Pentagon wants more money for Israel's Iron Dome

[Purveyor]

Source: Associated Press

(03-27) 10:57 PDT WASHINGTON, (AP) --

The Pentagon says it will ask Congress for more money for Israel's anti-rocket system known as the "Iron Dome."

In a statement released Tuesday, Pentagon press secretary George Little said the system to defend against short-range rockets and mortar attacks has been critical in recent weeks when nearly 300 rockets were fired at southern Israel from Gaza. The Iron Dome system intercepted more than 80 percent of the targets.


Read more: http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/n/a/2012/03/22/national/w123753D34.D

[mother earth]

1. Why don't we just give the Pentagon all the money? Why not, we are almost there anyway. nt

[rayofreason]

2. Defense is 20% of the budget in 2010. n/t

[mother earth]

6. Really? Progress then...but I can't help but think about all the money spent that could have done

so much good. The war machine is shameless. I don't begrudge Israel it's defense, and I'd rather see this than WWIII.
Still, we could have done wonders with all we've thrown into death and destruction.

[FarCenter]

7. Defense is over half of the budget

if you take out Medicare/Medicade and Social Security, which are funded by their own tax revenues.

And you take out interest on the debt and mandatory spending programs.

Defense actually exceeds all other discretionary spending.

[rayofreason]

10. If you take out everything else, defense is 100% of the budget.

Defense as a fraction of the budget and as a percentage of GDP has decreased just as the other parts of the budget have increased. For comparison with other countries see

https://www.cia.gov/library/publications/the-world-factbook/rankorder/2034rank.html

Of course, it is still a lot of money we spend, and it should be scrutinized carefully. But outcries of "our defense spending most of the budget" don't hold water and are not a good place to begin rational discussions of policy.

[provis99]

17. the CBO says defence is more than half the discretionary budget.

This figure doesn't even include military spending covered in the non-discretionary budget, such as veteran's benefits, disability pay, or veteran's health care.
http://www.cbo.gov/publication/43119

The budget figures also don't include the costs of maintaining the Afghanistan and other foreign wars.

[Autumn]

3. This fucking sucks

cuts for the poor and elderly and schools in our country and not only does most of our money go to OUR military, we also supports another fucking countries military. How fucking stupid is that.

[denverbill]

4. God allegedly chose that land for the Israeli's why won't he protect them?

I'm getting pretty tired of borrowing trillions of defending the entire world.

[awoke_in_2003]

15. because he doesn't exist? nt

[Comrade Grumpy]

5. No, thank you. Let Israel pay for its own defenses.

[sulphurdunn]

12. This system is a joint venture

between Raytheon and Rafael Advanced Systems. It is essentially Israeli. It sounds like they cut Raytheon in to help peddle it to the Pentagon. You'd think a country that spends about $1 trillion annually on national defense and security would be building its own defense systems and selling them to the Israelis.

[sarcasmo]

21. +1

[felix_numinous]

8. "Nope sorry not this year

too many starving kids, and we need more for education and housing, can't spare it, sorry,"---The People.

[SamG]

9. So we should borrow MORE money from China

to help Israel defend herself, since she is being such a good neighbor to the Palestinians, and all her Arabian neighbors, and has been such a gracious, caring, generously philanthropic partner to those nations close-by her, over the last 65 years.

Israel, such a nice nation, why do those Arab nations not treat her well?

From the link:
"The Iron Dome system intercepted more than 80 percent of the targets."

Sounds like the Iron Dome system is being quite effective, and that, with a little more dollars borrowed by us from China, it could be better. OR Israel could spend more of their own $ on what she wants for herself.

Talk about chutzpah!

[Prometheus Bound]

11. That's a pretty leaky dome.

Just change the name to 'iron sieve' or something and save the money.

[Posteritatis]

14. a 20% strike rate's rather better than the 100% rate they'd have without it. (nt)

[Devil_Fish]

13. Since when was Israel part of US?

Seriously, If Israel wants to bomb Iran, and kill the people in Gauza, They can do it them selves. We have enough trouble over here. We don't need to pick any more fights.

[sarcasmo]

20. Has been a defacto state for quite some time.

[Canuckistanian]

16. No.

They should pull themselves up by their own bootstraps. They get enough money from the Pentagon as it is.

[marble falls]

18. So when will they ask Israeli taxpayers for some more tax bucks?

[sarcasmo]

19. More money for Israel, but no Medicare for all. The Empire does not care about it's people.