On Wed, Jun 4, 2008 at 12:03 PM, William Bowen <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: > 1. He opposes the War in Iraq. He always has. He supports the war in > Afghanistan and has gone on record as such. He wants to keep military > options on the table, but exhaust all avenues of diplomacy before > using them.
"There's not much of a difference between my position on Iraq and George Bush's position at this stage." - BHO July of '04. He changed his position when he ran for President > 2. . 10s of billions weighed against the current budget of...$560 > Billion--I think there might be some wiggle room. > Ref -- > http://www.defenselink.mil/comptroller/defbudget/fy2008/fy2008_greenbook.pdf Didn't we just bitch about benifits? > 3. "Unproven missile technology" - is just that, missiles we can't > make work, time and time again. Other weapons systems are cut all the > time given they don't work. 3. Cut investment in unproven missile defense technology. Isn't all new technology unproven? > 4. "Not weaponizing space" is a pretty good goal I think, in ~50 years > of space "travel" we've managed to not create an orbiting missile > platform, I happen to think that is a good thing. Maybe you disagree. > If that is so, well, nothing I say will convince you otherwise. I'm thinking Reagan's Star wars would be nice. What if someone else does? > 5. Create an Independent Defense Priorities Board ... -- Pretty sound > logic there. Weigh the priorities against the recommendations, rather > than assume a Cold War scenario, which is what we've been doing for > the last 50 years. Great, another layer of bureaucracy paid for by the cuts they make in military spending > 6. "a world without nuclear weapons" -- might be unrealistic in our > lifetime, but lofty goal != bad goal. And what would be wrong with a > world without nukes? What is your opposition to no nukes? There's only one way I can think of getting there. It aint pretty. Really, why not just say he'll creat world peace? > 7. No development of *new* nuclear weapons -- reminds me of a story my > father told once. (He worked for the DOD in Force Modernization) The > Army wanted a new piece of artillery that would increase kill > effectiveness from 96% to 97%. The Mod Managers turned down the > proposal as it was not a significant enough increase to warrant the > increase in spending. Our current batch of nukes I think kill pretty > well (at least on the drawing board). What is the benefit of "new" > when weighed against the cost of development? Notice also that he does > *not* say stop production of current systems. New means better and more efficient. > 8. Global ban on the production of fissile materials -- does not > preclude production of nuclear fuels for power. Power Grade != Weapons > Grade. That worked so well in NK > 9. Negotiate with Russia to take ICBMs of "hair-trigger alert" - I > thought this had already been done, but if not. maybe it should be. Shhh. > 10. And "achieve great cuts in ... nuclear arsenal". Which is already > in progress. > > So where again do you get "the impression he wants to dismantle the > military"? Where does that come from? Cut military spending, create a panel to cut even more military spending, stop funding new weapons is the killer. We lose if we don't stay at the cutting edge. ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~| Adobe® ColdFusion® 8 software 8 is the most important and dramatic release to date Get the Free Trial http://ad.doubleclick.net/clk;192386516;25150098;k Archive: http://www.houseoffusion.com/groups/CF-Community/message.cfm/messageid:261336 Subscription: http://www.houseoffusion.com/groups/CF-Community/subscribe.cfm Unsubscribe: http://www.houseoffusion.com/cf_lists/unsubscribe.cfm?user=89.70.5
