We just can't afford to take care of all the poor people in the world.

[Scuba]

Not if we want to wage endless wars, anyway ...

[CaliforniaPeggy]

1. Well, gee! Doncha know the war profiteers must have their money first! I mean, they MATTER!

[Mnemosyne]

4. The arrogance and gall are astonishing. I'll join you...

[steve2470]

2. kick and rec nt

[jwirr]

3. K&R

[newfie11]

5. There might be less poor people in the world if we stopped destroying their countries nt

[n2doc]

6. But if we fed them, they would just be poor next year!

Just throwing money down a black hole to help those takers. While there will never be a need for further military spending! Gosh.

[Fred Sanders]

7. One plane, the F35 has wasted enough money to pay for universal health care for the entire

Western Hemisphere.

[Indydem]

39. Based on what mathematics?

The population of the Western Hemisphere is 1 Billion.

The TOTAL COST of the F35 over it's entire lifetime of 50 YEARS is 1.5 Trillion.

So unless you know how exactly we can offer Universal healthcare for $1,500 a person, you should probably stop.

[Fred Sanders]

42. Based on hyperbole.....calm down.

[daleanime]

45. If you add that to what we are already paying in health care costs....

I do believe your there.

[BobbyBoring]

69. And that's based on what mathematics?

The fucking plane still doesn't fly right and has Tom's of bugs. That figure will continue to rise.

[randys1]

77. We need the plane, without it billionaires cant get richer...

[Leith]

8. We Can't Afford NOT to

I get so angry about war. The horror, waste, uselessness, suffering. Why can't the US use its might and influence in the world to help instead of hurt?

[ReRe]

17. Your question haunts me daily...

... if this country really wanted to live up to what it says we are (exceptional), we would be doing exactly the opposite of what we have since WWII. We would be that "shining city on a hill."
It just seems like peace would be allot more profitable than war and pestilence.

[hifiguy]

58. War is a splendidly, spectacularly profitable racket for the 1%.

Until the 1% and their baleful effect on the rest of humanity (the system they sit atop, which is laughably and euphemistically called "free-market capitalism&quot are conclusively removed from the discussion nothing will change.

[ReRe]

60. Well...

... that certainly didn't make me feel any better.

Nothing like a little truth to totally ruin ones day.

[hifiguy]

61. Sorry...

[Zorra]

9. K&R nt

[abelenkpe]

10. K&R

[Spitfire of ATJ]

11. You can BET someone has done the math to figure out how to KILL all the poor people of the earth.

[obxhead]

15. Not all of the poor people

Only those living above profitable resources. The others need to be saved to be the labor.

[DhhD]

16. It is the Anointed One that want all of the poor to give everything they have to his Dominion

existence. He got off to a start by shutting the US government down last year. He is openly calling for the closing of most all government agencies. Ted Cruz is supported by Rick Perry. Both want to become President of a country with a democratic government that they can destroy. They must be planning on killing all the Resistance.

[Spitfire of ATJ]

35. Someone posted a video a while back from Texas....

http://www.democraticunderground.com/107819645

Go to 1:40 in the video.

The thug says the gays should all be exterminated and then he says the same should happen in poor areas of town.

Betcha that "trash" he speaks of are non-White....

You know,....'cuz he's not racist and all...

[KamaAina]

73. That'd be Jello Biafra of the Dead Kennedys

[nomorenomore08]

82. "EEE-ficiency and PRO-gress is ours once more, now that we have the NEU-tron bomb!"

A total classic for sure.

[randys1]

78. It helps that most of them are Brown, killing Brown people is something we do real good

here in the good ole USofA



I miss this man more than I miss John Lennon, Elvis Presley, Michael Jackson, John Belushi, Jimi Hendrix and Janis Joplin combined...


[link:

|

[Spitfire of ATJ]

79. We need another "Mr. Conductor".

[Moostache]

12. What we can't afford any more is the collective global 1% (really 0.01%)...

The global elites suck the system dry through rigged commerce, monopolistic practices and out right fraud...they are no more "job creators" than I am in my role as a consumer...less in reality since I spend (and therefore circulate) a much higher percentage of my total compensation...

The world's insane while you drink champagne and I'm living in black rage. - Ice T (Body Count - 1992)
This shit's just getting worse by the decade and it does not matter if its 8 years of Dem's (Clinton, Obama) or 8 years of Rep's (Bush)...no matter who sits in the big chair, the "little" people are losing ground.

We need real change already and we are not getting it if we put ANOTHER Clinton in the White House...Hillary remains "likeable enough", its just her politics are KNOWN...she is 3rd Way Corporatist through and through and we do not need more of the same to know this insanity has to end...

[Scuba]

19. +1

[Dustlawyer]

25. Don't forget the fossil fuel industries killing all of us to squeeze every drop of oil and lump of

coal and turn it into $$$$$!

[daleanime]

47. +1

[niyad]

13. k and r for this amazingly simple concept and fact.

[delete_bush]

34. Yes, it's an amazingly simple concept.

So tell me, what would you do to actually IMPLEMENT this concept?

[TBF]

14. K&R for truth. nt

[Hubert Flottz]

18. "Where There's Smoke, There's Work!" ~ George Leroy Tirebiter

The movers and shakers don't care a damn, about the "little guy." Remember Mitt's 47% speech?

[mckara]

20. We Can Only Afford to Kill Everyone

[ReRe]

21. K&R

We cannot call ourselves civilized as long as this mass destruction continues by TPTB & MIC.

[brachism]

22. That approximation seems suspect

It would take approximately $135 billion to totally eradicate poverty?

Does anyone know the source of that approximation quote? Is that $135 billion for the U.S. or for the world? Is that $135 billion per year? That number seems suspiciously low. I'm not disputing the bigger point that if much of the money wasted on weapons and war was diverted to better uses such as addressing poverty then the lives of 100’s millions or billions of people could be improved. I am suggesting that it will take a lot more than $135 billion (per year?) as shown in that infographic to eradicate all poverty, or even to significantly reduce just extreme poverty.

http://www.gallup.com/poll/166565/one-five-worldwide-living-extreme-poverty.aspx
WASHINGTON, D.C. -- Gallup's self-reported household income data across 131 countries indicate that more than one in five residents (22%) live on $1.25 per day or less -- the World Bank's definition of "extreme poverty." About one in three (34%) live on no more than $2 per day. The World Bank Group recently set a new goal of reducing the worldwide rate of extreme poverty to no more than 3% by 2030, but Gallup's data suggest meeting that goal will require substantial growth and job creation in many countries. In 86 countries, more than 3% of the population lives on $1.25 per day or less.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Poverty
Poverty reduction is a major goal and issue for many international organizations such as the United Nations and the World Bank. The World Bank estimated 1.29 billion people were living in absolute poverty in 2008. Of these, about 400 million people in absolute poverty lived in India and 173 million people in China. In terms of percentage of regional populations, sub-Saharan Africa at 47% had the highest incidence rate of absolute poverty in 2008. Between 1990 and 2010, about 663 million people moved above the absolute poverty level. Still, extreme poverty is a global challenge; it is observed in all parts of the world, including developed economies.[5][6] UNICEF estimates half the worlds children (or 1.1 billion) live in poverty.[7]

http://inequalitywatch.eu/spip.php?article105
Poverty is declining worldwide. However, still 1.3 billion people live below the line of extreme poverty, which is nearly one quarter of the inhabitants of the world. Translated by Rita Stadtfeld

The number of people living under the threshold of extreme poverty [1] in the world has declined from 1.9 to a little less than 1.3 billion between 1981 and 2008. A positive evolution, even more so since the world population has increased at the same time. The extreme poverty rate was reduced by half: today, 22.4 % of the world population lives with less than 1.25 Dollars per day, against 52.2 % at the beginning of the 1980s.

[Scuba]

24. If your assumption is that the money would be given directly to the poor, then ....

... it would not be sufficient to eradicate poverty.

However, if it were invested in cooperative, job-generating, poverty-easing programs it would multiply its benefit.

Hard to pin down actual numbers, but the massive waste of military expenditures has zero return for everyone except a small number of defense industry employees and a smaller number of already wealthy MIC owners who take the largest cut. The idea is to make the money productive for the masses, not the few.

[Half-Century Man]

29. Give it to the world's poor; as wages.

Spur the world's economy by the mass hiring of the poor to
Rebuild infrastructure wasted by war.
Convert as much of the world's power grid to renewable energy as possible.
Clean the land and the sea of 150 years worth of human garbage.
Begin sorting, recycling, condensing, composting, and reclaiming the resources we have already excavated, from the waste products of our civilization.
Reclaim and renew our wasted lands, from urban ruins to lands blasted by strip mining. We stop encroaching on undeveloped lands until we prove we can take care of the land we have.
Educate everyone, the sheer mass of the waste of potential is our greatest tragedy.
And start reaching for the stars. It is time we started to move from our first home.

[hfojvt]

43. NO amount of money spent has ZERO return

Once I made a decent living working for the MIC. Had I stuck with it, I could have lived pretty well and raised a family and so on. You think the hundreds of thousands of people employed by the military and the people employed by the contractors are NOT spending their money and stimulating the economy? That's just absurd. That's not the way an economy works.

Now the actual WAGING of war has a negative impact, it ends the productive lives of perfectly healthy people and it destroys perfectly good buildings and roads and bridges and other infrastructure and supplies. It burns a lot of petroleum in jet fuel, helicopters and tanks and in moving supplies around the world.

But even that could be said to create jobs - for undertakers, but also for re-building. Blowing up a bomb and then buying more bombs stimulates the economy just like blowing up a firecracker and then buying more firecrackers. It's a stupid activity, but it gives people something to do, something, apparently, that some people WANT to do.

And sometimes, with our silly economic system - having nothing to do is one of the worst things ever - in terms of employment.

It shouldn't be, but it is.

[daleanime]

48. zero return for everyone "expect"....

I think that point was covered nicely. You really believe that's the best way to simulate the economy?

[joeglow3]

54. Wow. You managed to stuff some words in his mouth

Nowhere did he say that was the best way.

[daleanime]

59. Gee, your right...

not 'gun-ho' in the least bit.

[hfojvt]

66. I may have mentioned in my post

that I used to work for DOD. Made good money in 1986 and was promised even more money. One guy I talked to said I would likely be a GM-14 if I had stayed with it. GM-14s make $40.99 an hour.

I quit as a GS-9 ($20.11 an hour) in November 1986 and was promised a promotion for the next two years, up to GS-12 ($29.17 an hour).

Why did I quit? Because as a 25 year old hippie, I did NOT want to be part of the war machine.

Also, I felt like a 40 hour week was boring as hell and also sucking my life away.

So there I was in the 1990s working 70 hour weeks and I calculated how much money I lost by quitting. It was something like $300,000.

But hey, I did get an MA in economics in 1990 so I know something about how the economy works.

The money that members of the MIC get simply does NOT benefit just THEM. Because they spend it. They go out to eat, the buy TVs and DVDs, they buy cars, and dog food, and stereos and high speed internet, and so on and so forth. And then the people that they bought a car from also have some money to spend, and so on.

When you pay some people to do a job, whether that job is just to bang rocks together or whether it is making armaments, then that money stimulates the economy.

I made a great personal sacrifice to get out of the war machine, something that ultimately cost me a lot and slowed the war machine not one bit. In fact, compared to now, even the 1980s look like the 1960s.

[daleanime]

67. Still was mentioned.....

yes when you pay people it tends to simulate the economy. Surprising how that works, so why is it so hard to admit that if you pay more people(including many currently unemployed) you get a bigger 'bang' for your buck?

Not trying to be jerk, just don't understand why you seem to want to obscure something that looks so obvious.

[joeglow3]

68. I think they pointed out the flaw in someones reasoning

they gave the impression that $135 billion (about $70 per person in poverty, assuming 1.5 billion worldwide) would stimulate the economy so much that it would do the trick in eliminating poverty and pretended like the money spent on the war did not stimulate the economy.

That is a SEPARATE discussion from the ethics of the war. One can recognize the economic benefits that can come from military spending without supporting the military spending (due to ethical opposition).

[Scuba]

80. You've conveniently omitted the fact that ...

... most of the money spent on the war machine doesn't go to the workers in the industry, it goes into the bank accounts of already-wealthy owners of Raytheon, General Dynamics, etc. It is not spent, it is hoarded.

[hfojvt]

81. because I am sure that is not true

Take General Dynamics, which I just looked up
annual reports here http://investorrelations.gd.com/phoenix.zhtml?c=85778&p=irol-reportsannual

For 2013 they report $31.2 billion in revenue and only 11.8% of that is earnings. The other almost 90% is going to expenses, payroll and supplies (and so on). They even set aside over $1 billion to pay taxes (although how much was actually paid is seemingly not known as it is in the report as "provision" for income taxes.

They only paid out 34% of their net earnings in dividends. Which would be $850 million, the other $1.7 billion staying with the company. Which, even if all of that is hoarded is no more than 8% of revenue.

And while rich people are like me, in that they do not spend all that they make (gasp), they don't hoard all that they make either.

And a good portion of war machine spending doesn't even goto contractors, it goes to soldiers. At least 25% if the DOD budget, with another equaivalent amount going to veterans. (I am surprised it isn't higher, but don't want to do more digging, but notice it does not include civilian employees of DOD, apparently)

[BlueCheese]

32. If there are 1 billion poor people...

That works out to $135 per person annually, or 37 cents per day per person. I don't see how that could work.

As you said, this doesn't affect the larger point about priorities, but I don't think there's any way $135 billion a year would do it.

[YOHABLO]

23. I give up. The Human Race is so fucked up. Sorry but that's the truth!

[abelenkpe]

31. Right there with you.

[Amonester]

33. Agreed 100%.

Besides, for that (other) Utopia to ever become reality, the USSR (uh... the Russia, sorry), China, North Korea, UK, France, Israel, Canada, and every other country that has a functional army (including, of course, the US) would also have to stop all their spending in their MIC at once.

Not to mention the millions of UNION jobs to get lost at once...

Not gonna happen, ever.

Sorry to rain on the utopic parade.

[demwing]

26. End the war spending - perfect. No argument here!

but how do we know how much it will take to end poverty? I'd like to repeat this meme, but I'd like to know that it's true. Sources?

[Dark n Stormy Knight]

74. I don't think the numbers are correct. But I agree wholeheartedly with the

idea that we ought to stop spending billions to destroy and spend that money instead to build. And I don't mean build palaces for the 1% either. Build a better world.

Not gonna happen though, since the powers that be are spending a great deal of money to change the rules so they can acquire even more wealth and power. So, they're getting wealthier and more powerful, and it continues to spiral. And they don't really care how fked up the world is, as long as they get to buy a newer, bigger yacht. (Though a few are happy if you just let them torture some "muslims". And they'll kill for the wealthy, too. They come in real handy and speak well of their masters.)

[LittleBlue]

27. I agree with the sentiment of the first statement, but the second...

How does that person figure $135bn would eradicate poverty? That seems way too low. I think that is a severe underestimation.

[daleanime]

50. Your right, it does seem low....

so let's experiment. We'll do this for one year and see what happens.

[Ken Burch]

28. It's all in what you mean by "take care of".

At this point, our leaders are trying to "take care of" the global poor in the same way a homeowner would try to "take care of" termites.

[Logical]

30. Where does that 135 Billion come from? Is that for a year, etc? nt

[Enthusiast]

36. Kicked and recommended!

It comes down to priorities.

There are better ways to make money than through the military and wars.

Why not do some good for a change?

The people are weary of the lies used to justify ever greater military spending and military expansionism.

[valerief]

37. But killing poverty would kill the war machine, and the very richest people

wouldn't get richer. That's inconceivable to the ruling class.

[hughee99]

38. Wow, the US alone spent $82 billion on food stamps last year,

and didn't eradicate poverty in the US. For only an additional $53 billion a year, we could eradicate GLOBAL poverty? That's astounding!

[Indydem]

40. Why is math so HARD?!!

There are 3 billion people living in poverty.

$135 Billion divided by 3b is $45.

Can you eradicate poverty with $45??????

Even if you used the 1.735 Trillion number, it's still only $579.

How about $579? Can you eradicate poverty with that?

No?

Math. Use it.

[blackspade]

41. we have a winner.

[JCMach1]

44. Those poor people aren't job creators... jeesh

[pansypoo53219]

46. we can't afford the rich not paying their fair share.

[geardaddy]

49. K and R

[liberal N proud]

51. Find a way to make caring for the poor profitable and making bombs unprofitable

Then and only then will the poor get the attention they deserve.

[sadoldgirl]

52. It would be already a huge improvement,

if we stopped selling weapons to other countries. I dare say that helping the poor might also create more friends, but what would we do with NSA and CIA then? We are told that we need them desperately!

[malthaussen]

53. How does $200 per person "totally eradicate poverty?"

Seen this one before. The arithmetic doesn't work. Even if the larger figure were divided among everyone, does $3000 per person sound like it would "eradicate" poverty? Although I daresay it would improve conditions somewhat. I could sure use it.

-- Mal

[drynberg]

55. Too bad so many DUers have missed the point, that we cherish blowing stuff up more than feeding

Those starving...this is the point, right?

[demigoddess]

56. If we would stop spending it on wars

we would be able to develop wealth through not having to rebuild all the infrastructure etc. It is kind of like breaking all your dishes every meal instead of washing them. You would soon go broke restocking all the plates etc that you destroy. Even buying at thrift stores, which I do.

[Indydem]

63. When the entirety of mankind shares in your love of peace

I am confident we will have a wonderful utopia.

Until then, reality is what it is.

[hifiguy]

57. Maybe, but where is the profit in that?

Gotta keep your eyes focused firmly on the corporate bottom line and returns to shareholders, ya know. Nothing else really counts. Ever.

[steve2470]

62. BOOTSTRAPS !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Yes, the world can do a whole lot more to eliminate this horrible condition.

[world wide wally]

64. Too mind boggling for words

well there is on word … what BULLSHIT
We deserve what we get

[Taitertots]

65. We have to choose between: eradicate poverty or have a tiny cabal richer than kings

War is just another way that the tiny cabal of oligarchs impoverishes the masses to inflate their pocketbook.

[steve2470]

70. Report: 27% of Americans think poor are lazy

Report: 27% of Americans think poor are lazy

http://www.cbsnews.com/news/report-27-of-americans-think-poor-are-lazy/

May 16, 2012, 3:25 PM

[Dark n Stormy Knight]

75. It's because people don't think logically much of the time. It's true

that some poor people are lazy. But then so are some rich people. It goes back to that faulty belief that anybody who works hard will do well, and that people who are doing well must have worked hard. It's just not true, but you can't convince many people of that.

[steve2470]

76. agreed ! nt

[KamaAina]

71. The point is to lift them up out of poverty

but that, too, would require an end to the 1984-esque state of perpetual war.

[Boom Sound 416]

72. Is that 135B per year?