Libtalker Thom Hartmann Says Eliminating Military is 'Really Good Idea'
A caller to Thom Hartmann's radio show Friday offered what he described as an "absurd" suggestion. That it certainly was, though Hartmann didn't think so.
The caller complained that President Obama missed "a great opportunity" to rein in defense spending and asked Hartmann what he thought about "completely closing down the military." Here's a transcript of the conversation and Hartmann's response (audio) --
CALLER: You inspired me to give you a call and I have an absurd solution. It seems like this is the time for absurd solutions because the right seems pretty absurd.
HARTMANN: OK.CALLER: But Obama missed a great opportunity when he came in to not pick up the war. Under Obama, I mean, he's spending around $1.3 trillion. If he cut a trillion from the war, brought the troops back, closed the bases, stop the Petraeus-led war on Americans and took that budget and put it on the economy, in terms of creating jobs in the United States and also trying to deal with climate change. I'm a climate scientist and so, I was working at NASA, and so, do you think it's an absurd idea, that idea of completely closing down the military and cutting off a trillion dollars?
HARTMANN: No, I think it's a really good idea and I totally agree with you. And in fact President Eisenhower has, you know, would have agreed with you. Back in, it was a speech he gave to the American Association (Society) of Newspaper Editors and it's famously known as the Cross of Iron speech.
... whereupon Hartmann played an excerpt of Eisenhower's speech, delivered in April 1953 three months after he took office. (transcript and audio).
That Eisenhower loathed waste in the military, having seen plenty of it during his decades in the service, and did not trust what he later derided in his farewell address as the military industrial complex, is beyond dispute.
That the man who led Allied forces in Europe against a ruthless Nazi military emboldened by pre-war weakness in the West would want to close down the American military is beyond absurd.
Hartmann, not surprisingly, has a bit of a following in Russia, presumably extending to the like-minded pacifists in the Kremlin.
(Illustration credit, Lala50 via Flickr)
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Comments
The following is what hippies like
Submitted by UpNorth on Mon, 06/18/2012 - 7:45pm.
Hartmann and the left always leave out of Ike's speech that day, "The amassing of the Soviet power alerted free nations to a new danger of aggression. It compelled them in self-defense to spend unprecedented money and energy for armaments. It forced them to develop weapons of war now capable of inflicting instant and terrible punishment upon any aggressor".
"It instilled in the free nations-and let none doubt this-the unshakable conviction that, as long as there persists a threat to freedom, they must, at any cost, remain armed, strong, and ready for the risk of war".
They can't acknowledge that, because it destroys their whole, everything is wonderful, we don't need the military, mantra.
Take out the US military and the financial crises blow up
Submitted by Dragoon on Mon, 06/18/2012 - 8:08pm.
There is a part of me that's curious about how countries like in the EU would fare if we drastically reduced/eliminated our military. I think there would be a lot of countries imploding under the burden of having to provide their own military. Countries like Syria could run roughshod over their poor defenseless neighbors and bring more under the control of brutal regimes. Yup, sounds like a great plan to me.
Also, I wanted to say hi to the NB community. Been reading for about two - three years now and finally got annoyed enough to sign up for an account. I look forward to future discussions with you all.
I've wondered about that too
Submitted by dmacleo on Mon, 06/18/2012 - 8:13pm.
and I have mixed feelings. some days I say too bad for them, other days I can't believe I thought it.
there is one solution.
withdraw and say if you attack we attack.
use the nukes.
you try to over run a country we turn you to a smoking heap.
MAD tactics
Submitted by Dragoon on Mon, 06/18/2012 - 8:18pm.
Mutually Assured Destruction will only work if your opponent has some fear of death. You take the Soviets for example and they weren't going to risk total annihilation. But with the current enemies we're seeing who believe martyring themselves is a path to heaven and it nullifies the MAD approach.
so nullify them
Submitted by dmacleo on Mon, 06/18/2012 - 9:35pm.
no downside.
Now THAT was ---
Submitted by matthewdean on Mon, 06/18/2012 - 10:57pm.
pithy. :o)
MD
just like a tactical nuke...
Submitted by dmacleo on Tue, 06/19/2012 - 3:32am.
I aim to please :)
Exactly upnorth*
Submitted by cajun2 on Mon, 06/18/2012 - 7:53pm.
When the World is at peace and then we can all sing Kumbaya.....until then...
http://www.globalsecurity.org/military/world/war/
Hippie hopey changey
Submitted by Pilgrim1949 on Tue, 06/19/2012 - 11:06am.
Brings back to memory the height of the hippie down-with-the-pigs days(daze?) -- which is now revisited in the Occupy-Space Cadets -- wherein there were bumper stickers that said:
If you think the cops are bad, next time you need help try calling a hippie!
Until there is a new heaven and new Earth with perfect peace, the lion might lie down with the lamb, but only the lion will get any sleep; the lamb will have to keep one eye open at all times.
"Ye canne change the laws of physics....." but some politicians believe that with the right legislation you can pretend they don't really apply to your own pet projects...
Whatever happened to the so-called Anti-War Movement?
Submitted by Dave. on Mon, 06/18/2012 - 8:06pm.
Funny how they apparently fell off the planet the day after the Dear Ruler's coronation.
I guess the left's anti-war sentiments depend solely on the letter that comes after the name of whoever happens to be the CIC at the time.
It figures.
-Dave
Vote for the American in November
You got it, Dave.
Submitted by UpNorth on Mon, 06/18/2012 - 8:19pm.
The anti-war movement became the pro-intervention movement the moment that Baracka was immaculated.
Because, with Baracka in power, we just do it for "the right reasons".
Oh yes.
Submitted by GregE on Mon, 06/18/2012 - 8:42pm.
Everyone knows President Eisenhower really wanted to close down the military.
These people need to be very careful. Whatever they are smoking is likely illegal.
Funny, isn't it?
Submitted by CobraMan on Tue, 06/19/2012 - 2:03pm.
Funny, isn't it? They claim that GENERAL Eisenhower, as Commander in Chief, wanted the standing military to disappear. As if!
The Citizens of each State shall be entitled to all Privileges and Immunities of Citizens in the several States. The US Constitution
Unless you're a fetus. The US Supreme Court
Or Anwar al-Awlaki.
I like how the caller thinks
Submitted by Sude23 on Mon, 06/18/2012 - 9:14pm.
I like how the caller thinks that his plan is saving the budget by cutting 'a trillion' dollars from the defense but really it's just moving the money somewhere else and they would still be spending that 'trillion' instead of saving it.
double post
Submitted by Sude23 on Mon, 06/18/2012 - 9:16pm.
double post
Radio 'liberal' Host
Submitted by Danube on Mon, 06/18/2012 - 9:15pm.
These people [anti-americans] are out of their minds. Now what we're seeing in America is, 'The Media Industrial Complex'
Agendas
Submitted by Izayas on Mon, 06/18/2012 - 9:21pm.
Brainwashing a nation requires total, or as close as you can get it, control of the message and it's outlets. It has become so self evident in my lifetime.
Ingratitude
Submitted by Unsane on Mon, 06/18/2012 - 9:43pm.
Freedom is just 100% free to Hartmann and Co.
"CONSUMED DEMOCRACY RETURNS A SOCIALIST REGIME" - Slayer, "Fictional Reality", from Divine Intervention (1994)
Hey, Thom............don't
Submitted by killa37 on Tue, 06/19/2012 - 1:25am.
Hey, Thom............don't come grovelin' (Obamaspeak) to me to protect you when things get down'n'dirty, after the military has been abolished!!! I don't 'get the backs' of libs, progos, or Dems.............and a very high percentage of Republicans either........
and I certainly wouldn't put my ass on the line for some dope named Tom who spells his name with an 'h'!!!!!
IMHO
Submitted by amyshulk on Tue, 06/19/2012 - 3:31am.
This just exposes the rift - R's want to spend on our security, and D's want to spend on social justice.
Who does the R&D? The Pentagon, via the military. The D's want to bypass them and go straight into it with the Solyndra's.
Ronald Reagan
Practicalities and the RealPolitik;
Submitted by LaVallette on Tue, 06/19/2012 - 7:15am.
Taking the numbers in the actual military, add their civilian support staff including the DOF, add all the people working in the military industrial complex and their suppliers: Put them all out of work!
And additional 10-15+ million unemployed to the current numbers. What a great idea!
And pray tell: why does spending on the military not fit into the Keynesian model???
Who gave this person a
Submitted by wiwf on Tue, 06/19/2012 - 11:42am.
Who gave this person a megaphone so he could parrot his idiot ideas?
Let's not repeat 1812
Submitted by CobraMan on Tue, 06/19/2012 - 2:12pm.
I wonder if any of these people ever learned history? It was the War of 1812 which taught us the importance of a standing military. We dang near lost that war, because we were completely unprepared. That's a mistake we have not repeated. Guess what? We're still here! Coincidence? I think not! Just ask the Japanese about that. They may have attacked Perl Harbor, but we still held it. And we still do.
By the way, I've always wondered about that tactic. They attacked the Harbor, but never intended to seize it? That doesn't make any sense. You don't just leave a stronghold like that behind. You seize it, and hold it, and use it to your own advantage. Had they seized it, and held it, they would have dominated the entire Pacific. Just as we did, after they left Perl Harbor relatively intact. We didn't attack strategic strongholds like Guam and then just abandon it, did we? No, we seized it, held it, and used it to our advantage. That's how we won the war.
The Citizens of each State shall be entitled to all Privileges and Immunities of Citizens in the several States. The US Constitution
Unless you're a fetus. The US Supreme Court
Or Anwar al-Awlaki.
Logistics
Submitted by Unsane on Tue, 06/19/2012 - 8:48pm.
Cobra, the logistical tail required to capture Pearl Harbor would have been impossible to sustain. Besides, the idea for the Japanese was not to go across the Pacific to the United States for resources. That would have been too far.
Instead, the whole idea of their "southern strategy" was centered around snatching the colonies of Britain and France. Japan judged that they were easy pickin's, and they were right. While the Brits put up a valiant struggle, the French coughed up what they had. And were the Netherlands prepared to defend the East Indies?
Thus, all they needed to do was to knock out the United States, while they "ran wild" for six months and secured possessions from Australia to the Home Islands. At which point, when the United States "came to", the Japanese conquest of the Greater East Asia Co-Prosperity Sphere would have been fait accompli.
Such, anyway, was the plan.
"CONSUMED DEMOCRACY RETURNS A SOCIALIST REGIME" - Slayer, "Fictional Reality", from Divine Intervention (1994)
Thom?
Submitted by CO2Maker on Tue, 06/19/2012 - 8:31pm.
Thom, like thumb? First off, let's all laugh at Tom-with-an-H Thom.
Did you notice that the NASA climate scientist who called in said that Obama could save $1 trillion by stopping the "Petraeus-led" war. Okay, accept that premise and ignore the insult to the general and assume that doing that would save $1 trillion. The guy then says to take the savings and "put it on the economy" (whatever that means), creating jobs and some for climate change.
Not spending $1T would immediately reduce the deficit and all the financial pressure on the economy. But the caller doesn't want to save the unspent (deficit) money. He wants to spend it on other things. Well, what good would that do to the deficit problems?