Donald Trump is a billionaire. That doesn’t mean he’s a terrible person. Everything else he does, says, and probably enjoys thinking about DOES mean he’s a terrible person. It’s easy to see why he would think about cutting social programs, including arts programs that barely affect the budget. It’s easy to see why he would give all the money to corporations and let the average person suffer. The answer is simple. He likes to hurt people. He’s never wanted to pay anyone for work they’ve done, even when he’s said he pay them. He’s threatened people, and he’s going to keep doing that.
What will Trump do with the extra money? (By the way, his budget plan doesn’t seem to actually make him any money, but who’s paying attention besides me?) He’ll build up the already gigantic military to be an even stronger force. Fact is, that can’t be all that bad, but do we need it? Well, there’s North Korea, China, Iran, ISIS, and others that want to kill us. I mean, that’s true, but our military budget is already more than half a trillion. More than half of $1,000,000,000,000. Lots of zeroes there. That’s per year, FYI. We all know this, but he wants to add even more to it.
However, I think it’s probably not a bad idea to invest in the military. I think you can do it without spending much more money, though. I think he wants to increase the budget by 14%. However, he could shift some resources to cybercrime without spending extra money. He could also retrain officers in more modern skills that aren’t akin to the conventional warfare strategies that are proving highly ineffective. Moreover, I don’t think even a 14% increase will be enough to attack the major enemies we have. ISIS? Okay. We can do that. Tough, but we can do it. North Korea? No. That can’t be done no matter how much money we throw at it because China will never let it happen. Cybercrime? I’m not sure that won’t be our Achilles heel. We’re just not good at cyber defense. We’re trying, but so far, the Chinese, Russians, and a couple others are far better than us. I’m not sure cutting Planned Parenthood to pay for a cyber defense is really smart. We’ll end up getting rid of an important domestic program in favor of a military program that doesn’t accomplish its goal. I say go for it, but I don’t think it’s going to work, and I don’t think we should gut our domestic programs for a fight we can’t win.
I think it’s more effective to simply start boycotting countries we don’t like. Not just sanctioning but specifically banning economic activity in certain industries of an entire country. In most countries, you can’t do that. For example, Iranian citizens seriously do not deserve this. However, North Korean already destroys its people so if we hadn’t already sanctioned them in every way possible, I’d say blocking all economic activity between the U.S. and North Korea wouldn’t hurt them more than their government is already hurting them anyway. When it comes to China and some industries there and some industries in some other countries, I think it’s time to put a blanket ban on economic activity across entire industries. I don’t think we can continue competing in traditional ways. China has found a way around that. They’re real smart, and they’re beating us. Therefore, I think we need to start changing the way we fight them and their allies, and I don’t think that requires more money.
We might consider more publically supporting the Make In India campaign. To be brief, they have the same number of people, the largest democracy in the world, a disputed border with China (See Map of Arunachal Pradesh), nuclear weapons and quickly growing military, political connections with the U.S., a prime minister that is supporting economic growth and export activity through aggressive tax reform and financial system modernization, and many other factors that, with their scale, can be a formidable competitor against China. Moreover, I don’t believe India wants confrontation with China or anyone. Therefore, I think they are a safe alternative.
Supporting the abovementioned program doesn’t cost the U.S. any money, and it takes us out the woods when it comes to China’s economic activity so defined by cheating, poor standards, currency manipulation, and generally anti-Western attitudes. That could do a lot more to benefit the U.S. and help us militarily in Asia than simply funding conventional warfare, and we wouldn’t have to cut funding to so many great domestic programs that Trump wants to get rid of.
Other military action that might be good or bad? Well, we’ve got troops in Syria now. Trump talked about encouraging South Korea and Japan to have nuclear weapons. We’ve obviously conducted a raid in Yemen. Some of these are good, and some of these are bad. I’m not sure we want to have no military activity in Syria, though I’m not sure boots on the ground is the best way. Frankly, at this point, it might be, but I wish it weren’t. Nuclearizing South Korea and Japan? Haha, c’mon Donnie. That’s a blatant anti-China statement, and it would do nothing but worsen relations. If anything, we’re not there yet, and we’re not even close to needing that. THAAD will do just fine for now, especially since China thinks it’s against them even though it’s so clearly not and might not even be successful in stopping a Chinese missile. Its radar isn’t even functional in all directions, and the whole thing is only functional at a short distance. Yemen was okay but small.
My point is we can be involved in conventional warfare, but none of this is really getting us anywhere. We’re just spending more money, and we ought to find a better way before throwing so much more money at it.
So what’s my prediction?
Well, I think India will continue to grow economically and THAAD will continue to piss off China. So I don’t think we need much more for now. The most important thing to remember is that we’re already spending a ton of money fighting ISIS, and if we can do that, that’ll free up a lot of resources to function more conventionally, though with the addition of a cyber force.
The last thing I’ll say is apparently Sweden has reintroduced the draft. Apparently, Scandinavia has been irked enough by Russia into forcing people to serve in their military. I’m not sure there’s a saying that when one Scandinavia country does something, they all do it, but Norwegians often say that serving in the military is very honorable. Therefore, I’m unsure whether conscription won’t spread. However, I don’t think that means the trend will spread everywhere. I doubt we’ll have a draft, even if Trump decides he wants one some day.
CALL TO ACTION: Research the military, get educated on what we need to do and where we need to stop wasting money. Much of the military is concerned with the unconventional military tactics of certain enemies, but Trump thinks he can use such conventional methods as bombing the s*** out of them (YouTube). We need to teach him, in the 30 years he’s been cosseted away in Trump Tower in NYC hiding from the rest of the world, that the world has changed.
Tell Trump to stop cutting funding to social programs here in the U.S. unless he’s going to use those funds to EFFECTIVELY run the military. He doesn’t know what he’s doing. I love the military. I really do. However, the Commander-in-Chief I do not love, and he’s got the power.
Only the people are a strong enough force to stop Trump from making a huge mistake with our military. Speak Out!
To read more about how irritated China is about THAAD, take a look at the below screenshot from Weibo, China’s largest social media website. I’ve translated it from Mandarin to English.
This is a daily schedule. First you wake up (起床). Then you “hate” (恨). For example, from 8:31-9:00, that’s breakfast. After that, you’re supposed to hate Japan (日本) for three hours until lunch at noon. After that, hate America (美国) then Vietnam (越南) and then the Philippines (菲律宾) and Singapore (新加坡) until dinner. Afterward, you’re supposed to hate independence movements in Tibet, Taiwan, Xinjiang, and Hong Kong. From 10:01pm until 5:59am, you’re supposed to have a “China Dream” (中国梦). So things are getting bad over there, though that’s just one person’s Weibo post.