I think we need to step back and think about just what the United States military really is.

It is the one public works project that the entire country can really agree to.

Before World War 2, much of the population were no more than third generation and even those longer settled tended to identify with their regions and states, more than the country as a whole. The Civil War ended 80 years previously and that was about as long as it's been since WW2 to us.

The automobile, airplanes and telephone were the equivalent of what the internet and information age are to us.

It was preceded by the Great Depression. So there was this enormous public effort in which everyone was involved and drawn together, rich and poor, all classes, creeds and colors.

It was the defining event for this country and there was no turning back.

Consider that in the Korean War, just five years later, more tonnage of bombs were dropped on that little area, than were dropped on both Germany and Japan.

The Machine was cranked up and there was no turning it off.

Is it any wonder the North Koreans still seem psychologically scarred?

The problem is that society cannot exist without public works, but our nation and country is based on the individual as supreme. Ha.

Doesn't it occur to anyone that people are not the biggest, or toughest? We are not the lions, or tigers, or bears. We are the ground apes and we climbed to the top of the environmental hierarchy because we work together.

Consider that the Federal debt really began to grow with the Depression, so not only was Roosevelt putting unemployed labor back to work, but unemployed capital as well. The fact is that money is a social contract, not a commodity and to store the asset side of the ledger, there has to be a debt on the other side. Much which is public. Much of which is poured into the military. Because it's that one public works project we all agree to.

The fact is, there isn't the investment potential for everyone to save individually, but we do save for many of the same reasons, so public works and public commons would be a logical solution, but that would require understanding a healthy society is based on collective responsibility, with rights as reward, not rights as ordained and responsibility as optional.

As it is now, our cumulative saving for the future are a bunch of promises that can never be repaid. Blowing up other countries and treating the financial system as casino is not going to pay off. Ever.