Trump Embraces Military Industrial Complex Conspiracy Theory

[Revoltingest]

No, but it stands to reason. It's just logic, when you look at who benefits.



In the case of a $20,000 toilet seat, it appears that something went awry. There's missing money there, so someone must have taken it, even if it may be difficult to prove who did it or where it went. The fact that there's missing money is evidence that something fishy is going on.

That doesn't address the MICC claim, ie, that
generals & corporations direct Ameristan to wage war.

So, there is evidence, but perhaps not enough to constitute absolute proof, which is what you seem to be asking for here. It still doesn't mean that anyone is concocting some outlandish conspiracy theory. Some of it may be more a matter of general cynicism regarding the reputation of certain government institutions and political factions.

It's evidence of the MICC in the manner that existence
of humans & apes co-existing is evidence of creationism.
There's no explanatory power.

I don't see any logical reason for China to have any designs or plans to conquer America. They've made no claims to any of our territory, and we've made no claims to any of theirs. They might still hold resentments and anger over things America did to them in first half of the 20th century, but I don't know if they'd want to go to war for that reason.

It doesn't matter what you & I find to be an existential threat.
The history & current politics of Ameristan is that we travel
the world waging wars against perceived threats.

But this doesn't address the MICC, which is the claim that
the military & suppliers are directing government to wage war.
If they actually exercised such power, does it make sense
that no one presents any smoking gun for any of the numerous
such directives? All anyone has offered is that companies make
money, the military likes war, therefore they coerce leaders to
authorize it. Now Trump is in bed with these liberals.

I speculate that voters, especially liberals, claim this in order
to evade responsibility for wars their choices pursue. They
say voting cannot stop it, yet they vote for war mongers.

 

[Revoltingest]

It seems there was a benefit, but that all changed with wars commencing after 9-11. It seems to revolve around on how wars are financed.

Financing by debt allows the spending to be invisible to taxpayers.
They don't notice increasing debt, higher taxes in the future, & less
money available for other things, eg, health care.

I favor financing wars by immediate direct taxation.
That would get their attention.

Brown University article....

US Economy | Costs of War

Dang....such waste.

 

[Revoltingest]

And they both did so at the behest of their big money campaign contributors making huge profits off military contracts.

Which contributors told them to vote to start the war?
Is there documentation or a recording of a command?

It's true we get involved in wars just to profit the military industrialists, but it's not because the military says so, or even wants to, it's because the bribed up politicians say so.

Evidence of these bribes?
Were Hillary & Joe both bribed?
Did/will you vote for either?

 

[PureX]

Which contributors told them to vote to start the war?
Is there documentation or a recording of a command?

Evidence of these bribes?
Were Hillary & Joe both bribed?
Did/will you vote for either?

They don't call them bribes, and can't be prosecuted for taking them because they have made bribery legal. They cl them campaign contribution. They call them speaking fees. The call them jobs (for family members) that they don't have to show up for. The call them jobs that they take after leaving office, and get paid huge salaries for corrupting their successors in government. They call them "working vacations" for the politician's whole family. They call them privately sponsored campaign advertising tools. And I'm sure there are more ways that this to bribe a senator without calling it a bribe or ever being prosecuted.

 

[beenherebeforeagain]

Size of the military-industrial complex, for a 2017 article:

"Manufacturing has always relied on public funding in one form or another, and in particular on outlays for weaponry, even nearly three decades after the end of the Cold War. Roughly 10 percent of the $2.2 trillion in factory output in the United States goes into the production of weapons sold mainly to the Defense Department for use by the armed forces."

There is more to the MIC than simple manufacturing, but that facet was only about $220 billion in 2017. Defense spending in 2017 was about $606 billion...proposed 2021 budget, is about $740 billion...up from about $600 billion in 2016...[EDIT] That's a 22 percent increase under peacehawk Trump.

The U.S. Still Leans on the Military-Industrial Complex

 

[Revoltingest]

They don't call them bribes, and can't be prosecuted for taking them because they have made bribery legal. They cl them campaign contribution. They call them speaking fees. The call them jobs (for family members) that they don't have to show up for. The call them jobs that they take after leaving office, and get paid huge salaries for corrupting their successors in government. They call them "working vacations" for the politician's whole family. They call them privately sponsored campaign advertising tools. And I'm sure there are more ways that this to bribe a senator without calling it a bribe or ever being prosecuted.

Who got what speaking fee that led to a leader voting for war?
How about Joe & Hillary?

 

[Revoltingest]

Size of the military-industrial complex, for a 2017 article:

"Manufacturing has always relied on public funding in one form or another, and in particular on outlays for weaponry, even nearly three decades after the end of the Cold War. Roughly 10 percent of the $2.2 trillion in factory output in the United States goes into the production of weapons sold mainly to the Defense Department for use by the armed forces."

There is more to the MIC than simple manufacturing, but that facet was only about $220 billion in 2017. Defense spending in 2017 was about $606 billion...proposed 2021 budget, is about $740 billion...up from about $600 billion in 2016...

The U.S. Still Leans on the Military-Industrial Complex

There's certainly a lot of money spent.
But the claim of conspiracy to control government,
directing them to wage war is the part I find unevidenced.

What is evidenced is that voters choose pro-war candidates
over peace candidates. It happened in the Dem primaries
this year. And November will see them choose one again.

 

[sun rise]

Do you agree with Trump that we go to war because
military leaders seek to please contractors?

No.

I find it hilarious that the old liberal Military Industrial
Complex conspiracy theory

I guess Eisenhower is a liberal by today's standards since the phrase originated with him.

An interesting chart about drone strikes....

So we should just let them kill us? How would you say we respond to attacks in the US and on our citizens? Just allow them to do whatever they want with no response on our part? Do you extend that to the personal level so if I whack you with a mallet or shoot you, that's just too bad but responding to my brazen attack is something you won't do? How far does your pacifism go?

Who got what speaking fee that led to a leader voting for war?
How about Joe & Hillary?

Yeah, I know, you hate them and ascribe evil to them and don't care what else a candidate or POTUS might do or has done, it's only about what you think incorrectly they feel about war. "It is what it is". But you reminded me it's time to give more money to Biden and/or Democratic senate candidates to get rid of the agents of darkness and destruction now tearing at the heart of America.

 

[Heyo]

Do you agree with Trump that we go to war because
military leaders seek to please contractors?

In principle, yes, but it is more complex than that. The military wants to assert that it is still necessary and it surely helps their decision when they are friends with the contractors they are buying from (possibly some old buddy from the military).
The secret services are in a similar position to validate their existence so they produce the necessary intel when asked to (WMD).
The politicians are bought and paid for by the MIC, both parties.
The voters get their superiority complex and irrational nationalism massaged.

Everybody is happy, though someone is paying through their nose for nothing more than a feeling but that doesn't matter if you're not aware of it.

 

[Daemon Sophic]

And they both did so at the behest of their big money campaign contributors making huge profits off military contracts.

It's true we get involved in wars just to profit the military industrialists, but it's not because the military says so, or even wants to, it's because the bribed up politicians say so.

Who got what speaking fee that led to a leader voting for war?
How about Joe & Hillary?

Well. Following the money....
Cheney and Shrub (Bush Jr) willfully and knowingly misled the majority of the Senate (including Hillary Clinton and Joe Biden) into granting Shrub military power if he needed it to make demands for inspections more threatening. Shrub in turn bypassed normal double dare and double dog dare etiquette and went straight to fullscale war.
So why did Shrub and Cheney choose war over everyone else’s recommendations for increased inspections?
Answer - $$$ Money $$$
Who got the no bid contract for all the engineering/construction work in wartime and post-wartime work in Iraq? Cheney’s Halliburton if you’ll recall. $$$$ And yes, he was not disconnected from Halliburton. He personally profited.
Who got a continuation and more public display of military dominance, thus ensuring re-election of a “wartime president”? Shrub.
Remembering Why Americans Loathe Dick Cheney

It is still, and always will be, on the shoulders (and necks) of the politicians, not the military or their contracted manufacturers. But to believe that advertising (and the money for advertising - ala Citizen’s United - a.k.a. Propoganda) is not responsible for swaying good citizens to vote for bad people (Shrub, Chump), and their bad actions (War) is indefensibly naive.

And lest we forget, Chump most definitively embraced war in Iraq, just like Joe and Hillary, although he went on to say how the Iraqi people should pay for our war (sorta like Mexico’s wall), and that the US should have taken all their oil $$$. So please step down from your frickin high horse.

Fact check: Trump falsely claims, again, to have opposed the invasion of Iraq - CNNPolitics

 

[exchemist]

In the news....
War is 'a last resort,' Army chief says after Trump's comments
Excerpted...
The Army's top general defended military leaders on Tuesday after President Donald Trump accused them of going to war to keep defense contractors "happy," saying he and others take the decision to send troops into combat "very, very seriously."
Army Chief of Staff Gen. James McConville declined to comment specifically on Trump's remarks to reporters on Monday, but defended the Pentagon brass against the accusation that they are beholden to arms manufacturers.
......
The general's comments mark the Pentagon's first public response to Trump's remarks during a combative White House news conference on Monday, in which he said "top people in the Pentagon" probably aren’t “in love with me” because “they want to do nothing but fight wars so that all of those wonderful companies that make the bombs and make the planes and make everything else stay happy.”


Do you agree with Trump that we go to war because
military leaders seek to please contractors?

No I think that is ridiculous, for two reasons.

First, anyone who has had ANY contact with military officers knows they need to have a bond with their men based on implicit trust and would not wish to sacrifice their lives unnecessarily, least of all for the profit of some 3rd party corporation.

Second, these corporations do very nicely out of the peacetime expenditure of the armed forces on equipment. They don't rely on wars to be profitable, nor does the military have any incentive to bankroll them artificially through starting wars.

What certainly does seem to exist, however, is Eisenhower's "military-industrial complex", whereby there is an incentive to talk up threats, propose new equipment to meet them and then supply it. But that is not at all the same as actually fomenting war for its own sake.

The people that do that, notoriously, are politicians and their acolytes in think tanks and the media, trying to push an agenda or distract from problems at home by building up foreign bogeymen and uniting the country on the pretext of these bogus threats.

 

[exchemist]

In principle, yes, but it is more complex than that. The military wants to assert that it is still necessary and it surely helps their decision when they are friends with the contractors they are buying from (possibly some old buddy from the military).
The secret services are in a similar position to validate their existence so they produce the necessary intel when asked to (WMD).
The politicians are bought and paid for by the MIC, both parties.
The voters get their superiority complex and irrational nationalism massaged.

Everybody is happy, though someone is paying through their nose for nothing more than a feeling but that doesn't matter if you're not aware of it.

Re WMD, as I recall, the Iraq invasion was promoted by politicians and political commentators, not by the military.

 

[Heyo]

Re WMD, as I recall, the Iraq invasion was promoted by politicians and political commentators, not by the military.

 

[exchemist]

He was not one of the warmongers.

The warmongers were Rumsfeld, Wolfowitz and the clique of neocons (The Project for the New American Century, and others in various newspaper columns and think tanks) who had a political philosophy of spreading US values via force of arms.

I recall one of the generals (Gregory someone - I forget his last name) caustically dismissing these people, saying that in his experience those calling for war have the luxury of not having to plan and execute the operations - or to bury the consequences.

 

[Tambourine]

No I think that is ridiculous, for two reasons.

First, anyone who has had ANY contact with military officers knows they need to have a bond with their men based on implicit trust and would not wish to sacrifice their lives unnecessarily, least of all for the profit of some 3rd party corporation.

Of course not. They sacrifice foreigners - or as they call them, "collateral damage".

 

[Heyo]

He was not one of the warmongers.

The warmongers were Rumsfeld, Wolfowitz and the clique of neocons (The Project for the New American Century, and others in various newspaper columns and think tanks) who had a political philosophy of spreading US values via force of arms.

I recall one of the generals (Gregory someone - I forget his last name) caustically dismissing these people, saying that in his experience those calling for war have the luxury of not having to plan and execute the operations - or to bury the consequences.

He lied to Congress and the world and defended the war. And he isn't the only top brass who is either pro or at least silent about wars of aggression.
There are exception, though. But they get called Russian assents.

 

[tytlyf]

Do you have more than correlation being causation?
.

Yes I do. The holy grail of a corporation is to gain access to government contracts and tax dollars. Government contracts pay a premium compared to the free market. Take a look at the first ever pentagon audit. Money vanishes.
But we all know the republicans support that thievery. Only 1 party wants to defund education to transfer funds into the MIC.
Another fine example is the talk of 'school choice.' Privatization of the education system in the hopes of massive profits, tax dollars and corporate freebies.
It's been a long road for republicans on defunding public education and today we get to see the result of that effort. Terrible public education, thanks to republican policies.
But republicans and their corporate overlords knew what they were doing from the beginning, slowly eroding the public education system and it's perception among the country as a whole.
This gives corporate schools a chance to step in.

Same grifting thievery, different arena. Tax dollars and corporate freebies at the expense of the middle class is what they're after.

Judge strikes down DeVos plan to boost pandemic relief for private schools

A federal judge on Friday ruled that Education Secretary Betsy DeVos’ effort to boost the amount of emergency pandemic relief that flows to private school students is illegal and struck down the policy.

 

[Revoltingest]

No.

Brain share!

I guess Eisenhower is a liberal by today's standards since the phrase originated with him.

He originated the popular term, but twas liberals who embraced it.
(And as I recall, liberals say that not all are loyal to origins, eg,
Democrats & slavery. Btw, Eisenhower was no saint.)

So we should just let them kill us? How would you say we respond to attacks in the US and on our citizens? Just allow them to do whatever they want with no response on our part? Do you extend that to the personal level so if I whack you with a mallet or shoot you, that's just too bad but responding to my brazen attack is something you won't do? How far does your pacifism go?

Would they attack us if we weren't there?
I'm not a pacifist, just an opponent of our massive foreign military adventurism.

Yeah, I know, you hate them and ascribe evil to them and don't care what else a candidate or POTUS might do or has done, it's only about what you think incorrectly they feel about war. "It is what it is".

That is quite a fantasy you've built there.
Unlike you & the other angry partisans, I've no feelings for
them or Trump stronger than mild disdain. Not everyone
wallows in pools of deep emotional love & hate. I'm meh.

Odd....to be criticized for opposition to these awful wars.
No wonder these war mongers keep getting elected.

But you reminded me it's time to give more money to Biden and/or Democratic senate candidates to get rid of the agents of darkness and destruction now tearing at the heart of America.

Again, meh.
Everyone does what they need to do.

 

[Revoltingest]

In principle, yes, but it is more complex than that. The military wants to assert that it is still necessary and it surely helps their decision when they are friends with the contractors they are buying from (possibly some old buddy from the military).
The secret services are in a similar position to validate their existence so they produce the necessary intel when asked to (WMD).
The politicians are bought and paid for by the MIC, both parties.
The voters get their superiority complex and irrational nationalism massaged.

Everybody is happy, though someone is paying through their nose for nothing more than a feeling but that doesn't matter if you're not aware of it.

Even after people decide that the premise for a war was bogus,
& see that the war has gone poorly, they still re-elect the people
who authorized the war. People generally approve of wars that
aren't in self defense.
It brings us back to an earlier question about the MICC...
Are soldiers innocent dupes in the conspiracy, or do they too like war?

 

[Revoltingest]

Well. Following the money....
Cheney and Shrub (Bush Jr) willfully and knowingly misled the majority of the Senate (including Hillary Clinton and Joe Biden) into granting Shrub military power if he needed it to make demands for inspections more threatening. Shrub in turn bypassed normal double dare and double dog dare etiquette and went straight to fullscale full scale war.
So why did Shrub and Cheney choose war over everyone else’s recommendations for increased inspections?
Answer - $$$ Money $$$
Who got the no bid contract for all the engineering/construction work in wartime and post-wartime work in Iraq? Cheney’s Halliburton if you’ll recall. $$$$ And yes, he was not disconnected from Halliburton. He personally profited.
Who got a continuation and more public display of military dominance, thus ensuring re-election of a “wartime president”? Shrub.
Remembering Why Americans Loathe Dick Cheney

It is still, and always will be, on the shoulders (and necks) of the politicians, not the military or their contracted manufacturers. But to believe that advertising (and the money for advertising - ala Citizen’s United - a.k.a. Propoganda propaganda) is not responsible for swaying good citizens to vote for bad people (Shrub, Chump), and their bad actions (War) is indefensibly naive.

And lest we forget, Chump most definitively embraced war in Iraq, just like Joe and Hillary, although he went on to say how the Iraqi people should pay for our war (sorta like Mexico’s wall), and that the US should have taken all their oil $$$. So please step down from your frickin high horse.

Fact check: Trump falsely claims, again, to have opposed the invasion of Iraq - CNNPolitics

Strongest argument yet, but a conspiracy this massive over
so many decades should yield more than circumstantial
evidence. How did Obama (one of the conspirators) benefit?