t Tuesday’s GOP presidential debate in Milwaukee, Rand Paul railed against Marco Rubio for calling for increases to the military budget: “How is it conservative to add a trillion dollars in military expenditures? You can not be a conservative if you’re going to keep promoting programs that you’re not paying for.” Rubio replied by arguing that “we can’t even have an economy if we’re not safe,” and that “the world is a safer place when America is the strongest military power in the world.” This brief exchange captures a debate that’s been dividing America's political class for years. Paul is standing in for those, on the left and the right, who believe that the time has come for the U.S. to stop pretending it can be the world’s policeman, and to start shifting money from our military to needs closer to home. Rubio speaks for those in both parties who see U.S. global leadership as more important than ever, and who worry about the erosion of U.S. military power. Both sides make compelling arguments. But in the end, Rubio is right. The …show more content…
The U.S. defense budget is already quite large. In 2015, the U.S. spent $610 billion on the military, making its defense budget the largest in the world by a wide margin. The U.S. spent more on defense than the $601 billion that China, Russia, Saudi Arabia, France, Britain, and India—the countries with the next seven largest military budgets—spent combined. If we limit our comparison to America’s NATO allies, the numbers still look quite stark. The U.S. alone accounts for a whopping 75 percent of the military spending by all of NATO’s 28 current members. Under the two-year budget agreement that the Obama administration hammered out with the Republican leadership in Congress, baseline defense spending will be $548 billion while spending on Overseas Contingency Operations will be $59 billion, for a grand total of $607 billion. That’s hardly chump change. But it’s not
On October 3rd, 2002, Minnesota Senator Paul Wellstone walked unto the Senate floor to give what would be one of the most momentous speeches of his career. A day prior, the Senate leadership had introduced a resolution, backed by the George W. Bush Administration, to authorize the President to attack Iraq. Wellstone, a progressive Democrat, had long been noted for his strong anti-war views. However, he was at the time struggling to win reelection, and a vote against the popular resolution could sway the election in his opponent’s favor. Yet instead of joining the bipartisan chorus for war with Iraq and abandoning his anti-war convictions, Wellstone chose to stand as a “monument of individual courage” and raise his concerns about the direction of American foreign policy (Kennedy 223).
Without understanding the importance of foreign relations the American people’s way of life could be at stake. Not only could the economic strength of the U.S. diminish, but the military might of the U.S. could also be compromised. Mead argues that without the centrality of foreign policy being evident in American politics the happiness of the world is at risk. “Since the United States has become the central power in a worldwide system of finance, communications, and trade, it is not only the American people whose happiness and security will be greatly affected by the quality of American foreign policy in coming years (Mead 176). I contend that without a strong emphasis on foreign policy, we could begin to see the end of American
Reinstating the Draft To each and every person, war means something different. For some, it is against the things they believe in, but for others it is everything that they believe in. In America, the men and women have the privilege to determine whether or not they are a part of serving this country by going into: the marines, navy, national guard, air force, etc. Previous to this choice being available, they had what was called the military draft. The military draft is where men from the ages 18 to 25 years old legally have to register with Selective Services where you could potentially be chosen to go to war.
Presently, the United States places a high value on its military power and often boasts of its strength in the news. Not only does
"The soldier is the Army. No army is better than its soldiers. The Soldier is also a citizen. In fact, the highest obligation and privilege of citizenship is that of bearing arms for one’s country” (-General George S. Patton Jr). Here within our borders we are the lucky ones, we have been blessed with the pleasure of so many brave men and women; to volunteer in the world's greatest military; and put their lives on the line for something that they believe is a moral obligation. But, think of some other countries, that have conscription (the practice of ordering people by law to serve in the armed forces) laws. We as a nation have some laws on conscription, and if you are male and above the age of 18 you have already signed the slip of paper stating that in the time of war; if our great nation re-instated the draft then there is a great chance you will be serving on the frontline of the next Great War. This brings me to my first topic of this page, is it ethical to have a draft? My second topic that I will discuss will be on if it is morally acceptable to "draft dodge". What I mean on the second topic is if you have a right; that morally allows you to not go fight in the war.
The Military draft is the random selection of qualified citizens of the United States, that is put to use when a crisis occurs, like a war. When American citizens reached age 18, they had to sign up for eligibility to be drafted to go to war for their country. Throughout the country’s history, the requirements and limitations of drafting have changed. The draft has been going on since colonial times in America in order to fulfill the country’s military needs when there were not enough volunteer fighters for the military. The total amount of soldiers that one side has fighting for it is an important factor in any type of battle so getting the necessary amount of fighters is crucial. The draft assures everyone that this military need is satisfied at any point in time. Many people feel like the draft is not fair and not “American” and the draft has seen so much conflict since its invention. Throughout the history of the United States, the military draft has been a very important, yet highly controversial topic at the same time.
The United States is an extremely affluent country, however, the U.S. government does not allocate its funds correctly. The government spends entirely too much of the budget on military spending. A segment of the military budget should go towards education. Education is completely undervalued in America and is often pushed to the side in political debates. Conversely, several of the top-ranked countries in education are also flourishing economically. Even though the U.S. is struggling to compete in education, the government has all but given up at this point. There are no signs of increased education spending or a decrease in military spending. How is this country supposed to continue to grow and move forward if the citizens
In an article, it explains that “The State Department’s Military Assistance Report on June 8 stated that it approved $44.28 billion in arms shipments to 173 nations in the last fiscal year, including some that struggled with human rights problems. These nations include the United Arab Emirates, Qatar, Israel, Djibouti, Honduras, Saudi Arabia, Kuwait, and Bahrain” (Toombs 1). These nations are where ISIS originated from. This is more than likely the reason why there are so many terrorist in the Middle East who are able to do so much damage. By giving these terrorist weapons, we are giving them weapons to kill our people. It makes no sense for the United States to provide weapons to countries who are using them to cause terrorists acts within their own country and other countries as well. If the United States stops providing these people with weapons to kill, we would not have such a problem with terrorists. Also, if we are able to increase our security even more so. Things like “congress federal(izing) airport security by passing the Aviation and Transportation Security Act, which created the Transportation Security Administration” (Villemez 2). We can increase security in our own home by providing funds to the military. They will technologically advance our security through various ways. They have always been making newer and different inventions that prevent future possible terrorist attacks. We can fund the military financially
National defense is a sensitive topic to most because we need it to live in our country as safe as we do, but it is a big problem in our national debt. The Washington Post showed that the United States spends 20% of its budget on defense and it has increased dramatically since the tragedy of 9/11 (“America’s Staggering Defense Budget”, Plumer). America spends more on its military than the next 13 nations combined, which...
Since the attacks a number of civil defense programs have been initiated, which leads to more departments asking for an allowance within the national budget. This ultimately is leading to a larger and larger deficit that is quickly encompassing full percentage points of our GDP. There is a debate on how much defense spending is actually needed, because during the Clinton administration there were massive cuts to the defense budget, which lead to critics saying that our military force was in question. These same critics said that without the funds that had been cut-off by Clinton the military would spiral down to not being able to defend the homeland, let alone take on any offensive. The one argument I have is that President Bush was not in office long enough for his increased defense budget to take affect when he overthrew two regimes (Afghanistan & Iraq) with the same military force that was said to be completely ineffective because of lack of funds.
Proper school funding is one of the keys to having a successful school. Americans believe that funding is the biggest problem in public schools. School improvements revolve around funding. There needs to be funding not only in the successful schools but also the schools that aren’t doing as well. In documentary, Waiting for Superman, it talks about how smaller class sizes will help students. Funding is what will help the smaller class sizes. State funding mechanisms are subject to intense political and economic scrutiny (Leonard). Studies have shown that funding is inversely related to accreditation levels (Leonard). School funding needs to be increased, but there must be accountability as well.
We all know that the US spends the biggest amount of money on the military because of terrorism and wanting to be strategically ahead of all the other countries. They are just trying to protect our country from being attacked again especially after Pearl Harbor and 9/11. But maybe the military has gone a bit too far in some instances, like underwater sonar testing. The Navy was just renewed permits to conduct exercises in an extensive area in the Pacific Ocean. The training and testing range stretches from Northern California to the Canadian border. The navy claims “many adversaries have and continue to acquire modern, quiet subs, torpedoes, and underwater mines that pose serious threats to the lawful use of the sea, the global economy, and the safety of our forces”, which is why the navy needs to be able to have real life practice out in the ocean. The navy did think about the animals in the area and are practicing routines to protect animals, “such as using trained lookouts to avoid marine mammals or halting sonar if marine mammals approach our ships within certain safety zones.” But the percentage of "Visual detection can miss anywhere from 25 to 95 percent of the marine mammals in an area," says Heather Trim, Director of Policy for People for Puget
Introduction As all states are facing budget cuts, it is imperative that all stakeholders work together to ensure academic success for all students. The idea then seems to be, teachers must learn to do more with less resources. Throughout the video, there were many main points made about how to cut the budget but not place student achievement at risk. For example schools must determine what expenditures could be removed and replaced with increasing innovation in the classroom. Another way is for schools to determine students’ performance on high performance testing and design budget to benefit this.
On September 11, 2001, the United States was attacked by a group of Islamic terrorists who hijacked four airplanes and carried out three simultaneous suicide attacks against the Pentagon and the World Trade Center. As a result of the multiple crimes, the United States’ government increased national security and prioritized our nation 's’ defense, often at the expense of the people’s privacy, by enacting policies like the Patriot Act (What is the USA Patriot Web 2011). This left personal emails, text messages, internet history, and personal belongings exposed to the government. Although the government reduced the public’s rights to privacy, it is a necessary step to ensure national safety and security.
Governor Walker and his supporters claim that, rather than hurting Wisconsin’s school system, the budget cuts actually help by making schools be more careful and efficient with their use of money, and they say that spending more money on education will not actually improve it. For example, when budget cuts in Colorado forced some schools to rethink their spending, they switched to several more efficient teaching practices, the most original of which being a four day school week (Schouten 1). The four day school week allowed some districts to save up to $65,000 a year in transportation costs, such as the Maccray School District in Minnesota (Coleman, Walker & Lawrence 5). These newer teaching practices not only saved money on buses and other