​Income inequality, wars, and $400,000 helmets

Will we ever get our priorities straight?

The Pilgrims of the Massachusetts Bay Colony were the first Americans to pledge support of wounded war veterans after members of their “militia” were killed and wounded during the massacre of native Pequots in 1636. Caring for our veterans after 400 years of war has now become a trillion-dollar business.

In addition to all of the costs of my training, and support for active and reserve duty for eight years in the Marine Corps, I have used the GI Bill for attaining a Masters Degree and VA loans for buying a house. We had three children born in Navy hospitals.

I wish some reputable think tank would make a serious attempt to determine how many trillions we have spent on wars and preparing for wars over the last 400 years. I was surprised to learn that we are still paying benefits to one dependent of a Civil War veteran, to 88 dependents of Spanish-American War veterans, and to nine dependents of veterans of our military adventures with Mexico early in the 20th Century.

In the modern era we are still paying benefits to thousands of dependents of World War I veterans, hundreds of thousands of World War II veterans and dependents, to hundreds of thousands of Korean War veterans and dependents, to at least 1.8 million Vietnam-era veterans and dependents, to millions of veterans and dependents of the Gulf War, and to millions of veterans and dependents of the wars in Afghanistan, Iraq, Syria, Libya, Somalia, Pakistan, Yemen, and dozens of other places in the world.

The VA operates the largest health system in the country, with 468 hospitals and medical centers and 1,053 outpatient clinics. The VA has determined that we will be paying benefits to about 13,000 veterans of World II—not counting their benefits—as late as 2034.

The perils of war seem to last forever. We were still paying benefits to a dependent of an American Revolutionary War veteran until the 1910s and to a Civil War widow until the 2000s. If America is still around in the 2170s we will still be paying benefits to the dependents of veterans of the wars we are fighting today.

And we have already spent trillions preparing to fight future wars. Muskets, 40-gun frigates, battleships, tanks, submarines, and bombers are very expensive to build, man, and maintain—but we ain’t seen nothing yet. The helmet for the pilot of our new F-35 stealth fighter plane costs $400,000. At last count each F-35 runs about $110 million. The military-industrial complex as described by General Dwight Eisenhower is planning on building about 2,000 of them. The F-35 has been expensive because it is being built as it flies through the air. Sometimes it’s incapable of getting into the air.

I wonder how Great Britain has taken care of its veterans and dependents. The Brits have been in more wars than we have. On the first day of the Somme offensive in France in World War I Britain suffered 57,470 casualties, 20,000 of them killed in action. In the four months of the Somme offensive the British suffered 420,000 casualties. As Marine General Chesty Puller used to tell us in 2nd Division meetings: “War is hell.”

If wars are such hell, why do religions often start them?

New York Times writer Gary Gutting attempts to answer this question by analyzing some of the world’s leading religions. He writes that both Islam and Christianity claim to be “revealed” religions, believing and teaching that the truths they preach have been revealed to them by God Himself. These two religions are missionary religions charged with bringing God’s truth to the entire world.

Gutting writes: “The world faces the question of how to deal with people who refuse to accept it. To what extent should it (the religions) tolerate religious error? At certain points in their histories, both Christianity and Islam have been intolerant of other religions, often of each other, even to the point of violence.”

I hasten to add that both religions have their extreme groups that are violent all of the time. Look at ISIS, the Taliban, the honor killings, the Klu Klux Klan, and the murderous Christians who kill abortion doctors and bomb abortion clinics.

In a very important paragraph Gutting summarizes why divine revelation, the “truth,” is “extremely dangerous” to mankind: “The potential for intolerance lies in the logic of religions like Christianity and Islam that say their teachings derive from divine revelation. For them, the truth that God has revealed is the most important truth there is; therefore, denying or doubting truth is extremely dangerous, both for nonbelievers, who lack this essential truth, and for believers, who well may be misled by the denials and doubts of nonbelievers. Given these assumptions, it’s easy to conclude that extreme steps are warranted to eliminate nonbelief.”

We are involved again in one of those extreme steps now, which is war. Since Islam became a world religious power, starting in the 7th Century, Christianity and Islam have been at each other’s throats and basic truths about 15 times in various “Crusades.” Will it end when the Middle East is finally at peace? I am a doubting Thomas.

People can accept human standards of morality which often limit the interpretation of divine teachings, or they can insist on total fidelity to God’s revelations. To some people God’s revelations exceed any kind of human understanding and they feel they are in no position to challenge that divine truth. To these people “false’ beliefs are intolerable.

With gods of war dominating humans, no wonder Earth is never without wars

There is something very stirring about the warlike theme of the lines “Onward Christian soldiers! marching as to war/ With the cross of Jesus going on before/ Christ the royal Master, leads against the foe/ Forward into battle, see His banners go/ Christian soldiers, on to victory/ Like a mighty army moves the Church of God.”

If there is a tribe or country on Earth that features gods or goddesses of peace, please let me know. They are very hard to find. Gods and goddesses of war are dominating in almost every culture on earth.

Anahit is the Goddess of War of Armenia, Anhur is the God of War of Egypt, Ah Chuy Kak was the Mayan God of War and was called The Destroyer, Ares was the powerful Greek God of War specializing in weapons, Athena was the Greek God of warfare, Astarte was the naked Bronze Age war goddess of Semitic tribes, Bishamonte is the Japanese God of warriors and warfare, Burijas is the War God of Iran, Bellona is the Roman Goddess of War who always carries a torch and spear, Chamuda is a Hindu Goddess of War who likes sacrifices, Beg-tse is the Tibetan God of War who wears full chain-mail, Erra is the Mesopotamia God of War and death, and Gun is the African God of War and iron.

Christianity has been around 700 years longer than Islam. Thinkers such as Voltaire and Rousseau raised questions about the tolerance level of Christians who reject all other religions. Popes, fundamentalists, and demagogues have often insisted that there was only one path to salvation. It appears now that most Europeans and Americans understand and tolerate other religions.

But, as late as 2013, a Pew Research poll revealed that most Muslims think Muslim “sharia” laws should be the law of all lands. Over 75% of the Muslims in Iraq, Malaysia, Pakistan, Afghanistan, and other Middle East countries favor executing Muslims who leave their religion.

Gutting writes: “During the Middle Ages Muslims were far more tolerant of Christians than they are today. The path of modern tolerance has proved to be more difficult for Islam than for Christianity.” We have to remember that Muslims called the Gulf War and the Bush invasion of Iraq the 15th Crusade against Islam.

I guess that’s why we have just spent $13 billion building another nuclear-powered aircraft carrier for our Navy. That’s the cost without 75 planes at about $110 million each on the deck—and with those 75 helmets at $400,000 each in the cockpit.

Islam has not cooled its intolerant attitudes to the extent Christianity has, but there is great danger in both religions if they claim they are the exclusive representatives of God’s truth. That’s when religions march off to war.

Education is the only answer to religious wars

Priorities, priorities. The Star Tribune’s headline this morning about the season-ending injury to quarterback Teddy Bridgewater dominated the news. How can Minnesotans enjoy the new $1.1 billion stadium they have invested $600 million in if they don’t have a first-class quarterback? Education is the answer to that problem, too.

It’s interesting that the kindergartners and some first graders entering schoolrooms this year were not born yet when the Great Recession “ended” in 2009. A New York Times editorial made the point on August 29th that many states are neglecting to fund education at levels previous to 2007. Research shows that 25 states were spending less per student than before the recession, adjusted for inflation, and seven states cut more than 10%. Local spending for education went down in 31 states between 2008 and 2014. Some states cut income taxes to the point that made it impossible to adequately finance K-12 education.

The biggest offenders are all Republican states: Arizona, Kansas, North Carolina, Oklahoma, and Wisconsin. In contrast, California voters increased sales taxes and income taxes, restoring budgets cut during the recession. Minnesota raised income taxes on wealthy residents, finally funding full-day kindergarten in all school districts.

When the Fargo Forum published the lists of supplies students and parents were supposed to provide for classroom activities, I as a former educator was amazed at the length, scope, and price. No doubt these lists show that schools no longer have the funds to pay for necessary items. Evidently school stockrooms that used to be full are now almost bare.

A nationwide survey on this problem revealed that since 2007 the cost of supplies and extracurricular activities has increased 85% for elementary students, 78% for middle school students, and 57% for high school students.

The one cost for students that bugs me the most is the increasing costs for participation in extracurricular activities, including athletics. Politicians scream about the system of “pay for play” involving the wealthy, but we force students to pay for playing in band, debate, and hockey! Extra-curricular activities are very important to the development and education of all students—and should be free to all students.

Shiller: “Today’s inequality could easily become tomorrow’s catastrophe”

Economist Robert Shiller recently said that income inequality, race, exclusionary religious and social structures like Christianity and Islam, and innovations in robotics, making good jobs impossible to find, make all kinds of wars very possible.

And future wars will force countries to invest in highly destructive technology that could devastate vast populations. Investments in war materials will create ever-increasing gaps in income for the disappearing middle class and poor.

Kenneth Stave of Stanford and David Stasavage of New York University have studied the tax policies of 20 nations over the span of two centuries and have concluded that taxes generally do not go up even when there are huge income gaps. Taxes only go up when countries are involved in warfare.

Although our infrastructure is becoming third-world and our K-12 and higher education programs are failing to educate a broad base of our society because of lack of funds, increasing taxes on the rich appears to be a nonstarter. Our tax collections are now the lowest since the 1940’s.

There are a few wealthy people who are beginning to understand the dangers of income gaps to them and that ever-increasing national security costs may bring on a catastrophe, but they don’t speak very loudly.