Last week’s announcement of a record-breaking US aid package for Israel underscores how dangerously foolish and out-of-touch is our interventionist foreign policy. Over the next ten years, the US taxpayer will be forced to give Israel some $38 billion dollars in military aid. It is money we cannot afford going to a country that needs no assistance to maintain its status as the most powerful military in the Middle East.
All US foreign aid is immoral and counterproductive. As I have often said, it is money taken from poor people in the US and sent to rich people overseas. That is because US assistance money goes to foreign governments to hand out as they see fit. Often that assistance is stolen outright or it goes to the politically connected in the recipient country.
Just as bad is the fact that much of what we call “foreign aid” is actually welfare for the wealthy here at home. The aid package to Israel is a very good example. According to the agreement, this $38 billion will all go to US weapons manufacturers. So the real beneficiaries are not the American people, and not even Israeli citizens. The real beneficiaries are the US military-industrial complex. Perhaps the money won’t even leave Washington – it may simply go across town, from the Fed to the Beltway bomb-makers.
While even US government aid to desperately poor countries should be opposed on moral and practical grounds, it is even harder to understand US aid to relatively rich countries. At a nominal per capita GDP of over $35,000, Israel is richer than Japan, Italy, and South Korea. Not long ago Business Insider published a report by the Institute for the Study of War showing that the Israel is the most powerful military force in the Middle East. We know they have hundreds of nuclear weapons, a sophisticated air force, drones, and even nuclear weapons-equipped submarines.
So why is the US giving a rich and incredibly well-armed country a record amount of military aid? Part of it is that the US government believes it can coerce Israel to do Washington’s bidding in the Middle East. History shows that this is a foolish pipe dream. If anything, US aid subsidizes Israeli human rights abuses in Gaza and elsewhere.
Another reason is a very powerful lobby in Washington, AIPAC, that pressures Members of Congress to focus on Israel’s interests instead of US interests. Members of Congress should look at our economy, with effectively zero interest rates, an anemic non-recovery from the 2008 crash, historically low participation in the work force, and inflation eroding the value of the dollar and conclude that this might not be the best time to start handing out billions of dollars in foreign aid. Unfortunately most Members of Congress find it impossible to say no to special interest groups like AIPAC.
Here’s a better aid package for Israel: free trade, travel, friendly relations, and no entangling alliances. Israel should be free to pursue its national interests and we should be free to pursue ours. If individual Americans feel compelled to provide assistance to Israel or any other country or cause overseas they should be allowed. But the rest of us should not be forced to do so. Trade, not aid.
‘Cause DA JOOS!!!
The “cesspool” is israel’s puppy dog. Think 600% overrepresentation of jewdogs there.
While I have no issue with individual Jews (Unless they’re evil creeps like Soros), Israel IMO should never have been, and the only reason it is is because a group of nut jobs thought they could blackmail God into the second coming of Christ by creating it.
Who the hell died and appointed Israel the “master” of the middle east?? Iran (and all other middle-eastern countries) KNOWS that any nuclear “discharge” would affect the whole middle east . . . Any country that possesses nukes is not stupid . . . Israel has over two hundred nukes, manufactured with stolen American classified technology, refuses inspections of its nuclear facilities and is, in general, a “pain in the ass” to the rest of the world, along with (blackmailed) “big brother” United States of America. In fact, U S law prohibits “foreign aid” to any country that has not signed “nuclear non-proliferation” agreements…Israel being the sole violator (and exception)…
It is no secret that the U S State Department is infested with dual-nationality Israeli-Americans who form (and foment) the bulk of our neocon “foreign policy” straight from Tel Aviv. In fact there are 40 or so congressmen and senators with dual-nationality “ties” to Israel.
Most people are unaware that Israel holds a “Damocles sword” over the world. Any attack on Israel will be met with a nuclear device being detonated in a city of Israel’s choosing. Israel calls this the “Samson option” and is very real.
It is easy to see the pervasiveness of Israel’s Mossad (if one knows where to look), arguably the most effective spy agency on the planet, please read “By Way of Deception” by Viktor Ostrowsky. From the Lavon affair (a “false flag” operation designed to draw the USA into a war with Egypt by making it look like Arabs bombed the U S interests section–a planted bomb exploded prematurely, exposing this as a Israeli planned and executed “incident”) to the deliberate attack on the USS Liberty (NOT “misidentification”, but another attempt to draw the USA into a war with Egypt and to hide the deliberate massacre of civilians in an Egyptian city, Deir Yassin), to Jonathon Pollard and NSA spying utilizing a company named Amdocs (which handles all US telephone billing records), you will find that Israel looks out for Israel’s interests ONLY. Normally, there is nothing wrong with a country looking out after it’s own interests, BUT Israel has a nasty habit of spying on(and setting up) its “friends”.
Isarel is quite capable of supporting itself . Foreign aid is typically bribes for some naferious purpose that enriches some connected band of assholes or ass kissers (see Clinton cash) ! Most government spending on the federal level is money most of Americans could make better use of pissing it against some wall drunk in an alley !
This includes domestic spending too look at section 8 , yes it helps poor people have a nice place to live till they fuck it all up but meanwhile a property investor gets more rent for a property that would otherwise be “NON-PERFORMING PROPERTY , translation without a rent subsidy it would never pay to invest in it . As a taxpayer it’s not up to me to make someone’s risky investment pay off but I am forced by a wealth redistribution plan run by The IRS !
It’s everywhere and like malignant cancer you just can’t kill it without killing every part involved sadly even the patient !
Because they call the shots in America; even Useful Idiots understand that.
I’ll be the devil’s advocate here. The aid package is about $500 per year per Israeli. As Paul points out Israel maintains the most potent military in the region and, in extremis, the US and Israeli forces could be fighting alongside each other.
Now the US maintains large forces in South Korea, Japan and various European nations that cost a lot more than $3.8 billion per year to maintain. If Japan, South Korea and Germany maintained combat forces the equal of Israel we probably could cut or even eliminate American military support for those nations. We might even want to offer, e.g., Germany $3.8 billion in military assistance for it to field a military commensurate with its population and GDP. Putin might not like it but from the US POV having a German Air Force capable of taking on Russia’s would certainly allow the USAF a lot of operational flexibility!
https://youtu.be/txDJFzKgi4k
here you go unit…check it out.
We send Israel 3.8 billion every year routine-wise. Now we are talking 38 billion.
how about why we are offering military support to ANY country?
Gerald Celente:
1. seal the borders (NO more immigration)
2. bring the troops home
3. rebuild America
NO foreign entanglements
Because they keep a percentage, their cut, and then send the rest back to us. All they do is use it to hire lobbyists in D.C. who then give it back to them in the form of contributions, etc. Think of it as giving yourself a gift, but making it look like you’re helping someone else….
that’s an idea Spinolator,
in any case, it is clever.
Interesting timing of the signing of a 10 year agreement. I suspect Trump will keep the money spigot wide open to Israel, but I guess they didn’t want to take the chance that the money flow would stop. We can hope though…
so, let’s say you have to control the world, because your a megalomaniac (ala Dr. StrangeLove) and you need to protect you precious bodily fluids.
This is the point of view I see most US actions, they are the behavior of little boys in uniforms, justifying their positions.
the plot is so thick with boogey men, we have all but lost track of where this Ziegfeld Follies is going, and how it is going to end.
we are at war, and have been since 2003. If you were to wake up from a coma today, you would say WTF.
“wait, so it was Bin Ladens fault, but we killed him, and now there is another boogey man, but this one goes by two different acronyms,
and is funded by the US/SA, but is fighting against the US/SA, I don’t understand, but you say Hillary is going to save us?”