Hey man, I want to really apologize for asking questions and providing an opinion that you didn't agree with. That was really mean of me to trigger your delicate sensibilities like that.
Wow. Straw man much?
You and I have been the only 2 to post any data at all supporting our claims. Guess you don't remember mine, but it was the numbers and graphs I've posted throughout from such sources as the Congressional Budget Office. What empirical data has anyone else posted, save a few nuggets from you? I've asked for some several times, then those people never reply until they chime in with personal digs that contribute nothing meaningful to the discussion.
Gotta say, I'm disappointed to see you joining the group that are trying to attack me personally instead of my arguments. I typically have read your posts with interest and respect on here. I expect that crap from Brett, but not you. You're better than that.
Dude, you can write all the 10-paragraph posts in the world, and it won't change that your arguments are so far in left field that they've stopped playing baseball and are now serving beer to the spectators.
Well, I'd love to hear specifics on why you think so. I'm open minded and would love to hear a convincing argument, ideally supported with facts, why I'm wrong.
My post you quoted was hardly a personal attack. It reads objectively as more of an observation- one similar to an observation you made about one of my responses several pages ago, referring to my argument as a “straw man” argument (I might add, somewhat correctly).
No, its not. Walter Russell Mead described the 4 competing themes of American foreign policy as being based on Hamilton, Wilson, Jefferson and Jackson. Mirage appears to be in the Jeffersonian camp, while most of the others vocal here are either in the Hamilton or Wilson camps.
Business insider? LOL. Irony... dead.
www.bbc.com
I think that the level of draw down you want would make it difficult to respond to a gradually rebuilding and increasing Russian threat. It is better to maintain training and readiness. It can be scaled down or scaled up, but should be maintained. It we will take Russia years to rebuild, yes, but those years can go by in the blink of an eye.
What difference is $400 billion going to make given the size of the deficit and debt? Also the federal debt isn't something that needs to be repaid, it just needs to be kept at a reasonable size in proportion to the economy.
We have had a larger debt-to-GDP ratio in the past and not had any economic blowups. We had larger interest payments as a percentage of federal revenue during the 1980s for example. So the debt is not the ticking time bomb you think it is.
$400B is insignificant if the only major cut. Also I do not believe it is politically palatable to cut the other three, just that that is what would be needed.
It isn't that they could rebuild quickly, it is that they could do so gradually where no one realizes how much they've grown until it's too late, at which point trying to scale up to match them would take time.
We get to act provocatively in order to deter because we are not aggressors. He on the other hand is. He does not maintain a military strictly for defensive purposes, but for purposes of aggression. You make it sound like he wants peace. No he doesn't want war with US, but that doesn't mean he isn't a tyrant and won't immediately increase his aggression if we start showing weakness. It's a Mafia-style regime with a history of aggression and violence. Reducing our military presence WILL NOT get him to become more friendly.
I found it interesting how quickly the respective governments were drawing conclusions (“this could only have been a state actor!”) and blaming each other. The pipeline was as shallow as 80m in at least one place, based on what I’ve read. That’s doable for a non-state actor if you have the right equipment. Not sure about the deeper parts of the pipeline.
I don't have a dog in this fight overall, but: with the benefit of hindsight, the failures of these conflicts make it easy to cast us as the aggressors. I wouldn't be so quick to dismiss the perception of us as the aggressors; it is more common than you'd think when viewed outside the shores of the U.S.
Many prominent US leaders argued in Kim's lifetime that we should have invaded NK to stop them from getting nukes. Put that together with our continued drills on their coast and our history of using our military offensively (that is, not defending US territory directly), I find it hard to believe that NK would agree with your assessment of their opinion that we only use our military for defense and they have nothing to fear. NK on the other hand has not, in modern history, used it's military outside the Korean peninsula. So what facts are you using to come to your conclusion? Could you be succumbing to the typical American bias that our shit don't stink and the rules are different for us? What facts convince you that SK, supplied with our technology and allied with us, cannot deter and defend itself?
I didn't claim those were aggression, I said they're aggression from the NK perspective. That said, many of them were aggression, such as our 2nd invasion of Iraq. Kim doesn't give us bonus points for not slaughtering the Iraqi people. He does dock us points for slaughtering Sadaams regime. Whatever our reasons have been, no country has used it's military to destroy it's perceived threats more than us.. not even close. And Kim knows we perceive him as a threat.