12:07 pm, July 12, 2014

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  • 7

  • Ah yes
    spoken by a man who never served this country in uniform.
  • NeoCon Redux
    ["We have more than 300,000 uniformed personnel doing jobs that should be done by civilians. That means that nearly three times the number of troops that were on the ground in Iraq during Operation Iraqi Freedom are doing nonmilitary jobs that should be done by civilian personnel." - Donald Rumsfeld, May 22, 2003 http://wapo.st/QWrctB "More than 300,000 military members performing civilian jobs and numerous general officers: $37 billion." - Sen. Tom Coburn (R-Okla.), Nov. 16, 2012] I hope that it's pointed out that Coburn is rehashing Rumsfeld's "Defense for the 21st Century" case right down to the exact number of troops he wants to privatize and outsource. Make no mistake, conservatives loathe all federal government employees and want to privatize every one of them. So essentially Coburn, like Rumsfeld, wants to hand 300,000 active duty positions from DoD over to contractors. This went over like a lead balloon in 2003 when Rumsfeld talked about it and I remember pretty negative covers on all of the Military Times publications, which later called for Rumsfeld's resignation. I hope Mr. Jason Miller can make the same connections (we're not talking the Six Degrees of Kevin Bacon here), and will write a piece taking these connections into consideration. It's worth noting that both Rumsfeld & Coburn seem to be reading off CATO Institute's "Downsizing the Federal Government." If so, there's numerous areas of concern when it comes to CATO's focus on downsizing DoD. www.downsizinggovernment.org/defense If Mr. Miller does a follow up, I hope that's taken into consideration as well. Scary stuff from the still scary NeoCons.
  • Neobama
    What's scary is when we see Obama bomb Libya and send U.S. special forces into Jordan (w/French, Brit, and Qatar) to prepare a no-fly zone over Syria. But I guess its ok when democrats bomb people, just bad when republicans do it, etc. Is Obama a neo-con when he's doing the same thing Bush or Romney would do? Its time wake up, little kiddies.
  • A guy who has never served.......
    Big Joe
    I get it....alot is spent on non-military goods. So, when my family lived in Spain, Italy, Turkey, and Germany, would my kids go to a local school and just pick up the local language and receive a FREE great education? It shouldn't take them more than a week or so for a 7th grader to learn Italian enough to start understanding.....right? Same with the commisary and exchange. My wife should know before we get to Turkey how to cook several meals using authentic Turkish food found in the local markets. These comments from Sen Coburn sound like a guy that has never served in uniform, never lived internationally...and never ventured far from his personal parking spot at Reagan airport and all the other perks he seems very comfortable with.....
  • You wrote it well. These guys who never served want to scroo the military guys over.
    The Original Joe S
  • Coburn knows not what he speaks of
    Tom Coburn's arguments are shot full of fallicies. Although he is right out the Flags...some of them should go!1. Commisaries (grocery stores for the military) are self-sustaining and in fact give money back to Command MWR programs. 2. DoD schools - I'm pretty sure that he is talking about stateside schools. The only problem with closing them is you really won't save much money since you'll have to give a healthy chunk of funds to local school districts since the large majority of students who attend stateside DoD schools live on base and, if you live on base housing you don't (or your landlord doesn't) pay property taxes. I don't know of any school district in the country which can or will absorb a bunch of new students without some additional funding. 3. As another commentor put it, you get rid of 300,000 military personnel you still have to hire someone (GS or contractor) to do those jobs. No huge savings there either. 4. Tuition Assistance (TA) - Most VA programs require you to have finished your service prior to using benefits. The Active Duty TA program is just that...for use while you are active duty. Few people actually complete an entire Bachelor degree using TA, most just use it to pick up some classes so they are ahead of the game when they do separate from the service. 5. Much better comments regarding research have already been put out there so I'll leave that one alone.
  • My view
    Time Bandit
    I am not too familiar with military spending but I do know defense contractors blow a good deal, used to be a defense contractor for 10 years with the Navy in DC before I was laid off. The company I worked for would hire do nothing slackers, they would sit in their office, twiddle their thumbs and collect a hefty paycheck. They would hire wet behind the ears graduates from college that had no experience in Navy work, let alone know how to cut and paste in power point and pay them $58k+ a year while I...who only had a diploma and was paid $42k, did more work and knew way more. I still love and miss the Navy, would love to go back but seeing how things are going..I don't think it's a good time to try.