Our Distorted National Priorities

[unhappycamper]

http://smirkingchimp.com/thread/peter-g-cohen/49941/our-distorted-national-priorities

Our Distorted National Priorities
by Peter G. Cohen | June 8, 2013 - 9:14am

The House Armed Services Committee has just finished the National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA) for 2014. Little has changed. “the one and only rule is, ‘my district can’t be reduced by anything,’ (so) we wind up paralyzed,” said
senior Democrat, Washington Rep. Adam Smith in Breaking Defense of June 5th. The committee authorized $552.1 billion in the base budget and $ 85.8 billion in contingency operations for the war.

The vote on the F-35 joint Strike Fighter, grounded at the moment for faulty performance, supports jobs in 47 states. Rep Tammy Duckworth offered an amendment to delay purchases until the software is fully verified and tested. Why wait? It failed with only ten members supporting. The closing of domestic military bases also failed to pass, though the Pentagon has admitted that it has more bases than it needs.

Meanwhile, Mayors for Peace, with 197 members in the U.S. and 5,600 worldwide, has passed a strong Resolution, which will be considered at the U.S. Conference of Mayors later this month. After carefully listing many “whereas” it resolves:

“Be it further resolved, that the U.S. Conference of Mayors calls on the President and Congress to substantially reduce military spending and to reinvest those funds in programs to address the dramatic increase in poverty and inequality in our country; take emergency measures to repair the social safety net and protect Social Security and Medicare; create jobs, retrain displaced workers, including military contractors, rebuild deteriorating physical infrastructure, invest in new technologies for a sustainable energy future, and aid local government to restore and maintain vital public services, reemploying teachers, police, firefighters and other workers;...” See the Resolution at: http://wslfweb.org/docs/uscmres2013.pdf