The President-Elect has asked the President to release the second tranche of $350 billion in emergency rescue funds authorized by Congress last October. Congress may revolt and try to block the funds, but Bush or Obama will probably veto their legislation and that veto will most likely be sustained.
I hope that the second batch of funds has a better effect than did the first, which vanished without a trace into the gaping maw of the financial system. The same whiz kids that got us into this mess by acting like rock stars on a three-day bender in Vegas have taken to button-downed financial conservatism with the zealotry of the newly converted. The money meant to flow through the economy sits under their amply padded bottoms; prim, secure and utterly useless.
$350 billion is a Really Big Number, so just for the context that’s in it, your host did some back of the napkin calculations on what that might have bought in the physical world he understands:
It would have bought:
- 6.4 million man-years of end strength. That would be sufficient funding, if you stuffed under the mattresses rather than investing it something safe, to man the Navy at its current size for the next 21 years without making another payment.
- The USAF wants to buy another lot of 60 or so world-beating F-22 Raptors to round out the 183 they currently have. $350b would have bought 2500 of them at the current unit cost. Which would have gone down massively by the economies of scale accompanying the additional purchases.
- $350b would have bought 8,750 FA-18C aircraft, if they were still in production, or 7,000 FA-18E/F Super Hornets.
- We could have bought 70 Nimitz-class aircraft carriers or, alternatively, bought, maintained, operated, modernized and disposed of 16 of them for 50 years.
- $350b could have bought us 448 Arleigh Burke-class destroyers.
- You could operate a Ticonderoga-class air defense cruiser for 12,500 years on $350 billion.
- We could have bought 175 Virginia-class attack submarines to augment the 5 currently operating, and the 30 we intend to build.
$350 billion a really big number, and it went nowhere.
Which reminded me to look this up: What $315 B looks like.
“and it went nowhere..”
True dat. What really hurts is to see that sort of cash being tossed around, willy nilly, when I’ve been having to sell a few possessions in order to put heating oil in the tank, and food on the table.
To be honest, I don’t mind at all having to do without if it’s what is needed to do my fair share. However, listening to UAW folks talk of suffering, when their union owns a 30 million dollar golf course, and watching as the nation spends 200 MILLION dollars on an inaugural event, and reading of another Kennedy trying to buy a title for their empire, makes this old fellow reconsider the thought of revolution in a more positive light.
Joan – that is one helluva website. Astounding.
Tim – I hear ya, especially about the inauguration. I know it’s the country’s once-every-4-years big celebration and party, but in these economic times it’s just … unseemly.
But then it’s to inaugurate The One. Can’t be seen to cut things back and bit, make them fit the times. Must have Roman Columns and big screen TVs for the masses.
Not sure of the real ramifications of this but it still sounds good to me:
maybe they could used the initial trillion plus to pay off everyones mortgage, eliminating the bad debt, infusing the mortgage companies with operating capital and giving me, for example, $1,300 a month more in disposable income that I could spend which would help stimulate the economy….and probably still have money left over…and they wouldn’t need the additional $315 billion….
just a thought…..
More bad economic news. NORTEL just filed for Chapter 11. One of the largest telecommunications equipment providers and largest Canadian companies. Major supplier to US market as well as DOD. If you have ever made a DSN call it went through a network primarily made up of NORTEL switches whether red or black call.
Wonder what happens when the CINC gets a “I’m sorry your call cannot be completed” message….?
OldT6
Nortel going belly up isn’t a bad thing. They are backed by Canadian guv-mint money so won’t disappear. Their stock has gone from $1200 CN (adjusted for splits) to $0.30 CN, an amazing loss of shareholder equity that rivals even some of our best busts like Lehman Brothers. Being in the telcom world we’ve been eating Nortel deals for over 2 years as their technology sucks, can’t compete and costs more than their competitors. Maybe the US can step in with some free largesse and bail ‘em out. Heck, just give the poor Navy the interest on the 350 billion bonzos and we’d be happy.
Joan’s website IS astounding. But it doesn’t BEGIN to show the waste.
The real waste is that the $350 billion we’re talking about is borrowed money, added to the trillions we already owe. We pay millions of dollars in interest each DAY to pay off that endless debt. The flushing sound you hear is our tax money going down the toilet to pay interest.
Senor Lex,
How many V-22 Ospreys duz that buy since one in transition from airplane to hover mode just flew past the picture window on the way to CHS rwy 33. Different noise along with a different view.
Seriously, I’d like permission to use some of your numbers in a letter to the editor of the local rag – and will give appropriate credit to “NeptunusLex”. More people need to see the unbridled scope of waste.
Go for it!
George, for the sake of others who didn’t click the link, the link is not to my website. “Astounding” would be a bit over the top for a description for me. I think “mildly amusing” might befit my poor offering.
From the Chump that promises Change, this is merely Chump Change. We haven’t seen anything, yet.
Should this 350 billion be filed under “The Hair of The Dog” or “Stupidity”?
Someone once said, “If you do something wrong often enough, it becomes right”.
2500 F-22s……7000 Super Hornets………sheesh, that puts things in perspective. Given the ringer the military is about to go through (a new, improved version of the ringer the military has gone through over the last 2 decades), the waste is simply stupefying. USAF is just about committing service suicide over a few dozen measly F-22s, and this nation pisses away enough money in a day to pay for squadron after squadron of the type.
16 carriers plus their 50 year life cycle……crikey. All gone in an instant…..vapor.
How many penicillin shots would it buy after a port call in Pattaya Beach?
As a space geek, I prefer the “we’d have 20 people walking on Mars in 15 years and a permanent colony of 100 people in 25 years… for half of that.”
Lex, you pretty much said all that needed to be said.