In the US federal budget for the year to September 2008, George W Bush is proposing to an increase of 49 billion dollars or 11.3 per cent in the defence budget, to 481.4 billion dollars excluding the cost of the occupation of Iraq and the broad war on terror.
Including Iraq and the war in terror, the president is asking for a total of 716.5 billion dollars for defence in the coming financial year, according to the Wall Street Journal.
Given that the US already spends a greater proportion of national income on defence than any other country, next year's US defence budget therefore includes at least 284.1 billion dollars in unnecessary spending on defence.
In the same budget, Bush wants to slash 95.9 billion dollars from major benefit programs including Medicare, the federal healthcare programme for the elderly and disabled.
Needless to say, Bush want to continue with tax cuts for the wealthy which he introduced at the start of his presidency.
No comments:
Post a Comment