Bush Reaffirms U.S. Missile Defense Plans (OMG)

[underpants]

http://story.news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&u=/nm/arms_missile_usa_dc

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - President Bush (news - web sites) remains intent on deploying a multibillion-dollar shield as an "important deterrent" against ballistic missile attack, the White House said on Thursday, a day after the system's first flight test in two years ended in failure.

"The president remains firmly committed to moving forward on a missile defense system," he told reporters. "Given the threats that we face in this day and age, missile defense is an important deterrent."


The Pentagon plans to spend more than $50 billion in the next five years on a wide range of related projects, including sea-based interceptors, a modified 747 jumbo jet airborne laser and what could become the first weapons in space.


Boeing's key subcontractors on the ground-based component are Northrop Grumman Corp., for command and control; Raytheon Co., for a "kill vehicle" meant to obliterate a target by colliding with it; and Lockheed Martin Corp. and Orbital Sciences Corp., which build booster rockets.

[Cocoa]

1. he also gave a Medal of Freedom to the rocket

that failed to launch.

[3days]

2. YES... We need more lasers

Bring on the lasers. Those are sooo cool and then when they are not shooting down nothing they can have a light show with Pink Floyd in the background.


"For example, on August 17, 2004, while speaking about missile defense during his campaign remarks in Ridley Park, Pennsylvania, George W. Bush said, We say to tyrants who believe they can blackmail America and the free world, "You fire, we're going to shoot it down."

CHIMP

Bring it down unless there's no clear sky over alaska

[daleo]

11. "You fire, we're going to shoot it down."

Assuming the weather is clear.
And the launch vehicle gets off the ground.
And the kill vehicle separates from the rocket.

None of which happened in the last few tests.

But God knows how many hundreds of billions were launched into stratospheric corporate profits, and how many socially useful projects were killed on impact.

[underpants]

Don't forget the homing beacons

The only thing close to success that StarWars has enjoyed (other than a "test" to see if the control panel lightbulbs work) was a missile to missile collision in 2001 -I think.

They started out with 9 decoys....cut it down to 7....then 3...then none and put a homing beacon on the target. Now if we can only get a homing beacon on every warhead in the world we will only have to deal with the physics miracles needed.

[daleo]

39. Here is a thought

Sell U.S. missiles to North Korea (and any other interested state) with homing beacons carefully hidden inside. Then the system is certain to work, at least every now and again.:crazy:

[underpants]

44. HA! put a "no peaking" clause in the sale contract

maybe they could regularly get UN imspectors to go over and make sure the seals hadn't been broken.

[IA_Seth]

24. Don't forget the homing device!

I mean honestly, has this shit-trap ever worked?

[LynnTheDem]

16. Notice how he differentiates between "America" and "the free world"?

Hmmmm...Freudian truth-telling slip?

[Just Me]

3. Oil-diggers, arms dealers, corporatists and war profiteers.

All the makings for the perfect neo-fascists.

Did you know that all fascists believe they are "good" and "righteous" and "benevolent"?

[Rick Myers]

4. Can you say...

Carlyle Group???

[LiberalinNC]

5. Even if these things don't work...don't they "fudge" the truth...

and say they worked? ;)

[nothingshocksmeanymore]

6. The intent is to suck money out of the treasury not defend anything

they KNOW this will never work which is why they have to fake successes

[Just Me]

10. Precisely. The MoFos are profiteering by funneling public wealth.

Simultaneously depleting the funds necessary for a government which protects the civil and human rights of our people. They seek a fascist governance where public wealth is used strictly for military strength and/or upholding corporate growth.

They are fascists,...pure and simple. That's what they are,...fascists. They are world empire kinda' fascists, too.

I'll bet they would never face their real selves in the mirror.

[underpants]

13. Is there only one missile defense system now?

There were two at one point the Navy one and the Air Force one. Not only do their corporate cousins get paid to make something that will never work they get to sell it TWICE!! at least they did.

BTW- Myers got the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs mainly because he has been a big supporter of StarWars for a long time.

[midnight armadillo]

45. There are several

There is THAAD "Theater high altitude air defense", an Army rocket for point defense. There is the Airborne Laser, which fills a 747 with a laser and actually has a good chance of being effective. There is the Navy version, launched from an Aegis cruiser, which has had successful tests against ballistic missiles. There are also the Patriot-3 and the US/Israel Arrow system.

All of these are tactical defense systems, used against Scud-scale missiles, for example. The laser can also be deployed to shoot down missiles in their boost phase.

The strategic ballistic missile system "works" against intercontinental missiles traveling in earth's upper atmosphere, and that is what Bush is claiming works when it is crap. Here, the opportunity for decoys will always overwhelm the technical sophistication of the interceptor.

So: battlefield, tactical ballistic missile defense - possible, but very hard and very, very expensive. Strategic, intercontinental BMD - impossible, and impossibly expensive.

[leftchick]

23. right on!

just like the fucking war in Iraq to "defend our freedoms"! Wake the hell up AmeriKa!

Lunatics!

[GHOSTDANCER]

37. Some of us are awake. Even an occasional re-puke amazingly.

Every gun that is made, every warship launched, every rocket fired, signifies in the final sense a theft from those who hunger and are not fed, those who are cold and are not clothed. -DD Eisenhower

[Lone_Star_Dem]

7. They trivialize the failures as minor errors

Damage control at it finest. :)

[crossroads]

9. Too bad they don't wage a war as well as they do propaganda! n/t

[Cha]

12. Or do anything "as well as they

do PROPOGANDA"! :-(

[WannaJumpMyScooter]

15. well, you see, you have to go to war with the Army you have,

not the Army that Clinton's penis destroyed!

[Lone_Star_Dem]

17. Damn that man's penis

For all the hell it has caused future administrations!

[3days]

28. Done

It has been damned

[old blue]

22. I have a colleague who tests these things for a living,

and during lunch last month he said steadfastly that they have no data to support that this system will work. They presented this result to the DoD, who proceeded to say, "let's buy it."

[Lone_Star_Dem]

8. For everyone here who buys this load of $***

I have a few bridges for sell, rock bottom prices. :)

[MaineYooper]

14. so incredibly stupid-

Missiles (unlike carbombs and other terrorist tools) are like a big flashing neon sign saying "it was us, come bomb/invade us please".

I guess it's pointless to try to convince * and co that the money (and we're talking boatloads here) could be spent *much* more wisely if protecting the country is the goal. (But as pointed out above, the goal is really sucking large sums of money out of the treasury.)

[Daisey Mae]

18. Such a waste of resources for

a psychopathic liar's desire to kill everyone he doesn't agree with.....

[sakabatou]

19. He still has a cold-war mind

wait... on second thought he lost it a long time ago.

[Spinzonner]

20. Failure is Success !

[driver8]

36. Bush should know!! He is a success at failure! n/t

[Pachamama]

21. What Bush really wants is to conquer the world into submission & control

it from space....

Crazy? Maybe not....

I also think that they are using this as a way to funnel money out of the treasury and into the pockets of the military contractors. Either this shit will never work and they all just profit from it, or they get rich while making it and then try to do more than just "defense"...

Can you imagine, like "Star Wars", Lasers shooting down at any target they choose?

:scared:

This has to be stopped!

[underpants]

25. Post #1and your post -this is sorta in that "Moonraker" killerlaser realm

huh?

Is that where this is going?

[Pachamama]

27. Those are the thoughts that came to mind for me...

1) The incompetence of this administration - (yes, they would award a medal to a rocket that couldn't launch or that "fizzled" during launch - heck, just asl Paul Bremer, Tenet and Franks)

2) The conquering "do as I say/your either with us or against us/spreading democracy & freedom" attitude

3) The rewarding of friends of Bush/FUCheney & Corporations mentality at the expense of the people

All these things and more make me think that is precisely what they plan....and where I think this is going....

[Toby109]

26. It'll really come in handy if 19 hijackers were ever to

slam airplanes into buildings.

[WannaJumpMyScooter]

31. Don't be silly! That would NEVER happen...

unless the government LET it happen, that is.

[neverforget]

29. I heard phasers, photon torpedoes and warp drives are right around

the corner and they too will serve as an important deterrent. :eyes:

[Geek_Girl]

30. So He's going to spend

Billions on Missile defense. Trillions on transition costs for privatizing social security, billions on the Iraq War and whatever future war they feel the need to fund. I think we're headed for Bankruptcy.

:nuke:

[not fooled]

32. But...a Small Price to Pay...

...to prevent even one thin dime from benefitting the commoners!!! Better billions for military doodads than anything to help people!

Seriously, anyone who isn't a corp or a defense contractor or $$$ who thinks * is on their side is an utter and complete fool.

[ilovenicepeople]

33. The biggest threat that George Bush faces is DEMOCRACY

[brentspeak]

34. Is there ANYTHING the Democrats in Congress can do to stop this mess?

I feel like someone has me at gunpoint and is fleecing me blind. Only this someone is the President of the United States and his cronies.

[driver8]

35. I feel the same way...

You would think that a couple of Republicans would grow some balls and help the Democrats put an end to the raping of this country. These guys are robbing the American people blind!

Bush and his cronies do not give a crap about the American people -- all they care about is big business, money and helping their buddies.

I hate to say it, but this country is fucked.

[PurityOfEssence]

38. The biggest boondoggle in American history, bar none

You can't hit a bullet with another bullet with any regularity. Now, when the bullet's a MIRV, that splinters into many different warheads, it's beyond ludicruous. Oh, then there's the issue of who the fuck would even launch one or more at us.

George W. Bush is a slobbering moron. He fears being found out as an imbecile more than any of his other many fears; may he live long enough to see the inevitable ridicule he so richly deserves.

Dad's a missile engineer, among many other things, and his take on this has been nothing but spitting derision since the beginning of Reagan's silly grandstanding. He was there at the beginning of the space program working on launch vehicles, and he's still working today, so he knows a bit about the beast. The very idea that this is still being touted as semi-sensible is beyond belief.

Ah, but it's that belief stuff again, isn't it? Reality's for fools.

How much money? How many friends?

[underpants]

43. A good friend of mine's late father worked on bullet-to-bullet stuff too

at White Sands a looooooong time ago. I asked him about it once and he laughed-he said there was no way they could do what they say they are going to do. He said they did actually have success once but that come from a combination of sleeping in the office and infinite number of factors that they had no control over coming together at exactly the same time. An actual "unknown anomoly". They could never replicate it.

[aikido15]

40. I'd like to stick a missile...

..up his ass!:nuke:

[Barkley]

41. $50 billion for Missile Defense; $300 million cut for Pell Grants

The new guidelines allow the Department of Education to revise the calculation for federal college aid in a way that would reduce the average allocation for the need-based grants by about $300 for about 1 million students, said Brian Fitzgerald, staff director for the Advisory Committee on Student Financial Assistance, which advises Congress.

In addition, he said, nearly 90,000 students now receiving Pell Grants would be cut off entirely.

But by allowing for a change in the formula, the revisions will save $300 million for the $12.4 billion program, which already has a $4 billion cumulative shortfall, Republican supporters said. Such a move could allow Congress to raise the maximum grant sooner, they said.

Congress curbs Pell Grants

Spending bill increases funding but could cut or even eliminate eligibility for college aid to as many as 1 million students.
http://www.detnews.com/2004/schools/0411/24/A05-15081.htm

[Barkley]

42. I wonder how much the $50 billion is going to spent in blue states?

That's one way to ensure that Dems in Congress won't make too much of a fuss about missile defense not working.

These companies are in California and Washington State.

Boeing's key subcontractors on the ground-based component are Northrop Grumman Corp., for command and control; Raytheon Co., for a "kill vehicle" meant to obliterate a target by colliding with it; and Lockheed Martin Corp. and Orbital Sciences Corp., which build booster rockets.

[Mike Niendorff]

46. Well, let's see, who has ICBMs ...

ICBMs. Who has 'em, who has 'em ... well, let's see :

Al Qaeda doesn't.
The Iraqi resistance doesn't.
Iran doesn't.
Syria doesn't.
Egypt doesn't.
Cuba doesn't.
Venezuela doesn't.

So, golly, it just really makes me wonder who Bush expects to be fighting against that he's so hot to get this anti-ICBM system up and running?
I mean, who has those dangerous ICBMs, anyway?
Oh, that's right:

China does.
Russia does.
The EU does.

But what on earth would make George think that he'll have to worry about a conflict with those powers? And, in particular, a conflict that would escalate to the point where they might consider opening those silo doors?

Well, gee, I just can't figure this out. Let's see what's on the news instead:

(Oil.)
(Invasion.)
(Occupation.)
(Escalation.)
(Oil.)
(Invasion.)
(Occupation.)
(Escalation.)

...


Nope, too tough for me to figure out. :shrug:


MDN

[underpants]

48. China won't they wouldn't want to hurt their investment

I'm just saying. They are the US's biggest stockholder.

[DFWJock]

47. Hey why not

drop a few more billion on this fantasy, we can pay for it with another tax cut.

[EFerrari]

49. Crazy AND greedy. MendacityCentral makes me miss Reagan