DIGGING DEEPER
By Ivan G. Goldman
By Ivan G. Goldman
Star Wars has been quietly but steadily milking the budget since early in the Reagan Administration, and after just about 25 years, the people pushing the hardware decided they must deploy something somewhere, so our warrior president is set to install stuff around Eastern Europe, where nations are so happy to be out of the Soviet orbit they’ll embrace almost any idiotic idea advocated by its new best friends in Washington.
After empowering al-Qaeda and Iran with his bungled occupation of Iraq, the gallant prince is off to kick-start another Cold War with Moscow. Understand that this missile defense scheme won’t protect us from anything. The respected American Physical Society took a good look at the theories and accomplishments of the program and in 2003, on a purely practical basis, debunked it as a crazy boondoggle. But with physical deployment, program backers can appear to be moving forward with a workable system.
Program supporters say anyone who opposes it wants America to be defenseless, but mathematically, this is madness multiplied by madness and then squared to the power of the military-industrial complex. For every dollar spent on missile defense, it costs only a few cents on the offensive end to overcome whatever was developed on the defensive end.
After empowering al-Qaeda and Iran with his bungled occupation of Iraq, the gallant prince is off to kick-start another Cold War with Moscow. Understand that this missile defense scheme won’t protect us from anything. The respected American Physical Society took a good look at the theories and accomplishments of the program and in 2003, on a purely practical basis, debunked it as a crazy boondoggle. But with physical deployment, program backers can appear to be moving forward with a workable system.
Program supporters say anyone who opposes it wants America to be defenseless, but mathematically, this is madness multiplied by madness and then squared to the power of the military-industrial complex. For every dollar spent on missile defense, it costs only a few cents on the offensive end to overcome whatever was developed on the defensive end.
We're spending $10 billion a year on this stuff now, and because of what Bush's people are setting in place, the Center for Defense Information forecasts this will rise to $18 billion by 2016.
The 2003 study found it might be possible to develop a limited system that with luck could intercept some missiles from Iran, but not those from North Korea. Meanwhile, the offensive trend is moving toward solid-fueled ICBMs which are harder to intercept during boost phase.
WHAT ABOUT CLINTON?
It would be nice to free the world of the threat of nuclear destruction, but the way to do it is to cut down the nukes, not undrwrite programs that will trigger a new missile race. The more missiles there are, the less safe we are.
This President watches blankly and dispassionately while young, broken bodies are sent home from Iraq, but gets very animated when it comes to pouring more funds into the accounts of his corporate pals, and Star Wars is just one more way to do it.
This President watches blankly and dispassionately while young, broken bodies are sent home from Iraq, but gets very animated when it comes to pouring more funds into the accounts of his corporate pals, and Star Wars is just one more way to do it.
If you wanted to manufacture a president that would ruin this nation one day at a time, he’d look very much like this one. Just throwing together a cold salad in the kitchen, this guy could burn down a city. Among his barely noticed abominable acts was to unilaterally pull the U.S. out of the Anti-Ballistic Missile Treaty in 2002.
Is help on the way? Maybe. Billl Clinton kept Star Wars afloat for eight years, and if he and Hillary get the next turn on the Bush-Clinton teeter-totter, expect more of the same.
Welcome back to the Cold War.
