Sirota of Salon only gets it half right. Here's the rest of the story on why we hear so little on the price tag of the Military Industrial Complex.
The featured piece on Salon right now is another well written article on how much the Pentagon gets of our tax dollars as opposed to health care, which is being debunked as "too expensive" by our fiscal "responsible" politicians. David Sirota (who is a favorite of mine) brings to light the elephant in the room that Eisenhower also warned us about so long ago in his farewell speech at the end of his presidency. Sirota brings out stark figures:
When the House considered a healthcare expansion proposal that the CBO says will reduce the deficit by $11 billion a year, tea party protesters and Congress' self-described "fiscal conservatives" opposed it on cost grounds. At the same time, almost none of them objected when Congress passed a White House-backed bill to spend $636 billion on defense in 2010.
He then continues as to the reason behind the lack of outrage:
So, as Bob Dole might ask, where's the public outrage at the contradiction? It's nowhere. Well, why not?
One clear answer is values -- or lack thereof. In our militaristic culture, we are taught to prioritize Pentagon spending over everything else.
Another less obvious answer is ignorance sown by skewed reporting.
The health bill's expenditures are typically described by reporters in 10-year, $1 trillion terms while defense spending is described -- if at all -- as a one-year, $636 billion outlay. That can lead citizens to think the healthcare bill will cost more than defense -- when, in fact, the 10-year comparison pits a $1 trillion healthcare bill against $6.3 trillion in projected defense spending.
But, disappointingly, he does not attempt to answer the why. Why does the media ignore and distort the true cost of our war prone society?
Several reasons, but they are all tied back to the fact that our country is owned by so few at the top and those few weave a web to keep the citizens ignorant and spoon fed with entertainment news. Our main stream media has consolidated into large behemoths that profit from our military industrial complex, General Electric being the most obvious - NBC's parent company that also receives direct money from the Pentagon under contract.
Those companies that don't also offer war product though have CEO's and executives that play golf with those that do, with our elected representatives driving the golf carts. As the gap between the rich and the rest of us continues to widen we will continue to hear the false outrage of dollars being spent on programs that benefit the many while endless war enriches the plutocracy and the main-stream-media megaphone beats the war-drums to keep the population compliant.
Our country is going to suffer and guess who's going to pay? Us, we the people - the bottom 98%. Unless we turn off our spoon fed news on TV and hit the streets, there is no way to stop this train bound for collective bankruptcy. This Great Recession is nothing compared to how bad it could get. The military industrial complex is right up there with the banks - they need to go down and go down quickly. Fight for your country or brace yourself, because it will be ugly.
UPDATE: OK, Thanks for the spellcheck, I'm with ya. As far as "blaming veterans" this should not be taken as such. If I could have used "military industrial complex" instead of "military" in the title, I would have. I have friends in the military, believe me. I feel so so badly that the cost of war includes the highest cost - of life. Again, those that should be blamed in this country are not the soldiers that go, but those that send the soldiers due to lust for profit - the ONLY reason we've been fighting both the Iraq War, and now, the war in Afghanistan (if maybe it started due to retribution, but not any more).
UPDATE II: I see the point that "military" could be taken to represent just the soldiers, but it can also be defined as a collective body of defense spending. Therefore I will not change my title. I also feel that the number of comments that I'm somehow singling out the American citizens that choose to serve is missing the forest (and probably not really reading the whole diary)- did you follow the link to list of billions of dollars GE - who owns a big news broadcasting network - makes off of our military industrial complex? By being shrill that I am singling out the troops is just playing into the hands of those that use that argument to divert attention from the fact that they lobby our government to keep Americans in war (and force their message by the various media that they own). Don't shoot the messenger.. get angry at those that tug at your indignation in order to divert ANY criticism from the amount of money - OUR TAX DOLLARS – the federal government spends on sending people to war.