"A nation that continues year after year to spend more money on
military defense than on programs of social uplift is approaching
spiritual death." -- Martin Luther King, Jr.
The U.S. discretionary budget
devotes more to militarism than to everything else combined. This
spending generates wars, rather than preventing them. It destroys the
natural environment, enriches the wealthy, drains the economy, erodes
civil liberties and government transparency, fuels bigotry, and is a
major source of death, injury, and homelessness.
Last summer, the U.S. public told pollsters it favored moving 10% of military spending to human and environmental needs,
but the U.S. Congress voted down a proposal to do just that. Now
President-Elect Joe Biden is proposing massive spending packages, to be
funded primarily through debt, with no mention of the military budget.
Click here to ask your Representative and Senators to join the Military Spending Reduction Caucus being created by Congress Members Barbara Lee and Mark Pocan, and to insist on immediately moving at least 10% of military funding to urgent projects (including all assistance required by every worker impacted by this shift).
Biden's proposal to immediately spend $1.9 trillion on the pandemic and economy (as
well as boosting the minimum wage to $15/hour) has a lot that's good in
it, though it could be made better in a number of ways. It could be
significantly funded by increased taxes on the super-wealthy, something
Biden campaigned on. It should also be funded by tax dollars redirected
from the military budget.
Problems with borrowing the necessary money
include (1) it costs more than it looks like, because of interest, (2)
it’s harder to pass through Congress, (3) it further empowers the people
who loan the money, and especially (4) it creates a major lost
opportunity to move funding out of places where it shouldn’t be into
places where it should be. It also fuels the “big government” vs “small
government” debate, displacing the badly needed “what kind of
government” debate.
Pandemic rescues, economic rescues,
and Green New Deals should not fail to draw on the massive,
counterproductive funding that goes each and every year into militarism.
Nor should they fail to take advantage of the plans and scholarship
that have for decades been poured into the project of conversion to peaceful industries.
Click here to email your Senators and your Representative right away.
If you have time, add your own words
to the email. If you have a bit more time, phone them as well.
After signing the petition, please use the tools on the next webpage to share it with your friends.
Thanks for all you do,
World BEYOND War
Background:
>> Martin Luther King Jr.: "Beyond Vietnam -- A Time to Break Silence"
>> David Swanson: "Where Will Biden Get the Money?"
>> New York Times: "President-elect Joe Biden’s $1.9 trillion economic plan will run up big debts"
>> Jeff Cohen and Norman Solomon: "The Martin Luther King You Don't See on TV"
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