Cheney Joins Lockheed to Fight Defense Cuts

[JonLP24]

Source: Bloomberg News

As Lockheed Martin Corp. (LMT) (LMT)’s chief predicts he may have to fire 10,000 workers under across-the- board federal spending cuts, a familiar voice is warning Republican leaders that U.S. defense readiness is at stake.

Former Vice President Dick Cheney said at a private meeting with Senate Republicans yesterday that the projected cuts totaling $500 billion could be “devastating” to military modernization and planning, South Carolina Senator Lindsay Graham told reporters.

Cheney, 71, said defense spending is “not a spigot you can turn on and turn off, that you need to keep money flowing in a predictable way so you can plan for the next war,” Graham said after the Senate Republicans’ weekly luncheon. They heard from the former vice president, who was President George H.W. Bush’s defense secretary from 1989 to 1993.

The defense industry and its Republican allies in Congress are increasing their volume this week in a concerted push to avert the defense cuts, part of $1.2 trillion in automatic reductions over a decade that will start in January unless Congress and President Barack Obama agree on an alternate plan.

Read more: http://www.businessweek.com/news/2012-07-17/lockheed-may-fire-10-000-under-budget-cuts-stevens-says

[2on2u]

1. Flip flopper

http://www.factcheck.org/print_anti-kerry_ad_misses_context_distorts_facts.html

Furthermore, Bush's own father, who was then President, and Richard Cheney, who was then Secretary of Defense, proposed to cut or eliminate several of the very same weapons that Republicans now fault Kerry for opposing. In his first appearance before Congress as Defense Secretary in April 1989, for example, Cheney outlined $10 billion in defense cuts including proposed cancellation of the AH-64 Apache helicopter, and elimination of the F-15E ground-attack jet.

Two years later Cheney's Pentagon budget also proposed elimination of further production of the Bradley Fighting Vehicle and targeted a total of 81 Pentagon programs for termination, including the F-14 and F-16 aircraft.

And the elder President Bush said in his 1992 State of the Union address: "After completing 20 planes for which we have begun procurement, we will shut down further production of the B - 2 bombers. . . . And we will not purchase any more advanced cruise missiles." So if Kerry opposed weapons "our troops depend on," so did Cheney and the elder President Bush.

[BumRushDaShow]

2. "defense spending is 'not a spigot you can turn on and turn off'"

But spending on health, education, food and consumer product safety, etc etc IS such a "spigot" with a permanent off valve?

Really?

They need to take the lot of them, stick them out in the woods without food, clothing, and shelter, and see how long they last.

[Deep13]

3. Go fuck yourself. nt

[Ikonoklast]

12. With a pineapple.

Turned sideways.

[Ash_F]

5. Cheney mispoke

“you need to keep money flowing in a predictable way so you can plan for the next war,”

should be

“you need to keep money flowing in a predictable way so you can plan the next war,”

[asjr]

6. Will we never be rid of this man. Now he is a lobbyist

for Lockheed? OMG I just had a terrible thought. Is Cheney rehearsing for a return as Vice-president?

[daybranch]

7. silver lining

The military industrial complex Eisenhower warned about is about to be dealt a crippling blow after its long ascent to controlling our miilitary budget and pushing our country torack up massive profits for the military contractors.
I salute president Obama for using the debt crisis created by republlicans to actually address the robbery of our people to support outrageous profits for purchases of weapon systems outdated and overpriced. Lockheed Martin is not about jobs no more than Boeing is about jobs. Lockheed Martin and other contractors place jobs as broadly as possible across the states in order to influence legislators from the various states and then extract as much as possible in the way of profits from us. Cheney cares only about his friends profits.
We do not need all these fighter planes unless we plan on attacking the world alone. They certainly are not for defense.

[DallasNE]

8. This Is All So Much Bullcrap

First, they always use 10 year figures so this is $50 billion a year and that is less than what we spend on the Afghanistan war today. Second, it is not a cut at all but a reduction in the projected increase. In constant dollars this would return military spending to the 2006 levels -- hardly a starve the beast level. Lastly, the job cut figures being thrown about are roughly 10 times what will happen based on proposed spending levels.

[harun]

9. Too bad they don't spend money to figure out how to stay out of the next war

[HIlton Brackett]

10. Keep Cutting

This Campaign of world conquest must come to a stop. With the end of the Afghan war should come the closer of military bases around the world. European security can no longer be the burden of the American tax payer. We must balance trade and restore manufacturing. Manufacturing American futures, not the toys of WAR.

[SaveAmerica]

11. "keep money flowing...so you can plan for the next war"

That's really all we need to know, isn't it?

I'm sick to death that these fools still have a say in anything that involves this country and its military. I'd love to see Bush, Cheney, and especially Karl Rove not allowed to surface in public ever again.

Senator Graham is a tool, I wonder what they're blackmailing him with? "Oh come on out to Baghdad and shop, the deals on rugs are awesome!"

[SoapBox]

13. Go back to the bunker, Mr. Cheeeeeeeney

This dirt bag makes me want to vomit.

[electedface]

14. Cut Unnecessary Spending!

I'm sorry, but everyone in America now knows that if one is in debt, and has bills to pay, unnecessary spending is the first to go.

Take the F22 for example. The F 22 has not been used in a combat despite the initial introduction of this jet in 2005. The last of the 188 planes rolled off the assembly line in April of 2012. It has cost The United States more than $64 billion, more than double the initial expected cost.

This video sums it up:

[OrwellwasRight]

15. How about closing bases overseas? Do we need bases in

Italy? and Australia? Really?