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ORIGINAL: Isaiah29

Around 975 BC King Solomon died, and his son, Rehoboam, reigned in his stead. Rehoboam called in his father's aged counselors and asked for their advice how he should rule Israel. They answered that his father, Solomon, had laid heavy taxes upon the people, and that he should lessen their burden. Indeed, Solomon's building projects had taken an extraordinary toll upon the people who were hoping to have their burdens somewhat lifted by the heir to the throne, Rehoboam.

Instead of heeding the advice of his father's aged counselors, Rehoboam called in "the young men who had grown up with him", (see 1Kings 12: 8), friends who counselled that Rehoboam actually increase the tax burden of the children of Israel. They were young and foolish and lacked the wisdom of their elders. Nevertheless, Rehoboam heeded the counsel of his younger friends over and against the counsel of his father's elderly advisors. The results were disastrous. Not only was the population unwilling to bear the burden of the additional taxation, they were not willing to bear any more burden at all. The northern ten tribes revolted, all but Judah and Benjamin.

Rehoboam thought to bring them back into the fold by force, but it was not to be, for God had already ordained that the kingdom be split up due to Solomon's previous apostacy committed in his old age. Still, the repercussions of Rehoboam's foolishness at raising the taxes of an already overtaxed people split the nation in half, never again to be united. From that time on Israel was no longer the 12 tribes. Rather they were the ten tribes to the north and two tribes to the south, and they remained in a state of semi-civil war until 722-721 BC, when the northern ten tribes were conquered by the Assyrians and carried off into captivity, never to be heard from again. The Assyrians repopulated the land with five different ethnic groups not indigenous to the area. Only tiny Judah and Benjamin remained in the south, and in 587 the Babylonians carried them away. First Israel was divided, then it was conquered, all because one young ruler refused to listen to the advise of his elders and insisted upon raising taxes on people who were already overtaxed.

Now I am sure that Rehoboam's young friends were not evil, but instead were maybe just idealistic. They probably wanted to expand on Solomon's building programs, building bigger and more elaborate cities, thus supplying more jobs for the jobless. By increasing the taxes on the farmers, they could increase the size of the workforce, thus putting more people on the government payroll, which is what Solomon had been doing, ie. increasing the size of the government workforce and hence its payroll. The problem arises when there are too many people on the government payroll, and not enough people to shoulder the tax burden necessary to sustain all those government employees. Eventually the pyramid becomes inverted with too few people at the bottom and too many at the top, and it crashes. People can only take so much taxation before they revolt, and Israel revolted.

Flash forward nearly 3000 years to the presidential election of 2008. The elderly candidate advocates cutting taxes on the overburdened population. Although he is old, his programs are cautious and prudent, not wanting to overtax the people and cripple the economy. Meanwhile, the younger candidate wants to increase taxes to support his wide array of government programs; for example: free universal health care, free college tuition, a massive domestic militia, massive domestic investment in "green technology", massive government handouts to the poor in other countries. His programs will cost trillions of dollars and can only come at the expense of the already overtaxed middle class. The question is: who will the American voter listen to: the wise advise of the prudent, elderly counselor, or the foolish advise of the reckless young friend? Those who don't learn from the mistakes of history are doomed to repeat them. How many people even know their history? For those who don't, I suggest they pick up a Bible and read 1Kings 12. Then read the rest. Their country and their souls may just depend upon it!

In Christ,

Ariel

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ORIGINAL: TaoPoohBear

Solomon would be Clinton and Rehoboam would be GW Bush.

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Solomon would be Clinton and Rehoboam would be GW Bush.

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ORIGINAL: huangshan

It should be noted that Obama intends to scale back our level of military engagement, which would likely end up saving oodles.

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The 2005 U.S. military budget is almost as much as the rest of the world's defense spending combined
Because the U.S. GDP has risen over time, the military budget can rise in absolute terms while shrinking as a percentage of the GDP. For example, according to the Center for Defense Information, the US outlays for defense as a percentage of federal discretionary spending, has from Fiscal Year 2003 consumed more than half (50.5%) of all such funding and has risen steadily. Discretionary spending accounts for approximately 1/3 of all federal outlays. Therefore, comparing nominal dollar values of military spending over the course of decades fails to account for the impact of inflationary forces, for which military spending as a percentage of GDP does account.

The recent invasions of Iraq and Afghanistan are largely funded through supplementary spending bills outside the Federal Budget, so they are not included in the military budget figures. In addition, the United States has black budget military spending which is not listed as Federal spending and is not included in published military spending figures. Other military-related items, like maintenance of the nuclear arsenal and the money spent by the Veterans Affairs Department, are not included in the official budget. Thus, the total amount spent by the United States on military spending is higher.

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ORIGINAL: ljmac

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ORIGINAL: huangshan

It should be noted that Obama intends to scale back our level of military engagement, which would likely end up saving oodles.

Obama doesn't know what he's going to do so I don't know how you do. In January of 2007 he wanted "all combat" troops redeployed out of Iraq by March 31, 2007. That date keeps moving further and further into the future.

Will someone please tell me what to say?

Facts:
- Military spending as a percentage of the GDP is about 4%, less than what was spent during the Carter administration and less than half of what was spent during the Kennedy administration.

- Inflation adjusted Fed tax revenue has tripled since 1965. It is higher today than when GWB took office.

- Mandatory spending (medicare, medicaid, social security) is 58% of expenditures. In 1965 it was 29%.

We have a spending problem, not a revenue problem. Revenues keep going up, but spending goes up faster. While military spending has risen since 911, it is below average post WWII levels. Most of the spending cannot be restrained without changing the laws. No matter how much your representative wants to restrain spending, he can't touch the biggest ticket items.

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I think it is disingenuous to use GDP as a measure of military spending, seeing as how it's based solely on the Defense Department's budget (2007 - $439 Billion).
Although for 2007 the military budget rose to $439 billion, altogether military-related expenses totaled approximately $626 billion; Not including Iraq & Afghanistan.

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Obama doesn't know what he's going to do

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ORIGINAL: SwedishCovenant

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ORIGINAL: ljmac

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ORIGINAL: huangshan

It should be noted that Obama intends to scale back our level of military engagement, which would likely end up saving oodles.

Obama doesn't know what he's going to do so I don't know how you do. In January of 2007 he wanted "all combat" troops redeployed out of Iraq by March 31, 2007. That date keeps moving further and further into the future.

Will someone please tell me what to say?

Facts:
- Military spending as a percentage of the GDP is about 4%, less than what was spent during the Carter administration and less than half of what was spent during the Kennedy administration.

- Inflation adjusted Fed tax revenue has tripled since 1965. It is higher today than when GWB took office.

- Mandatory spending (medicare, medicaid, social security) is 58% of expenditures. In 1965 it was 29%.

We have a spending problem, not a revenue problem. Revenues keep going up, but spending goes up faster. While military spending has risen since 911, it is below average post WWII levels. Most of the spending cannot be restrained without changing the laws. No matter how much your representative wants to restrain spending, he can't touch the biggest ticket items.

Republicans had control of Congress for fourteen of the past fifteen budget cycles, and rubberstamped a Republican President for six of those. Most of that new spending and new debt occured during those GOP-controlled years. And the most recent round of half-TRILLION dollar deficits came AFTER we had years of surpuls budgets - this most recent sailor-on-shore-leave deficit spending CANNOT be blamed on Congresses, or Presidents, prior to 2001.

The GOP took a healthy, even robust economy, and broke it. This is Bush/GOP Congress' deficit.

Why shoud anyone believe that the GOP should have yet another chance to screw things up, when their previous omnipotence GOT US INTO this mess?

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ORIGINAL: WesP

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I think it is disingenuous to use GDP as a measure of military spending, seeing as how it's based solely on the Defense Department's budget (2007 - $439 Billion).
Although for 2007 the military budget rose to $439 billion, altogether military-related expenses totaled approximately $626 billion; Not including Iraq & Afghanistan.

So, let's include all of it. What is the percentage? Around 7? Still less than Kennedy's time. Even if it was equal or exceeded by a bit, there is no reason to blame military expenditure for the economic worries.