the deductibles are supposed to incentives positive behaviors, (ie hybrid vehicle) but to be honest, while the United states system is messed up, downright abandoning it is not the right answer. I think that we must support the system until a replacement is found, and maintain what is dsyfunctional until then.

I couldn't agree more about changing US diet.

China will absolutely outpace the United states at it's current rate, but only will maintain it if they bring the impoverished 800 million plus into the light too. But thats for another debate.

I agree in principle with the ratio, thoguh not neccisarily the numbers you provided. I dont quite have a solution but your on the right track.

Still, the United States can still find a way. I hope its not too little too late though by the time a better sysytem is found. Im disgusted with the way politics are running currently.
Patriotic Swag^^

@ TWM cont.

Yes I am 100% in favour of protectionism. I'm sure you'd find the rest of my proposal a couple pages back infuriating but that was the core of it.

And I agree completely with you on the need to rebuild the manufacturing sector.

I just happen to think that you need to stop worrying about the military, cut spending there, restructure social programs to do more/the same for less, and save your economy.

"I should clarify what I meant by "small ships". I mean things like missile cruisers and small destroyers, certainly enough to curtail pirate activity and imposing enough to threaten enemies.
I stand by what I said about carriers, though. The US Naval Institute admitted that "Ships currently have no defense against a ballistic missile attack." after the Chinese developed the Dong Feng 21 in this report: http://www.usni.org/news-and-features/chinese-kill-weapon
The USNI says: "The size of the missile enables it to carry a warhead big enough to inflict significant damage on a large vessel, providing the Chinese the capability of destroying a U.S. supercarrier in one strike."
Soviet-made "Styx" Missiles sunk the INS Eliat in 1967, since then the Israeli navy has deployed smaller ships to avoid mass casualties like they had with the Eliat."

The Eilat was a cruiser, and Israel has no need for Aircrat carriers. I think your problem is assuming the US should build its navy to fight the Chinese, when we have fought 5 wars give or take in the last 20 years none against the chinese.

The chinese have just created their carrier killer missile, it doesnt make a carrier obsolete right away, especially when we are not fighting the chinese anytime soon

@Shua

I understand were your coming from with the deductibles, I just feel that they will provide the rich ways to have the government pay them money, and not contribute to society.

Glad to hear your on board with changing diet.

Out of curiosity what is your problem with the numbers? They used to be that low during the golden period of American as well. Or more like 1:50 then. But still.

Now they are 1:500 or something like that.

I hope you do find your way, I honestly thing that the system I proposed two pages back or so is a better way then what you currently have. A way that could turn the US around rapidly.

I think your system really could work, if the united states wasn't so hellbent on heading down this destructive path i think it could work. My problem with it is that the culture of the American wealthy is that of a spoiled class. adn with the globalized markets today, there is no incentive for them to stay in the US. why not move to somewhere where taxes are less, and they dont have to bow down to some 1:50 system. The US needs to gather money from the rich without pushing them away. A fine line that i think your solution ignores. If the rich leave, IMO the US will eb worse off than with the current system that is in place. Im going to sleep but this was a good discourse. Till next time.

Swag to the threehundredthousandtrillion

What I meant with the Eliat (it's a destroyer according to Wikipedia) example was that these types of weapons have been around since the 60's yet we still don't have sufficient defense against them. Anti-Ship missiles like the "Styx" have been sold to countries all over the world. I'm not specifically talking about a conventional war with china

I suppose you make a good point... Sigh. I think its stupid as hell to pander to the rich less they leave though. I mean you can always rebuild without them a better stronger path, less or this garbage.

Truly though in the current climate I can see why that is an unlikely occurrence. =(

yeah npr and pbs are the shit, if their funding gets cut i will definitely serve them up a larger donation than ive ever given to anything. i hope others do as well.

and the economist is also the shit, and i like that the writers are anon. it's as if the writer is the "economist" himself. lol.

Thanks for the desperate attempt to underail this : )

Honestly, I'm not *that* worried. It's not like this is the first time they've tried and failed. It just gets annoying after a while. I just hope it's not one of those things where they try so many times that defenders of npr lose interest.

McHuff-

We do have defenses against them, phalanx anti missile systems for one, but those missile boats would never get anywhere near an aircraft carrier with its escort and even if it did it would require alot of those missiles to bring a carrier down. The threat is the new Chinese carrier killers, only one nation in the world has those and have only had it for a period of months

..Erm, sorry Abge, I can't help but feel I'm directly responsible for derailing this with my first post in this thread.

@Santa:
You don't necessarily have to sink a carrier, a single hit can render it incapable of safely launching aircraft. The Phalanx CIWS only works at extreme close range and would be no match for a group of missiles like the Iranian made Fajr-5. With all that said, I agree that there is still some use for the carrier as a forward operating base and a platform for quickly gaining air superiority, but our entire navy is based on these monstrosities and from my perspective it seems like a waste of time and money that can be better used elsewhere.

@damian

hahah I don't care. If it keeps this thread at the top, it's fine with me.

"better clear the gift shops out first because the only battleships in the US navy are used as museums, the size of battleships made them outdated in WWII let alone today.

The new "battleship" and by that I mean a surface ship with loads of firepower capable of attacking shore targets are the next gen DD(X) destroyers."

Two Iowa-class battleships, though museums, have to be kept in a state of permanent readiness in case of war or national emergency (according to US law). That means not modifying the ships in any way that would hamper their military utility, and keeping a stockpile of special equipment, like 16-inch shells and barrels.

@ McHuff and Santa

Are air-to-air missiles fired from fighters effective against carrier-killing ballistic missiles?

Oh wow.

Its good to see the armchair admirals go into action. You kids are funny.

The entire point of everything in a carrier battlegroup (save the carrier) is to protect the carrier. The cruisers and destroyers have a pretty nice air defense system.

However, the real risk isn't above. Its below. Those submarines that somebody disparaged earlier are the real threat. You can't kill what you can't see. And believe you me... a single Seawolf boat in wargames wrecked a carrier battlegroup so badly they had to reset the entire exercise to get any training value out of it.

Antisubmarine warfare is a joke. They sure try hard, but I've personally watched three different nations try to hunt down a submarine. Nobody is very good at it.

On the other hand, its not hard to find an air or surface target.

You may go back to your semi-irrelevant economic discussion now. :)

this guy is so cool

"@ McHuff and Santa

Are air-to-air missiles fired from fighters effective against carrier-killing ballistic missiles? "

From what I understand, no, because the Chinese missiles are ICBMs, and as the Bush administration showed we dont know how to stop ICBMs. These things can leave the atmosphere reenter and hit a moving Carrier with accuracy so at the moment there isnt much defense systems can do.

But ask Jack Klein seems like he knows better, although I dont really see where I said anything he disagrees with.

Klein is always obnoxious and condescending. Don't mind him, he can't help himself.

Basically what Santa said. Hitting a moving target with a ballistic missile would be... difficult.

Cruise missiles are the danger, and the Navy has spent pretty much the last 30-40 years working on that. The AEGIS system on cruiser are rather nice, and they're supposed to be very good at shooting cruise missiles down.

That being said, that is all theory and exercises.

And Putin, I'm still black over here. I just want to check, you're black as well? EXCELLENT! :)

Is this the part where Klein does one of his famous "elbow drops"? I can never tell. Obviously nobody but Klein can know anything about the Navy, personal anecdotal evidence trumps all.

There is only one person making ad hominem attacks here, sir.

I'm sorry if three years experience tracking air, surface and submerged targets in a submerged environment doesn't qualify me in your mind to talk about naval warfare. I'm sure your own vast experience in the matter is far superior.

You're qualified. So are other people. The whole "you silly kids don't know shit" shtick of yours got old a long time ago.

No, but uninformed people spouting off about things they haven't researched is crap. As you should well know.

The cruise missile threat was something that the Navy has been working on since the 1950s. Is it a perfect defense? No. But going on about how the entire thing is obsolete because of a few guided missiles isn't a difference of opinion: Its flat out ignorant.

If you don't like that I'm calling people on it, tough. You've been just as condescending yourself in your own posts. And I don't go out of my way to personally attack you, but that isn't something you feel any particular need to emulate. Standards. We apparently have several of them.

Sorry, I don't respect this tendency to trot out resumes in order to win an argument. And armchair admiral is an ad hominem attack, last I checked.

@ Santa

I was under the impression that the new Chinese carrier-damager was a sea-skimmer, like an Exocet, but a hell of a lot bigger.

@ Jack_Klein

First, I agree with you about one thing. "...going on about how the entire thing is obsolete because of a few guided missiles isn't a difference of opinion: Its flat out ignorant."

Jack_Klein + 1

Second, I have a question. How does a Seawolf-class boat compare to a Virginia-class?

Oh, and Jack_Klein, you are a little biased towards subs, considering you used to serve on them. What exactly did you do, what boats were you on, and what was your rate/rank when you got out?

I got out as an EM2/SS. I was an engineer by training (nuc), but they cart a few of us up to the cone to help with tracking, because we can do (very basic) math in our heads (or so I was told). Our boat ended up spending about nine months before our big deployment in the yards, so I got to spend a lot of time up as part of the crew on the PCO/PXO(Prospective Commanding Officer/Executive Officer) attack trainers.

Virginia is the cheaper, and iteratively slightly more advanced version of the Seawolf. Seawolf was designed back in the Cold War when price was effectively no object. Like the B-2, etc. Virginia is is comparable for blue water (deep ocean operations), with a lot better brown water (shallow) capabilities.

All I'm saying is that I had a chance to observe three nations conducting ASW training with my boat playing rabbit. I can't go into details of course, but they were not good at it. And we're not talking about "oh, they might have gotten you, maybe?" but literally so bad that we could have sunk every single surface ship without too much issue. Taking close photographs of the stern of the ships so you can read the stenciling, etc.

Long story short, I think a lot of the current military spending is wrong. Projecting power is important, but we do spend too much money on the military, without question in my mind.

A handful of carrier battle groups, a good submarine force, and a decent air defense from our retarded brothers in the USAF, and we'd be sorted.

dude, abge, i will def not lose interest. holy shit.

npr is huge in my life. i dont know what i would do without it. not just the news, but the cultural programming. it's indispensable. i'd sooner get rid of like, the washington monument.... not kidding.

@Thucy

I agree, but I don't know how others feel.