"Somehow this madness must cease. We must stop now. I speak as a child of God and brother to the suffering poor of Vietnam. I speak for those whose land is being laid waste, whose homes are being destroyed, whose culture is being subverted. I speak for the poor in America who are paying the double price of smashed hopes at home and death and corruption in Vietnam. I speak as a citizen of the world, for the world as it stands aghast at the path we have taken. I speak as an American to the leaders of my own nation. The great initiative in this war is ours. The initiative to stop it must be ours."

Martin Luther King, Jr., The Trumpet of Conscience, 1967.


"A nation that continues year after year to spend more money on military defense than on programs of social uplift is approaching spiritual death."

Martin Luther King, Jr., Where Do We Go from Here: Chaos or Community?, 1967.

I find it interesting King should refer to "nations" that spend more on military defense than on programs of "social uplift", as opposed to "governments".

Dr. King was a very articulate speaker, and chose his words carefully. So I wonder what "nation" he was speaking of in this comment.

(First, I don't know what he means by "social uplift". Is a Michael Moore movie "social uplift"?

But, I confess, I didn't read the whole speach.)

No matter how you define it, no "nation" spends more on military defense than on other uses. Even the Saudi's military spending is only 15% of their GDP. 85% of the Saudi economy goes to non-military expenses. (That is probably the highest percentage in the world.)

Here in the US, the military takes only 4-5% of the "nation's" spending.

Assuming, however, that King meant "government" when he said "nation", I'm still able to report that the United States of America spend more on "social uplift", however you define it, then on military defense.

US governments spend more on education alone (when you count not only federal spending, but spending by the 50 states and the thousands of municipalities and private endowments) then it does on the military.

Yes. In 2000, for example, the total governmental spending on k-12 alone was $372 billion, (see http://www.policyalmanac.org/education/archive/doe_education_spending.shtml). That doesn't include vast amounts of private endowments and governmental money spend at the University level.

By comparison, the military budget for the year 2000 was only $289 billion. (See http://www.unitedforpeace.org/downloads/military_map.pdf)

And that doesn't even include the huge amounts of government spending on welfare, medical care, housing vouchers, disability, retirement, etc., again at the federal, state and local level.

So, while I'm not sure what "social uplift" means, it seems pretty clear that here in the states we spend far more on social programs than on guns. I guess King would be pleased to know that if he were still with us.

When he said those words, we were in Viet Nam.

You're pulling up numbers from 2000 (or is that really 1999), while, today we are involved in an expensive occupation of Iraq.

Furthermore, there will be additional military budget increases to replinish our spent arms, as well as another increase to recruit or draft more personnel.

And, last, we'll have to know how we count our money:

Does the Dept of Homeland Security become a military budget? What about the TSA folks at the airports?

What about money for the GI Bill, an education subsidy that is predicated on being a vet. It should be considered a military budget, because it's compensation for services. What about the new NASA priorities.

NASA's always had a quasi-military purpose (to build rockets) but today, the military direction is a bit more clear -- a space platform.

I'm not MLK, so I can't speak for him, but I think if I were the corpse of a Black assasinated Civil RIghts leader, I'd be spinning in my grave.

Raise small numbers.

2003's military budget is only 389 billion, including Iraq and Afghanistan. That is just a tad more than 2000's spending on k-12 education.

Note... 2000's ed budgets were probably a little larger than 2003's, due to belt-tightening due to the lagging economy. 2000 was still the tail end of the economic boom.

The defense budget is growing, the education budget is shrinking. More of the public sector is being engaged in war activities.

GOP Victories Power [War] Stocks:
http://www.usatoday.com/money/markets/us/2002-11-06-defense-stocks_x.htm

Also from USA Today:
http://www.usatoday.com/news/world/iraq/2003-09-07-cover-costs_x.htm

"The Pentagon is spending nearly $5 billion per month in Iraq and Afghanistan, a pace that would bring yearly costs to almost $60 billion. Those expenses do not include money being spent on rebuilding Iraq's electric grid, water supply and other infrastructure, costs which had no parallel in Vietnam."

"There is a key reason why keeping about 150,000 troops in Iraq and Afghanistan is almost as costly as the war in Vietnam, which at its peak involved up to 500,000 troops. U.S. forces in Vietnam were largely low-paid draftees, while today's all-volunteer military is better paid, better trained and better equipped — all of which means a bigger budget."

//// War, what is it good for? It's good for business. ////

"More rational" -- that moniker is ironic I suppose. Does a rational person just throw out an unsubstantiated claim like "education spending is shrinking" and expect people accept it on faith?

Fact is, education spending is rising throughout the nation, and Bush's No Child Left Behind Act, co-sponsored by Sen. Ted Kennedy, vastly increased federal spending on education.

Today, tax payers spend $500 BILLION on k-12 education -- still more than the 2003 military budget. See: http://search.netscape.com/ns/boomframe.jsp?query=education+spending+no+child+left+behind&page=1&offset=0&result_url=redir%3Fsrc%3Dwebsearch%26amp%3BrequestId%3D79c10721e99d4105%26amp%3BclickedItemRank%3D9%26amp%3BuserQuery%3Deducation%2Bspending%2Bno%2Bchild%2Bleft%2Bbehind%26amp%3BclickedItemURN%3Dhttp%253A%252F%252Fwww.brookings.edu%252Fviews%252Fop-ed%252Floveless%252F20040108.htm%26amp%3BinvocationType%3D-%26amp%3BfromPage%3DAppleTop&remove_url=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.brookings.edu%2Fviews%2Fop-ed%2Floveless%2F20040108.htm