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Source: (consider it)
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Thread: Reformatting American defence spending
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Horseman Bree
Shipmate
# 5290
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Posted
Paul Bibeau over at Goblinbooks has a really neat idea: let's take all the money spent on (not) defending the US and its "interests" and spend it on something more meaningful.
He recommends infusing insane amounts of cash in to the Canadian rock music scene, but I tend to think this would crud up the system and make the music worse, not better. Artists maintain their creative edge by needing money, not by rolling around in it.
What suggestions do you have for more useful places for the vast amount of money that goes into "defending" (picking arguments with anyone) the US?
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It's Not That Simple
Posts: 5372 | From: more herring choker than bluenose | Registered: Dec 2003
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Sioni Sais
Shipmate
# 5713
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Posted
The figures from SIPRI show that the US spent about $600bn in 2013. That is about $2,000 per American.
Maybe that two grand could go to the individuals so they can decide personally what shiny kit to buy. Musical instrument sales would soar!
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"He isn't Doctor Who, he's The Doctor"
(Paul Sinha, BBC)
Posts: 24276 | From: Newport, Wales | Registered: Apr 2004
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Palimpsest
Shipmate
# 16772
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Posted
Be careful what you wish for. How many extra deaths from drugs would a lot of extra money cause?
The U.S. spends an insane amount on "defense", and relatively little on arts funding. I remember hearing the head of the San Francisco Gay and Lesbian Film Festival comment that he had just seen the books and over the years they got more money from the Canadian Government to screen Canadian Gay Films than they got from the U.S. Government.
Posts: 2990 | From: Seattle WA. US | Registered: Nov 2011
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Kelly Alves
Bunny with an axe
# 2522
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Posted
Here's an idea-- how about we treat early childhood like the military?
Not the style of management, of course, but-- recruiting college students with incentives like loan forgiveness, benefits a solid paycheck, a pension. Extensive, 6-month practical training before a teacher sets foot in a classroom, and adequate mentoring and support afterward.
Then fund working childcare centers enough so that they can have the low ratios and small classes that all who study the issue agree are essential for healthy child development, while allowing the staff to be paid an actual living wage, and have classrooms designed to make daily rotutines functional and smoothly operating, for both staff and children. In other words, design schools with the same intent, study, and attention to detail we would design a stealth plane. So that federally funded schools are not forced to do the best they can with a church basement, or the least desirable space in an elementary school.
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I cannot expect people to believe “
Jesus loves me, this I know” of they don’t believe “Kelly loves me, this I know.”
Kelly Alves, somewhere around 2003.
Posts: 35076 | From: Pura Californiana | Registered: Mar 2002
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Leorning Cniht
Shipmate
# 17564
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Kelly Alves:
Here's an idea-- how about we treat early childhood like the military?
What - taking a bunch of individuals as input and forcing them into a particular mould? That's rather what we do to children now, and it's a problem. I have difficulty imagining that further state mandates will make things better.
Posts: 5026 | From: USA | Registered: Feb 2013
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Kelly Alves
Bunny with an axe
# 2522
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Posted
Uh, ono, of course not. That is why i talked about extensive training and mentoring, in appropriate practice. If you really think conformity is what I am advocating, you obviously haven't participated in any thread where I have talked about my views on child development. You also apparently didn't read past the line you quoted.
Tell me that children and childcare staff don't deserve the kind of budget and serious attention that the military does
[ 03. December 2014, 23:47: Message edited by: Kelly Alves ]
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I cannot expect people to believe “
Jesus loves me, this I know” of they don’t believe “Kelly loves me, this I know.”
Kelly Alves, somewhere around 2003.
Posts: 35076 | From: Pura Californiana | Registered: Mar 2002
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Horseman Bree
Shipmate
# 5290
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Posted
But how will the Koch brothers and other 0.1%-ers get richer if you diffuse spending all over the poor of the country rather than buying weapons?
(Obvious answer: the poor will immediately spend that money, since they rarely have any choice in the matter, and the money will flow back to the right people anyway. BUT the poor will be less likely to riot, unless provoked by idiotic policemen)
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It's Not That Simple
Posts: 5372 | From: more herring choker than bluenose | Registered: Dec 2003
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no prophet's flag is set so...
Proceed to see sea
# 15560
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Posted
In no particular order, a start:
- Free post-secondary education.
- 5 years of maternity/paternity leave.
- Subsidized day care in all work places.
Community health programs, like "healthy mother, healthy baby", "head start" for kids at risk, safe and mentally enriched older adult care
We could also ask about redirection of monies used to fund jails and prisons for nonviolent offenders into substance abuse treatment, jobs training, education.
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Out of this nettle, danger, we pluck this flower, safety.
\_(ツ)_/
Posts: 11498 | From: Treaty 6 territory in the nonexistant Province of Buffalo, Canada ↄ⃝' | Registered: Mar 2010
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Leorning Cniht
Shipmate
# 17564
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Kelly Alves:
Uh, ono, of course not. That is why i talked about extensive training and mentoring, in appropriate practice.
Yes, I know - I'm messing with you, mostly.
Although not entirely - there's something of a push in these parts for universal taxpayer-funded preschool, and the loudest voices supporting this are also purveyors and proponents of worksheet bootcamp. So I'm afraid that if we did get universal preschool, it would be a universal preschool that we wouldn't want.
Posts: 5026 | From: USA | Registered: Feb 2013
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Doc Tor
Deepest Red
# 9748
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Posted
Pay kids to stay in school. Give them grade targets, behaviour targets, community targets, punctuality and attendance targets, and if they hit them term by term, they get a pay cheque to take home. Better still, give half to the caregiver, and they can make sure the kid gets up and gets to school on time, and has somewhere to do their homework.
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Forward the New Republic
Posts: 9131 | From: Ultima Thule | Registered: Jul 2005
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Kelly Alves
Bunny with an axe
# 2522
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Leorning Cniht:
quote:
Originally posted by Kelly Alves:
Uh, ono, of course not. That is why i talked about extensive training and mentoring, in appropriate practice.
Yes, I know - I'm messing with you, mostly.
To what purpose? This is heaven, not purg, and I was daydreaming about a perfect world in which the science and practice of early childhood was supported and respected. I agree that it is currently not, and the kind of preschool we'd get from today's federal intitutions would suck, but why piss all over my daydream?
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I cannot expect people to believe “
Jesus loves me, this I know” of they don’t believe “Kelly loves me, this I know.”
Kelly Alves, somewhere around 2003.
Posts: 35076 | From: Pura Californiana | Registered: Mar 2002
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Kelly Alves
Bunny with an axe
# 2522
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Posted
Sorry, that was testy. But I thought this was one of those creative wish list sort of things, and treated it as such. I didn't expect such a thorough critique of something I didn't think was reality based in the first place.
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I cannot expect people to believe “
Jesus loves me, this I know” of they don’t believe “Kelly loves me, this I know.”
Kelly Alves, somewhere around 2003.
Posts: 35076 | From: Pura Californiana | Registered: Mar 2002
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