http://www.thenation.com/article/167811/dont-buy-spin-how-cutting-pentagons-budget-could-boost-economy#

And do you seriously suggest that providing your universities research facilities with the same money would not provide great bonuses to your nation? It is well documented that advances in technology often are offshoots of failed investigation into unrelated areas. But to suggest that a company such as Lockheed is capable of achieving the same social benefits when investigating how to better kill people than the top medics in your country being given the same money to help people is well .... ridiculous.

Also I find it very interesting that you demand sources whilst providing none.

The source for that image is the following article: http://www.thenation.com/article/167811/dont-buy-spin-how-cutting-pentagons-budget-could-boost-economy

What, praytell, would you do with the 70K jobs at Raytheon? Or the 120K jobs at Lockheed Martin? Or the 70K jobs at Northrop Grumman? Or the 110K jobs at BAE? Or the 90K jobs at BAE?

Those jobs are (indirectly) paid for by taxes; spending that tax income another way (see Ska's image and/or the article it came from) would generate at least as many jobs (in other sectors, but jobs all the same). The same applies to cutting taxes (and letting people spend the money they "save" in whatever way they choose).

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Off-topic: I notice you say "praytell" a lot; I don't think I've ever heard anyone else ever use that.

I provided no sources as prior to that post I hadn't provided any citable material. The employment numbers were taken off wiki and aren't likely to be subjected to research bias as your numbers are.

Providing universities with more research funding would also be wise but it has it's own issues of red tape etc. I am not saying the military spending shouldn't be cut, merely that it should not be cut by 90% or some similar extreme. There is value to it, some which could not come from other sources.

Yes wiki ... because my friend down the pub says it's true ...

The USA have the most aircraft carriers in the world.
HALLELUJA!
The USA dont have the most Nukes but they can nuke any country off the face of the earth!
HALLELUJA!
The USA spend more money on military expenses than all other countries combined!
HOW GLORIOUS!! HALLELUJA!!

but wait ... what do the other industrialized nations spend the money on instead?
Schools ...
ah come on, education is overrated, the USA has faith!
HALLELUJA!
Health care ...
wait, what do you need good health for anyways? If you kids get sick, you better pay for their health you ****ing communist!
HALLELUJA!
Infrastructure ...
Damn all these sewagepipes, streets, powerlines ... what do you need them for anyway. As long as there are enough parking lots at your local stadium, the infrastructre is just about right!
HALLELUJA!

Look at Norway for instance... typical communist country. Can they nuke the world? no ... how puny!! Can they invade bombard or destroy other countries? most likely not ... how puny!!!
They have healthcare for everyone ... pfff communists. Virtually no unemployment ... pfff communists!!
They have highest living standards, educational standards, health care and social security standards ... what is it damn worth? thats all wasted money. People will use up the living standard by living, the education is wasted if it goes into art or philosophy instead of capatilism/marketing/retailing or weapon manufacturing and the social security? what if they get nuked? who needs social security if they can get nuked?
They dont even use the oil they have to fuel up tanks and fighters, they use it for the comming generations. ... please, how stupid is that? Everybody should know that a truely glorious nation does the best it can to provide its elite with spaceflights, private jets, private mansions all over the world, carparks of 100 luxury cars plus ... but those communists try to improve the life of the population as a whole ... how inglorious and boring.

So be happy to live in the country that never loses a war, not even the one against its own population!
HALLELUJA!

Cited sources on wiki. Easy place to find the numbers.

I asked for source on your figures since they are likely to impacted by the bias. Employment numbers are not. I am sure you can see the difference.

Yes wiki ... because my friend down the pub says it's true ...

i hate and find it so how annoying how americans boast about there military,however the truth about their military is it's expensive.And i find the american government hypocritical,america they don't intervene in a country unless it has oil.Also americans are so easily fed lies about there government and world situation and they hang on to the words of the media and take their patriotism to a length where it is annoying,useless and in factual.Now americans please go back to being hypnotised by your governments you will soon be be snapped out of your.

Sorry i addressed all americans together i bet there are some who don't believe all they read.

Congrats on the 10-minute separated double post?

wikipedia cites articles. you click on the little number and it takes you to the source. that source isn't necessarily less reliable just because it happens to be on the internet rather than in a book or something. and it's a lot more reliable than 'my friend down the pub'.

wikipedia gets slammed a lot, because of vandalism and facts from spurious sources (or uncited facts) which appear, because anyone can edit it. but anyone with half a brain can discern what to put credence in by looking up the source and making their own judgement on whether it's reliable or not.

Thank you x.

While I recognize and understand the reliability concerns, wikipedia is a good source for straightforward facts that aren't a matter of public debate. So long as there is no controversy surrounding the subject in question there is unlikely to be an unreliability issues.

In this instance, the numbers were all cited as coming from annual filings to the government.

RvW:

First of all, I'm not a US citizen.
Secondly, while I do think America-bashing is quite dumb, none of my posts in this thread were actually "supportive" of the US in any way. The one about France was just general smart-assing around and "halelujah" was meant to be ironic. Because it is my opinion that if there's one thing more primitive than an actual penis comparison, it's a penis comparison without actual junks (hurr durr my country has more nukes than your's we would SO beat you hurr durr). So much for that.

now:

That's pretty hypocrite; when was the last time the US fought a war out of "some noble democratic sentiment"?

Where did I say they have? But okay. World War II. And boy am I glad they won.

Don't forget, Europe / the Western World will only stay obedient so long; sooner or later our politicians are going to figure out there's no incentive to roll over every time the USA wants us to

Oh you so sure about that? Way I see it, the Western World as a whole has 99% shared interests, that's why we refer to it with that term. To make clear that it's mostly common goals on both shores of the atlantic on a geopolitical level, despite some superficial (and rather minor) differences. Those goals include: secure global trade routes, secure access to raw materials, keep up "stability" at the periphery as much as possible (we don't want all those refugees...).
The Netherlands is part of NATO. The Netherlands has an export oriented economy. AFAIK, the Netherlands take part in that counter-piracy mission off the Somali coast. So does Germany. And France. And most other NATO countries, too.
Now, do they do that out of some "noble democratic sentiment"? No, they don't. They do it to secure global trade routes. Why did France, GB & the US "intervene" in Lybia? To 'stabilize' the periphery, most likely. And to secure access to some raw materials (oil^^). All economic reasons, we agree about that.
But there is no "peace-loving Europe", and there is no "big bad jingoistic US imperium". There is no easy black and white. It's all one and the same -> one big pile of grey shit.
War is waged for money. Around the globe. Noone is "the good boy". To say otherwise is either very naive or, yeah, hypocritical.

WWII ... Pearl Harbour had nothing to do with it? No of course being attacked by the axis powers came second to noble sentiment. Silly to think otherwise of course God save America

Why cant we all just get along it is this type of arguing that causes hatred and hatred causes wars
if we didnt need to fight wars the the US would be able to spend its massive military budget on other things like u guys want

The US mostly creates the wars. They aren't the victim. It's not like "because those vile Libyans had to start a revolt, so our intervention was necessary" The Libyan revolt started with not anything like what happened in Tunisia and Egypt, there were less people against Kaddafi. He did great things for his country! Going to a university was free! After 9/11, Libya was the first Arabian country to reject Al Qaida. He disarmed his nuclear weaponry.

Yea, great guy for his people... who cares if he 'liquidated' Libyan dissidents or financed terrorist acts in other countries on foreign citizens...

I thought that in this thread we were supposed to talk about why the french suck at wars. Not about the amrican revolution or why the U.S dont have good reasons to declare war.

The French had good times and bad times in the history of warfare. They produced one of history's greatest military leaders, Napoleon Bonaparte. The French Empire swallowed up most of Europe at one point. They have went into a decline, sure, like in WW2, but just look at WW1. They did an excellent job fending off Germany. I think the French have all in all, been a great military nation.

i agree with you on that. I dont see why people think they suck at wars. If any, even england got owned more often then them.