BUT, the dems are hard over to force sequestration to get their way…
Excerpted from DOD Buzz yesterday…
Standing up and trying to explain how sequestration and the resulting defense cuts are a bad thing because the Air Force can’t buy planes and the Army will lose soldiers is going right over the public’s head. Three out of four Americans want to see the Pentagon take a healthy cut in these fiscally austere times, according to a survey done by the Program for Public Consultation, the Center for Public Integrity and the Stimson Center.
Instead, the defense industrial base hopes they can grab Americans’ fleeting attention spans with a report Tuesday morning that states sequestration will force defense companies to fire more than 1 million Americans. At 10 a.m. Tuesday, the Aerospace Industries Association will release a study done by a George Mason professor that states that sequestration will almost certainly cost America 1.09 million jobs over the next year and put another 600,000 federal jobs at risk.
As a reminder, these are NOT low paying menial jobs, these are professional folks, engineers, researchers, highly skilled assembly folks, technicians, etc. I saw a blurb on-line yesterday too that stated it looks like Northern Virginia and Norfolk stand to lose 60,000 jobs just in those two areas…
Another point is that if this occurs, we face a significant risk of impacting the few high tech manufacturing/shipbuilding/aircraft manufacturers that are left in the USA. If we lose those folks, you can stick a fork in us, because those skills (and capabilities) are perishable…
Oh yeah, and a LOT of these jobs are union jobs too! THAT is really going to make things interesting…
Keep this in mind if you get a chance to ask your congresscritters any questions between now and November!
It’s like watching a slow motion train wreck, with the train engineers high as a kite, and the passengers too busy drinking and playing poker to even look up.
The cabin in the woods is looking better each day.
Most of America do not know what it means. I think that’s intentional on the part of the Dems. They give it a big name. It sounds important but nobody knows what it means. You sequester jurys. I’ve seen it in relation to pumping CO2 into the ground. But I’ve never seen it used for financial purposes. The media has done a poor job educating the public (per usual)about the origins and effects. All I can say is buy more ammo.
It is one more component of the purposful destruction of our country. And no – the Democrats simply do not care. I think that the believe the public will turn to them to pick up the pieces.
Perhaps they should be a little more concerned that the public might tear them to pieces . . . .
1. We’ve had these “the sky is going to fall” standoffs before and they always seem to get worked out at the last minute. The public is getting a bit numb to the warning cries of impending disaster. The Chicken Little effect and all that…
2. We are running deficits to the tune of almost a trillion dollars a year. Something’s got to give. Yes, cutting funding is going to cost people jobs…but they are jobs being funded by taxpayer dollars. In other words, WE, the taxpayers are paying the high salaries and funding the cushy benefits that those people are enjoying….while we’re facing layoffs, pay and benefit cuts and having to tighten our belts. I don’t think the average citizen who’s spending power and job security have been decreasing steadily over the past decade are feeling very sorry for those poor poor, taxpayer funded people who are finally beginning to face some of the same things the rest of us have been.
And continually reminding us of how much more “highly paid” these positions are probably isn’t helping much. If those people are so well qualified and deserving of those high paying jobs…they shouldn’t have any trouble competing in the private sector with the rest of us, should they?
3. The Republicans bought off on this deal when they agreed to the “compromise”. How much outrage can we now have when it comes time to pay the piper? We get the government we deserve.
The Republicans expect me to cry a river over their plight when they got themselves into this mess over my objections to begin with?
Give me a break. We elected these people to congress for a specific purpose. They failed. They were weak enough to sign off on this compromise instead of holding the line and refusing the increase the debt ceiling without agreement to significant spending cuts as we demanded they do.
They are now reaping what they sowed.
Will it hurt? Sure it will.
I hate to break it to you, but dealing with the consequences of bad decisions always hurts…and always should. Otherwise, why stop making them?
Don’t get me wrong…I’m retired military and worked for a government contractor for many years (in the private sector now, thank God). Many of my friends and family members are going to be affected by this. I don’t take it lightly. I live in one of the regions (Norfolk) that’s going to be hammered hard if it comes to pass.
But the bottom line is that we are on an unsustainable course. We cannot get back on track by crying and moaning because it’s OUR ox that’s getting gored instead of the other guy’s. As long as we keep electing these pansies to office who give in at the first sign of difficulty, that’s what we’re going to get.
And we deserve it.
We put them there after all.
I’m with Curt. It’s gonna suck, but it has to happen. However, it should also apply to the entitlements, federal employees of all stripes, and any other pork-barrel schemes. Across the board, no exceptions.
Curt, Don – perhaps you might want to re-visit the early 90s when Clinton gutted the military. Read the AARs of our somilia adventure – our military were lucky to have enough working equipment to get forces to the shores. We were even luckier to be able to evacuate our military with our asses handed to us by 3rd world warlords.
It will gut the “middle management” of our military, force us to fight with weapons systems that were new when I enlisted in the 60s.
As for the casual dismisal of the engineering knowledge base required to build the systems that keep our nation free – spend some time in defense development. Or spend some time as a person whose life depends on these systems. See if your casual attitued survives.
And I am pretty damn tired of the “somethings gotta give – let’s cut the military”. The military budget – even with our operational level today – is a trifle compared to the social programs that are sucking us dry as a nation. ~17% compared to over 60% – so lets get real as to where the true fraud, waste and abuse are.
The cuts may happen. The expense never goes away. Weak horses are prey. The price for our willingness to become weak once again will be paid in the blood of our citizens and our military. And in the massive expendature of our treasure to, yet again, win that battle.
It’s not a “game” – it’s our survival as a free nation.
All, thanks for the comments, and Curt you are right, but so is eia. We’re paying the price for our mis-steps in who we elected; and the ‘major’ issue to me is that I do not believe entitlements will EVER be cut.
Posted from my iPhone.
perhaps you might want to re-visit the early 90s when Clinton gutted the military.
I don’t need to revisit it. I was there, in the military, living it.
It wasn’t fun.
As for the casual dismisal of the engineering knowledge base required to build the systems that keep our nation free – spend some time in defense development. Or spend some time as a person whose life depends on these systems. See if your casual attitued survives.
Been there, done that…on both counts. Remember the part where I said I’m retired military and worked for a government contractor for many years?
Doesn’t change my opinion in the least.
Would I PREFER that defense be cut less (some of the cuts HAVE to come from defense, but not this much) and the bulk of the cuts come from other programs (like entitlements, DOE, DHS, etc)? Of course.
But this is the “compromise” that the people WE elected came up with.
If that means that a bunch of people are going to lose the high paying, cushy jobs they’ve become accustomed to…well…I’m sorry about that.
Been there and done that too. Also not fun.
But, as I said, if the people who lose their jobs are as highly qualified and skilled as the salaries and benefits the taxpayers have been providing for them imply, they should have no trouble finding suitable employment out here in the real world.
ei, I’m also retired Marine. I would gladly give up my pittance of a pension (30% on disability) if it meant my taxes to pay for the gooberments give-aways dropped to a level consistent with what the Constitution requires.
That’s what I want; a federal government that follows the Constitution, not “bread and circuses”.
I said nothing about cutting the military to the bone, downsizing it, or not replacing worn out equipment. But I also think there should be some cuts in some areas of the DoD. I also said that everything should be cut, not just the military.
But why do we need thousands of flag officers? Why do we need Deputy Assistants to the Assistant Secretaries to the Deputy Assistant Secretary for Cleaning Shitcans? And this doesn’t even begin to touch the other executive departments, Congress, or the federal courts.
The Constitution requires the federal gooberment to provide an ability to protect us from foreign invaders, a justice system and damn little else.
Curt – appears we have walked much of the same ground then sir.
Don – obviously you’re familar with the value of a strong national defense the.
My point is that we spend a mere pittance on national defense in relation to “entitlements”. We can – and probably will – gouge ourselves to the bone yet again on defense spendind, yet, in the long run is saves us nothing.
Our weak horse stance was one of the items the precipated 9/11 – as per UBL himself. The world simply has NOT become safer and I see no value in gutting our military now.
Time will tell . . . .
Just like when the cities and counties find out they’re overspending / not collecting enough taxes, the cry is “we’re going to have to cut the police and fire departments first!”
Yeah, call Parks and Recreation when the burglars set your house on fire.
Curt/Don/eia/Rick- We’ve ALL been there, and one point Curt. If they cut the defense contractors, there is NO place for them to be hired, as right now, other than Boeing, the USA has no commercial acft vendors, and Boeing will ALSO have to cut folks. On the shipbuilding side, same is true. Right now we have BIW, Avondale, and Ingalls; if they go, that is the majority of US capability. EB/NG are the ONLY submarine builder in the US, close them, no place in the US to go. Same in the IT world, and on and on. I’m glad I’m close to retirement, because I really think the end is near.
And yes, downsizing the upper ranks is a good start, but you need to keep the middle/lower ranks to promote at least some growth. But we DO need to update/refurb/repair equipment or we’re going to keep killing folks. It appears the HM-53E crash in Oman was a catastrophic material failure (those birds are over 25 years old).
I think we’re all on the same page, generally. But it’s also a microcosm of the greater debate that should be going on.
Your readers NFO, are generally of a military background, or at least familiar with it. None of us want to return to the 1930s when we had people training with bromsticks for lack of M-1s. But everyone has their pet area that just cannot be cut. BS! They all must be cut, at least to some extent.
My position is that we need to return to a strictly limited federal government as envisioned by the Founders. Unfortunately, we’re so far in the hole now that taxes and such would have to remain near their current unreasonable numbers until we get rid of the crushing debt.
Yes, we need the CH-53K, the MV-22 (or similar medium lift helicopter), we need a new DDG or CG, and a host of other things. But I’m of the opinion that one billion dollars is too much for one DDG. And a ten or fifteen year lead time for a new weapons system is BS, too. I believe it’s better to have a few hundred new build F-18Es in service than an F-35B or C in the pipeline for 2015. Unless, of course, that gets pushed back again.
Don- Concur with all, we need more DDG-51s not LCS or DDG 1000s. And no we don’t need the F-35 (and it’s over weight for carriers). I’m not saying don’t cut the military, but we also need to FIX the procurement process! When the congresscritters can FORCE the military to buy and un-needed and un-wanted engine for the F-35, something is wrong!
Vote them all out this fall.
I lost my retail job last October. Stimulus my ass.
My wife is a civilian on an Army contract. She’s only sure of pay through December.
We’ve laid in dried/canned food.
Have stocked up on other necessities.
It won’t be short. It won’t be pretty.
Saddest thing? Liberals will deny (nor even recognize) their actions lead to this.
At least my weekly unemployment claims help keep Teh 0ne’s numbers looking bad.
I agree we’ve all been through similar things. Wasn’t trying to say I’m the lone ranger or anything.
And I apologize if I came across too strong…the whole thing just pisses me off to no end.
I agree with all of you that this is a bad thing, I just can’t get over the fact that I keep getting told, over and over again, that if I don’t vote Republican I’m wasting my vote, or I’m voting for evil, or that the dems will gut the military and ruin us financially.
OK…we voted Republican…where did it get us? I’m sick of it.
We get the government we deserve.
Apparently we deserve either outright socialists with the courage fight (and the lack of integrity to fight dirty) for what they want, or spineless cowards to tuck their tails and run at the first sign of discomfort.
Because that’s who we keep electing.