Lukey
Senator
But, but, but...Obama "got" bin Laden!!!
http://www.washingtontimes.com/blog...nov/4/retired-top-military-brass-push-romney/
http://www.washingtontimes.com/blog...nov/4/retired-top-military-brass-push-romney/
500 retired generals and admirals endorse Romney...
- Thread starter Lukey
- Start date
Gramps
Mayor
500? Retired generals and admirals? That's a bunch of brass. I am a tad suspect of the figures. There was a time when 500 generals and admirals might've been retired but those glory days of war are really over except for regional scraps we elected to get into.
Anyway, what does that have to do with the price of rice in China? Generals are just people with opinions thst suit their particular fancy. Keep digging through the bone yard.
Gramps
Anyway, what does that have to do with the price of rice in China? Generals are just people with opinions thst suit their particular fancy. Keep digging through the bone yard.
Gramps
TomFitz
Mayor
Oh, there probably are 500 retired generals and admirals endorsing Romney........
And every single one of them is double dipping with a defense contractor or some beltway bandit and collecting six figures for "consulting", on top of the fat pension and benefits they already get.
Naturally they'd endorse Romney.
Romney promised to fatten the goose that's still laying golden eggs for them!
And every single one of them is double dipping with a defense contractor or some beltway bandit and collecting six figures for "consulting", on top of the fat pension and benefits they already get.
Naturally they'd endorse Romney.
Romney promised to fatten the goose that's still laying golden eggs for them!
KnotaFrayed
Mayor
Look up Eisenhower's speeches:
The Chance for peace:
"Every gun that is made, every warship launched, every rocket fired signifies, in the final sense, a theft from those who hunger and are not fed, those who are cold and are not clothed."
"This world in arms is not spending money alone."
"It is spending the sweat of its laborers, the genius of its scientists, the hopes of its children."
"The cost of one modern heavy bomber is this: a modern brick school in more than 30 cities."
"It is two electric power plants, each serving a town of 60,000 population. It is two fine, fully equipped hospitals."
"It is some fifty miles of concrete pavement."
"We pay for a single fighter plane with a half million bushels of wheat."
"We pay for a single destroyer with new homes that could have housed more than 8,000 people."
"This is, I repeat, the best way of life to be found on the road the world has been taking."
"This is not a way of life at all, in any true sense. Under the cloud of threatening war, it is humanity hanging from a cross of iron. These plain and cruel truths define the peril and point the hope that come with this spring of 1953."
"This is one of those times in the affairs of nations when the gravest choices must be made, if there is to be a turning toward a just and lasting peace."
"It is a moment that calls upon the governments of the world to speak their intentions with simplicity and with honesty."
"It calls upon them to answer the question that stirs the hearts of all sane men: is there no other way the world may live?"
http://www.edchange.org/multicultural/speeches/ike_chance_for_peace.html
Farewell Speech:
"This conjunction of an immense military establishment and a large arms industry is new in the American experience. The total influence – economic, political, even spiritual – is felt in every city, every Statehouse, every office of the Federal government. We recognize the imperative need for this development. Yet we must not fail to comprehend its grave implications. Our toil, resources and livelihood are all involved; so is the very structure of our society."
"In the councils of government, we must guard against the acquisition of unwarranted influence, whether sought or unsought, by the military-industrial complex. The potential for the disastrous rise of misplaced power exists and will persist."
http://mcadams.posc.mu.edu/ike.htm
The Chance for peace:
"Every gun that is made, every warship launched, every rocket fired signifies, in the final sense, a theft from those who hunger and are not fed, those who are cold and are not clothed."
"This world in arms is not spending money alone."
"It is spending the sweat of its laborers, the genius of its scientists, the hopes of its children."
"The cost of one modern heavy bomber is this: a modern brick school in more than 30 cities."
"It is two electric power plants, each serving a town of 60,000 population. It is two fine, fully equipped hospitals."
"It is some fifty miles of concrete pavement."
"We pay for a single fighter plane with a half million bushels of wheat."
"We pay for a single destroyer with new homes that could have housed more than 8,000 people."
"This is, I repeat, the best way of life to be found on the road the world has been taking."
"This is not a way of life at all, in any true sense. Under the cloud of threatening war, it is humanity hanging from a cross of iron. These plain and cruel truths define the peril and point the hope that come with this spring of 1953."
"This is one of those times in the affairs of nations when the gravest choices must be made, if there is to be a turning toward a just and lasting peace."
"It is a moment that calls upon the governments of the world to speak their intentions with simplicity and with honesty."
"It calls upon them to answer the question that stirs the hearts of all sane men: is there no other way the world may live?"
http://www.edchange.org/multicultural/speeches/ike_chance_for_peace.html
Farewell Speech:
"This conjunction of an immense military establishment and a large arms industry is new in the American experience. The total influence – economic, political, even spiritual – is felt in every city, every Statehouse, every office of the Federal government. We recognize the imperative need for this development. Yet we must not fail to comprehend its grave implications. Our toil, resources and livelihood are all involved; so is the very structure of our society."
"In the councils of government, we must guard against the acquisition of unwarranted influence, whether sought or unsought, by the military-industrial complex. The potential for the disastrous rise of misplaced power exists and will persist."
http://mcadams.posc.mu.edu/ike.htm
Arkady
President
Out of how many retired generals and admirals? There's about 500 actively serving at any given time. I'd assume a whole lot more in retirement.
Arkady
President
There are lots of reasons I'd expect more retired generals to support Romney than the general population. For starters, they're a vastly disproportionately male group, and males are more likely to vote Romney. They're also disproportionately white, and white people favor him. They're also wealthy (even those who aren't at the defense contractor trough earned the equivalent of six figures for years, and then retired with excellent benefits), and wealthy people favor him. They're probably also disproportionately southern, since the south has tended to have more of a militarized culture, and that also favors Romney. I'd even wager they're less likely than the general populace to have friends and family who are immigrants, and thus Obama's stance on immigration reform isn't going to be a big draw.
Plus, much of what Obama offers is stuff they get anyway, so there's not much for them in it. For example, how much use is a jobs program when you're already retired and living off a very comfortable taxpayer-supplied income? How much use is Obamacare when you already have socialized medicine that's far to the left of anything Obama is offering? How much use is student loan forgiveness when the government covered the cost of your education already and when your kids are much more likely to be going into ROTC or the military academies?
Then there's the fact that these men are specialists in war, which will naturally make them quicker to reach for it as a tool. That's just human nature. If you go to a doctor who specializes in a particular procedure, he's going to be more likely to see that as the appropriate procedure for your condition, even if an impartial doctor would suggest some other course. For example, surgeons are quicker to recommend cutting someone to deal with heart disease. It's just human nature to be biased in favor of thinking that the best solution for a problem is the one that calls on your own expertise. So, generals will, naturally, be biased towards military solutions, and right now it looks like Romney will be biased more in that way, too.
Military personnel are also a self-selecting group that values authority, discipline, tradition, and directed violence more than the general populace does. That fits in with the Republican mindset better than the Democratic one. These are, to a man, people who chose to spend their careers following orders almost absolutely, wearing uniforms, and killing strangers for money or glory or love of country. That's a blunt and probably offensive way to put it, but it's an accurate description. I don't mean it as an insult. Our society needs that type to defend it, because other countries have that type to attack us. But, in every country, I'd expect there to be a tendency for career military volunteers to have a conservative bent.
So, there are LOTS of reasons I'd expect more retired generals to endorse Romney than Obama (notwithstanding some big counter-examples like Colin Powell), even aside from the fact a large portion of them have a vested financial interest in favoring whichever politician proposes the fatter "defense" budget and the more interventionist foreign policy.
