How Much Money Could the Department of Defense Save if it Stopped Trying to Save Souls?

[cleanhippie]

When the average American thinks of military spending on religion, they probably think only of the money spent on chaplains and chapels. And, yes, the Department of Defense (DoD) does spend a hell of a lot of money on these basic religious accommodations to provide our troops with the opportunity to exercise their religion while serving our country. But that’s just the tip of the iceberg when it comes to the DoD’s funding of religion. Also paid for with taxpayer dollars are a plethora of events, programs, and schemes that violate not only the Constitution, but, in many cases, the regulations on federal government contractors, specifically the regulation prohibiting federal government contractors receiving over $10,000 in contracts a year from discriminating based on religion in their hiring practices.

About a year ago, the Military Religious Freedom Foundation (MRFF) began an investigation into just how much money the DoD spends on promoting religion to military personnel and their families. What prompted this interest in DoD spending on religion was finding out what the DoD was spending on certain individual events and programs, such as the $125 million spent on the Army’s Comprehensive Soldier Fitness program and its controversial “Spiritual Fitness” test, a mandatory test that must be taken by all soldiers. The Army insists that this test is not religious, but the countless complaints from soldiers who have failed this “fitness” test tell a different story. The experience of one group of soldiers who weren’t “spiritual” enough for the Army can be read here. But the term “Spiritual Fitness is not limited to this one test. The military began using this term to describe a variety of initiatives and events towards the end of 2006, and this ‘code phrase’ for promoting religion was heavily in use by all branches of the military by 2007.

Although it was clear from the start of MRFF’s investigation that determining the total dollar figure for the DoD’s rampant promotion of religion (which is always evangelical and/or fundamentalist Christianity) would be next to impossible, as this would require FOIA requests to every one of over 700 military installations to find out how much each is spending out of various funds at the installation level, one thing we could look at was DoD contracts, so that’s where we started. What we’ve found so far is astounding.

Even though this is still an ongoing project, and we’ll certainly be finding much more, I thought that given all the current brouhaha over what should be cut from the federal budget, people might be interested to see some of examples of how the DoD is spending countless millions of taxpayer dollars every year to Christianize the military.

http://freethoughtblogs.com/rodda/2011/08/19/how-much-money-could-the-department-of-defense-save-if-it-stopped-trying-to-save-souls/

[Yavapai]

1. Are the wars in the middle east crusades?

This has to stop, NOW!

[cleanhippie]

2. As a non-believer and a retired Navy guy...

I couldn't agree more.

[rug]

3. A fraction of what it would save if it stopped trying to save capitalism.

[Commie Pinko Dirtbag]

4. Those two savings aren't mutually exclusive, you know.

[rug]

6. Indeed they're not.

But one dwarfs the other.

[cleanhippie]

5. On that I strongly agree.

[AndyTiedye]

7. I Expect We Will See a Military Coup by the Fundies in the Army and Air Force Within Our Lifetimes

:nuke: :hide:

[dtexdem]

8. A lot, but not nearly as much as if it stopped trying to save excess profits for war industries.

[struggle4progress]

9. Saving money is a pointless angle on these issues: if the "Soldier Fitness" program

costs $125 million annually, that's less than 0.02% of "defense" discretionary spending.

The costs of the "Soldier Fitness" program won't vary much if one doubled the religious component or eliminated it. So in terms of savings, we're talking only a tiny fraction of that annual $125 million. Nobody in DC will notice that, on a typical day, unless posturing in front of a TV camera, hoping to gain some favorable media attention The Bushistas sent a hundred times that to Iraq, in cash on pallets, and handed it out without keeping records, or otherwise lost or misplaced it -- and bored Washington yawned

How the US sent $12bn in cash to Iraq. And watched it vanish
Special flights brought in tonnes of banknotes which disappeared into the war zone
David Pallister
Thursday 8 February 2007
http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2007/feb/08/usa.iraq1

I find it offensive that DoD will push the view a religious soldier is a happy well-adjusted soldier -- I just don't see a target audience for the strategy advanced in the OP. The conservatives who most often blather about deficits, for example, very often also yammer about religion: they won't touch this argument

[cleanhippie]

10. I do not disagree at all, but in this time where every penny of spending is on the chopping block

This is a good area where the hypocrites can be made to "put up or shut up" when they complain about wasteful spending.