Mid-breath cycling:
The Air Force's C-17 cargo planes alone, at $330 million each, with a total program cost of $65 billion, got $2.5 billion from Congress in 2010 for ten of these planes that the Pentagon didn't even ask for! That $2.5 billion, in 2010, could provide health care for 141,681 people, pay 6,138 public safety officers, 4,649 music and art teachers, and 4,568 elementary school teachers. There would still be enough left for 22,610 college scholarships, 46,130 Pell Grants, 1,877 affordable housing units, renewable electricity for 382,679 homes and 29,630 free Head Start programs - all for the cost of ten, unasked for C-17s. (16)
(16) "A Titanic Budget in an Ocean of Icebergs," TomDispatch.com, 2/28/10
Further on down the article, we read:
The freeze barely touches the deficit. Economist Paul Krugman estimates that without the freeze, total public debt would be 78.7% of US GDP by 2020. With the freeze the figure, according to the administration, would be 77.2%, a difference of one point five percent! (12) That's all it takes to justify the destruction of necessary social programs. In other words, once bankers and generals get their cut of our money, we won't even get crumbs. The plan is to sacrifice millions of our livelihoods via mass unemployment to please the bond market. (13)
(12) Lee Sustar & Alan Maass, "A budget that only Republicans could love," wsws 2/3/10
(13) Lee Sustar & Alan Maass, ibid.
I'm really left with no commentary.