs work best at the state and local levels anyway. And we can agree that churches need to step into any vacuums that might result. I believe that many of them have abrogated their responsibility to care for the poor and downtrodden. As well private citizens should become better Samaritans as well. After all, we should take care of our fellow man. Now, I say all that to say this, we, as Americans have allowed what should be on us to be pushed off on a federal government that we have seen over the years is completely ill-equipped to handle it. Maybe I can be persuaded that we shouldn't take a chain saw to everything. A scalpel perhaps?
We don't agree on much here, but I'm on-board with you on the States taking over these functions.
If this country is going to continue to elect geriatric dementia patients to run the country, the fewer things at their fingertips, the better!
It's too bad that instead of having an actual plan to orderly transfer people and resources to the States to take over these functions, they brought in a bunch of ignorant idiots who like to play with chainsaws.
Getting rid of programs you don’t like because of who’s running them while taking programs that actually help people at the same time, but giving no quarter to those harmed is not how any government should function. It’s not a case of “bleeding heart” it’s a case of having one in the first place. I’d trade the liberal abuses and inefficiencies for not having old people’s freeze or children go hungry.
I'll take states, local govts, and churches and charities over "the libs'" inefficiencies and abuses any day of the week and twice on Sunday.
A lot of "what ifs". Three caught my eye. NY spends enough on illegals to easily cover any shortfall in federal heating assistance. SNAP covers a lot more than school lunches and is abused. There is no excuse for not vaccinating children against diseases such as measles and polio. It should be a requirement not an option. Covid shots could have easily been optional for most children and many adults.
As for SNAP, there’s better ways to amend or enforce that law to remove abuses than to just shut it down. The point here is not efficiency, the way it’s being proposed.
School lunches will still be there under the administration's plan. The fraud riddled program that provides benefits on the order of $300/month for single individuals and much more for couples will be subject to increased controls.
Ah true. Except the infrastructure that the feds have (along with other infrastructure mentioned in the linked article) will go away. So what is the State of New York to fund? Even if the money exists, the program is what made it useful.
I took your concern about NY heating charity at face value. If NY needs such a program, they can establish one using their own funds.
https://www.msn.com/en-us/health/nutrition/these-are-the-personal-data-trump-asked-for-from-snap-recipients/ar-AA1EwJde?ocid=BingHp01&cvid=57a8d45a3fd040bbf0f07492143e7419&ei=60
This is information on increased scrutiny of SNAPS program. Recipients may not like it but it's their call on whether the benefits are worth it.
The comments have been fairly expected. Too many seem to be unaware that it was charities that lobbied for the Feds to start general welfare programs in the first place as they (charities) are typically not as efficient or as capable of serving everyone who needs assistance.
The damage done by this budget will be irreversible and people will die. What part of that is so appealing to Maga? I don’t get it. I really don’t.