1/ Every time they want to throw another $6B or $7B onto the Pentagon budget, remember this: there are four factors that statistically indicate there will be a greater incidence of peace and a lower incidence of conflict:

2/ 1. Expansion of economic opportunities for women. 2. Expansion of educational opportunities for children. 3. Reduction of violence against women. 4.Amelioration of unnecessary human despair. Those are the pillars of an agenda to wage peace.

3/ The Senate panel mentioned in that article is not responding to the needs of the military as suggested by military leaders, so much as they are responding to the short term profit motive of the defense contractors who are their donor class.

The US military has not been the single thing keeping peace since WW2! Given Vietnam & Iraq wars that’s a preposterous comment. Having said that I’m not suggesting we don’t need a strong military -only that we spend hundreds of billions of $ above what our military even asks for.