Ryan: Budget fights have pushed military 'past the breaking point'
Last edited Thu Jan 18, 2018, 06:29 PM - Edit history (2)
Source: The Hill
House Speaker Paul Ryan (R-Wis.) on Thursday cautioned about the crumbling state of the U.S. military, warning that long-term budget cuts and Washington melodrama have pushed our military past the breaking point.
Instead of upgrading our hardware, we have let our equipment age. Instead of equipping our troops for tomorrows fight, we have let them become woefully under-equipped, Ryan told attendees at a Center for Strategic and International Studies event.
The Pentagon started 2018 on a continuing resolution (CR), the ninth year the Defense Department has begun its year on a stop-gap spending measure. A CR keeps the building open, but prevents new programs from starting and delays maintenance and training.
This has left the military too small, over-worked and with aircraft that cant fly, Ryan said.
Read more: http://thehill.com/policy/defense/369527-ryan-budget-fights-have-pushed-military-past-the-breaking-point
Hey Paul ":ayn rand" Ryan here's a solution reinstate the draft. As for aging aircraft, your kidding right, the aircraft keep getting modernized until the next generation comes fully on line....................your full of shit
You realize that there are two nuclear submarines being built, right, and this country spend more on military hardware than the world---------------your still full of shit
After more considerable thinking I want the government to shut down, then Ryan, and McConnell , and sexual predator can't do anymore damage, no more appointments to the bench, no more land being given to the polluters.............shut it down, Social Security and Medicare Medicaid don't stop
November 2018 cabinet get here fast enough
Iliyah
(25,111 posts)underpants
(182,273 posts)Ryan, your party is the one that has killed all the budget deals often internally. Remember when your boy Cruz filibustered and created the shutdown?
aggiesal
(8,864 posts)and still be the highest funded military in the world.
AND, the half that was cut could easily pay for everyone's college education!
Little Eddie Munster can take flying leap!
Fred Sanders
(23,946 posts)montanacowboy
(6,052 posts)oh, our poor military
When this piece of filthy shit is gone from the halls of Congress will be a happy day
Fuck you and all the scumbags with an R after their name
A pox on all their houses
Chasstev365
(5,191 posts)Algernon Moncrieff
(5,780 posts)Whenever "education" or "social welfare" is brought up, I always hear lectures about how throwing money at things doesn't solve problems and how we need to "spend smarter." I also keep hearing about how the Fed, Freddie Mac, Fannie Mae, etc. need to be audited.
So this is my proposition to you, Mr. Speaker: not one dime more until an independent audit of the Pentagon and Defense procurement procedures with access to all classified information is allowed to take a critical, objective look at the defense budget. We spend an insane amount on defense compared to Russia and China and pretty much everyone else.
DetlefK
(16,423 posts)In the 1990s a decision was made to audit the US military. Last year they were ready for the first-ever partial audit. And even that revealed waste and inefficiencies.
Still no full audit.
Va Lefty
(6,252 posts)BumRushDaShow
(127,295 posts)leaving little or nothing (like armored vehicles and bullets) for the troops.
beachbum bob
(10,437 posts)this addressed 6 months ago??
cry me a river is my response to Ryan, McConnel and trump
Timmygoat
(779 posts)Does he forget that the GOP (Cruz) shut the government down for, if I remember right weeks (remember green eggs and ham) Someone should tell him to fund the dreamers etc and shut up!
guillaumeb
(42,641 posts)The US spends more on its war budget than nearly every other country combined.
The war industry buys a lot of politicians.
Paul Ryan is a liar.
Igel
(35,191 posts)Social Security: $910 billion
Medicare: $695 billion
Defense: $588 billion
Medicaid: $370 billion
When you look at discretionary spending, non-mandatory spending, a bit over half is DOD related. But over half of US spending is not discretionary.
There's a bit of military in the $600+ billion discretionary spending as well, mostly things like VA or college grants. But a Russian back in '89 pointed out to me that the pay scale for Russian soldiers was chump change, while for US soldiers it was respectable. In Russia, at the time, the military got first dibs on the best production with special specifications at the same prices everybody pays for off-the-rack stuff. Working for a Chinese national in '95 and '96 taught me that many of the businesses and factories in mainland China were owned by the military, so their not minuscule profits and some of their production went to the military and the funds were "off books"--to the extent you could trust the official records. Later it was pointed out that there was a secret budget for secret projects, many of which were military.
A lot of US military development is also R&D, and funds fairly basic research. Which in other countries might still be funded, but wouldn't be funded by the military. Except maybe in China and Russia.
Sophia4
(3,515 posts)A. To answer your second question first, qualifying for the maximum Social Security benefit is very difficultits the equivalent of winning a benefits Powerball. To get the highest benefit possible at your full retirement age (FRA), your income needs to have been at or above the Social Security earnings ceiling (the amount of income subject to payroll tax) each year for at least 35 years since age 22. The payroll earnings cap is $127,200 in 2017; in 1982, 35 years ago, it was $32,400. Only about 6% of workers earn above the maximum in any given year.
For someone who racked up maximum taxable earnings each year, and who reaches the FRA of 66 in 2017, the maximum benefit would be $2,687 a month, or $32,244 a year. By contrast, the average monthly benefit is just $1,342 a month.
Theres also what we might call a maximum maximum benefit. If you wait till age 70 to file, you get delayed retirement credits that boost your benefits by 7% to 8% a year for each year you wait. If you claim at age 70 this year, the maximum benefit is $3,538, or $42,456 a year. Only about 2% of workers wait to 70 to claim.
http://time.com/money/4644332/maximum-social-security-benefit-2017/
The average $1,342 per month amounts to $16,104 per year or $7.75 per hour for 40 hours per 52 weeks a year. Federal minimum wage is $7.25 per hour. Generally, older workers earn more than that. The poverty level is $11,367 per year for people over 65.
https://www.irp.wisc.edu/faqs/faq1.htm
wishstar
(5,267 posts)Social Security and Medicare should not even be lumped in with other spending as those 2 programs pay for themselves with their own specific dedicated revenue source (and still have some Trust funds on paper). They are solvent compared to other government spending for which we do not raise enough tax revenues to cover.
However Medicaid, Supplemental Security Income and other health care programs are paid from the general Federal income tax revenues that pay for defense spending and everything else.
Pie chart looks a lot different and defense spending is the biggest single chunk of the pie once Soc Sec and Medicare are taken out of equation.
guillaumeb
(42,641 posts)the war budget climbs to over 1 trillion. It is hidden in the Department of the Interior, in Veterans Affairs, in the Department of Energy, and we have no idea how much is in the various secret agencies that are part of the war machine.
VMA131Marine
(4,123 posts)Spend more
Do less
We are planning to build another 9 Ford class carriers at $10B each
We are planning to buy another 2400 F-35s at $100M each
We are planning to build another 31 Virginia-class fast attack subs at $2.7B each
We are planning to build 12 Columbia class SSBNs at a cost of at least $5B each
We are planning to build another 9 Arleigh-Burke class destroyers at nearly $2B each
sinkingfeeling
(51,276 posts)groundloop
(11,487 posts)THIS is what repubs always do, wave the flag and claim that they're the only ones who care about our military.
As is widely known the US spends FAR more on our military than any other country in the world. WHY??? We have military installations in over 100 countries around the world. WHY???
Unsustainable military spending hastened the downfall of the Soviet Union, you'd think that we'd learn from that and start making sensible cuts to our military budget (and use the money to fund education, social programs, infrastructure, etc.). But NO, repubs label anyone who dares to suggest reducing our 'defense' budget as unpatriotic.
Roland99
(53,342 posts)AtheistCrusader
(33,982 posts)I'm sure the kickbacks are worth it.
slumcamper
(1,603 posts)Slashing taxes and trying to drown government in a bathtub is incompatible with their BIG DEFENSE "principle."
Their entire philosophy is unsustainable.
Of course, our party seems to have a problem conveying that inescapable truth to a lot of folks.
titaniumsalute
(4,742 posts)SWBTATTReg
(21,856 posts)doesn't really cost anything. Of course having a strong military is essential, but to overspend so much?
Why? It's really time to downsize our military in line w/ the rest of the world. We are spending roughly 36% of the entire world's military budget, or a little more than what the next 11 countries spend militarily combined.
Why?
Wisdom as to when and how to use this military force is paramount...the desire to use such force should be an absolute last thing on the list of possible choices, but sadly, with this administration and republican congress I fear for the worst in the misapplication and squandering of this valuable resource...in that they will perceive something as a slight against the country and then BAM! Just like the Iraq supposed mass weapons of destruction leading up to the entire mess we have now in Iraq/etc.
I would think that the world is in a better place now and that NO ONE wins in a war, any war.
YOHABLO
(7,358 posts)Corgigal
(9,291 posts)Did anyone ever figure out how Sgt. La David Johnson was left behind? What arrived of his person the week after he was buried?
Yeah, like you ever gave a rats ass. Did you check with his widow to see if she delivered their last child thus month?
God, do I hate these liars.
UpInArms
(51,252 posts)The audit, conducted by the Defense Department's Office of Inspector General, found that the Army erroneously made $2.8 trillion in adjustments in the third quarter of 2015 to its Army general fund - one of the main accounts used to fund the service. The error amount skyrocketed to $6.5 trillion for all of last year, the report said.
The June report, first disclosed by Reuters on Friday, found "unreliable" data was used to prepare the financial statements, leading to the possibility that the Army's finances were "materially misstated."
Financial managers from the Pentagon and the Army "could not rely on the data in their accounting systems when making management and resource decisions," the audit said.
An Army spokesman disputed some of the findings.
dflprincess
(28,057 posts)That's where most the money seems to go.
Irish_Dem
(45,619 posts)Guilded Lilly
(5,591 posts)Freethinker65
(9,930 posts)sprinkleeninow
(20,133 posts)I'm almost on my last nerve.
left-of-center2012
(34,195 posts)Did they not fund the military?
nitpicker
(7,153 posts)DeminPennswoods
(15,246 posts)DoD has more money than it knows what to do with. I was a civilian fed in DoD in an organization that helped spend it. By the time I retired, my grade level could authorize spending up to $500,000 with no further review and my grade was the 2nd from the bottom of the chain of command. One grade above me, essentially my supervisor, could authorize up to 1M in spending.
DoD wastes money on unnecessary contractors, many of who are military or civilians who retired on Friday and came back (to a similar position) as a contractor on Monday. DoD is just mind-bogglingly wasteful.
Demsrule86
(68,348 posts)are in trouble in Janesville...going to retire you pos.