From harelb%cabot.dartmouth.edu@DARTCMS1.DARTMOUTH.EDU Mon Feb 25 23:55:43 1991 Return-Path: <@DARTCMS1.DARTMOUTH.EDU:ACTIV-L@UMCVMB.BITNET> Date: Sat, 23 Feb 91 01:06:17 -0500 Reply-To: Harel Barzilai Sender: Activists Mailing List From: Harel Barzilai Subject: The Pentagon System To: Multiple recipients of list ACTIV-L ======================== The Pentagon System Or, why Bush prefers War ======================== Newsgroups: alt.activism,talk.politics.misc,alt.desert-storm [This belongs in alt.desert-storm for reasons which will hopefully become apparent] In article <20421@shlump.nac.dec.com> borsom@imokay.cmw.ltn.dec.com (Doug Borsom) writes: >In article <20384@shlump.nac.dec.com>, haddad@akocoa.enet.dec.com (Bruce E. Haddad) writes: [Regarding the well over $100 billion wasted on unnecessary armaments each year] >> The fact is that those taxes we pay are not burned up or piled in a heap. >> They are spent! They are spent buying things produced by US companies so >> that the money can be spread around? >Yup. Just like the money "lost" by all the failed S&Ls and banks went >back into the economy, much of it into the construction industry. So >what? >The issue isn't whether money spent on X, Y, or Z goes back into the >economy. The issue is the productive use of that money being spent. >GAO studies indicate that defense dollars are less productive in terms >of jobs and technical spin-offs than dollars spent elsewhere. There is not need to weaken the argument in this way; the central issue is not that dollars spents on the military [not "defense"] are less productive "in terms of jobs and technical spin-offs" The issue is that, under the Pentagon System, the government is stealing this vast annual sum from us, the people, and this money is going to pay for the building of weapons, "high technology waste" which are entirely unnecessary for defense, and which dollars should be going towards health care, education, better transportation, cleaning up our land, the air we breathe, the water we drink, etc. This money is stolen from us, because it is money which *should* have been made available, but is not, for the projects just listed. The social costs are massive and devastating, and go far beyond having less "technical spin-offs." These massive social costs should be plain from the statistics I have posted: ======================================================= Bush couldn't possibly be looking for war for reasons having to do with a military budget that is according to many studies and experts more than $100,000,000,000 higher than what is necessary for defense, could he? Bush's motives could have nothing to do with squashing the "Peace Dividend" from this military budget, or to try to perpetuate the military-driven economy and divert attention from the domestic toll of this policy, including the U.S. ranking in Literacy: 50th in the world Infant mortality rank: 20th in the world Life expectancy: lower than Japan, Italy, Sweden, Austria, Finland, France, New Zeland, Denmark, England, and Canada (whose citizens pay, under it's National Health Insurance policy, 3/4 of what U.S. citizens have to pay, while having a life expectancy of 2 years longer; covering all its citizens, and whose infant mortality rank is not 20th (U.S.), but 5th) [Documentation to be posted later; or now by sending me email] ======================================================= So that the social costs involved include many babies which die due to (entirely preventable) lack of adequate health care; a higher rate of death than Canadians for heart disease; shorter life spans; more deaths and a less healthy life for scores of Americans due to pollutions and toxification our the environment, etc. There is also an economic cost, which is vast, including for example the lost productivity and loss of human potential due to factors relating to the figure on illiteracy; but these economic costs -and they are vast- pale in comparison to the human cost in terms of misery, suffering, and death. Now, the question may logically be raised as to why, given the terrible consequences of the present course, why doesn't, why hasn't a society which acts in its own best interest changed this? The simple answer is that that the social costs, just like political power, are not distributed equally; in fact they are largely inversely proportional, so that while a rational society would re-direct its resources to prevent these massive social costs, it is precisely because people like George Bush have political power but bear little or none of these costs -- George Herbert Walker Bush has little to worry about his family or grandchildren receiving adequate health care or pre-natal care, or worry about the living conditions perpetuated in urban ghettos -- that the status quo is perpetuated; This is especially not surprising when one considers that these elites not only enjoy effective immunity from the aforementioned social costs, but reap heavy benefits in the form of profits, both directly (domestically), and indirectly (internationally, where a military state at home allows for a militarized foreign policy, with brute force bending governments and peoples to the liking of the elites and corporations at home). --- I'd hate to ruin it for Netters who've been following this far with a quote by Chomsky, but the following brief excerpt, in its condensed language, conveys well this situation, and perhaps will convey it more clearly in the context of the present article: The [Reagan] administration was committed to...a massive increase in the state sector of the economy in the traditional American way, through the Pentagon system -- a device to force the public to invest in high technology industry by means of the state-guaranteed market for the production of high technology waste (armaments), and thus to contribute to the general program of public subsidy, private profit, called ``free enterprise'' Noam Chomsky, _Libya in U.S. Demonology_, Covert Action Information Bulletin #26, Summer 1986. ################################################################## For more information about ACTIV-L or PeaceNet's brochure, send inquiries to harel@dartmouth.edu ################################################################### # Harel Barzilai for Activists Mailing List (AML) # ################################################################### To join AML, just send the message "SUB ACTIV-L " to the address: LISTSERV@UMCVMB.BITNET; you should then receive a message confirming that your name has been added to the list. 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