A little context to Romney’s proposed Navy expansion
As part of his plan to increase defense spending by $2 trillion over the next decade, Mitt Romney has repeatedly cited the factoid that the United States has fewer ships in its Navy today than it did in 1916, suggesting that our naval power has declined since then. He is also campaigning on a pledge to boost the number of ships from 285 to 313. saying “I will restore our Navy to the size needed to fulfill our missions by building 15 ships per year, including three submarines.”
Our current ship-building rate is 9 to 10 per year.
Two points regarding that issue:
1.) As it happens, two political scientists at Florida State University recently completed a historical study that compares naval strength among the major powers from 1865 to 2011. They conclude:
“In 1916, the U.S. controlled roughly 11% of the world’s naval power. This is an impressive number that ranks the US third in naval strength behind the UK (34%) and Germany (19%), and just ahead of France (10%). What about the US navy in 2011? In 2011, the US controlled roughly 50% of the world’s naval power putting it in a comfortable lead in naval power ahead of Russia (11%).”
In Romney’s view, the fact that 4 percent of the world’s population controls a mere 50 percent of the world’s naval firepower, almost five times the amount of the second-ranked power, leaves that 4 percent dangerously vulnerable.
2.) Why is Romney stressing naval expansion in his campaign remarks? Take a look at the map of swing states. Virginia is critical to his election hopes. Virginia is also home to Newport News Shipbuilding, which with 21,000 employees is a major contractor with the U.S. Navy. The additional submarines that Romney keeps mentioning are nuclear-powered Virginia-class subs, built in part at Newport News at a cost of $2.5 billion per copy.
In other words, Romney is dangling billions of taxpayers dollars and government-financed jobs in front of Virginia voters, hoping that it wins him the presidency.
– Jay Bookman
measure of state naval strength for all countries from 1865 to 2011detailing the
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716 comments Add your comment
the day Billy Graham turned his back on God
October 25th, 2012
9:18 am
At the risk of sounding judgmental, that sounds pretty darn good to me -
____
Thanks…just a simple, humbled personality…that I am!!
Mighty Righty
October 25th, 2012
9:28 am
Here is a friendly piece of advice. If you want to get ahead in your work place, don’t let people known you are a Democrat or that you did or will vote for Obama. Your superiors will think you are stupid and it will limit your future. The exceptions would be tort attorneys, labor union members and certain whose political affiliations are well known.
Skip
October 25th, 2012
9:28 am
Nothing wrong with frozen seafood, trick is to run doen to the gulf, get it home and freeze it. Got some in the freezer now.
loyd george
October 25th, 2012
9:30 am
and bropheus and granny and taxpayer…
GT
October 25th, 2012
9:32 am
Steve-USA especially if the bumper sticker says Newt.
alex
October 25th, 2012
9:34 am
Powell is a good man, an intelligent man,don’t agree with him but respect him… and predictable
What WOULD have been NEWs is him supporting Romney (NEWs as in new,as in novel.. get it, …more APS education material)
Pass the cinnabon..
GT
October 25th, 2012
9:35 am
Billy Graham has taken the Mormons off the list of cults they apparently keep somewhere, maybe on a post office bulletin board. If you are able to sell the stuff old Billy is interested in you but if you have a birthday and you are not headline material God and Billy won’t be calling you on that day.
Jim F
October 25th, 2012
9:41 am
>> Romney is dangling billions of taxpayers dollars and government-financed jobs in front of Virginia voters, hoping that it wins him the presidency
Democracy in action.
GT
October 25th, 2012
9:43 am
Trump is giving five million dollar to a charity of O’s choice if Obama gives up his college information or his passport information. Why doesn’t he just give the five million anyway, why does it have to come with strings. What else is he going to do with it may sex films, with those floozies they runs for Miss America? Watch when they change the loopholes for the rich how much charity work Trump does, then watch people like Warren Buffett and Gates still give. It is call class and not so much class.
Mighty Righty
October 25th, 2012
9:53 am
“quote, that is not what he was saying, when they are caught with their pants down. It’s you with a hearing problem not Romney being a flip flopper, he never flip flopped, he never wrote that Detroit should go bankrupt, you misread it”
As usual, mis quoted, out of context, mis leading and ignorant of the facts. One Obama forced GM and Chrysler to file bankruptcy which they did. That was not a bad thing. It had to be done to save some of the thousands of jobs that would have been lost had they gone out of business. In the process thousnds of jobs were lost, sacrificed if you will to save the ones which were left. In fact, far more jobs were lost as a result of the Obama imposed bankruptcy than Bain Capital ever lost. So when Romney said to let them file bankruptcy, it was what exactly what Obama did that Obama now brags about with out mentioning the word Bankruptcy. When Romney called him on it during the debate. Obama then lied that Romney had never said the government should step in and help. When called on it he continued to lie. Since then the Obama lies have been exposed mnumerous times. The bankruptcy of both GM and Chysler cost thousands of jobs which Obama ignores when he takes credit for saving the auto companies for example more than 1000 Chrysler Dealerships were closed costing tens of thousands of those workers to lose their jobs, health insurance, etc. Funny how Obama wants credit for the few jobs he saved while ignoring the jobs his action lost. Then his supporter come along with their own lies repeating the BS put out by the Obama campaign thinking they are being witty. Wrong! While we are on this subject it is insructive to mention that thestate of Michigan is now a toss up moving from soid Obma to even in the latest poll. Speaking of flip flops, Obama has flip flopped more times in the last month just on Benghazi than Romney has since he was governor of Massachusetts.
Mighty Righty
October 25th, 2012
10:03 am
GT
As a protestant I have never seen a list of cults. Can you please cite your information source. I have heard that the Obama administration has lists of potential terorists which includes evangelicals and other scary right wing groups like tea party members, but I have never heard of a list of cults. He even has a list of terrorists he personaly wants to kill and checks them off as he bombs them and their neighbors. He then checks off his kills. I don’t know if he keeps a list of their dead neighbors.
Psalm 24
October 25th, 2012
10:55 am
Psalm 24
David testifies, The earth is the Lord’s and the fulness thereof, he who has clean hands and a pure heart will ascend unto the hill of the Lord, and the Lord of Hosts is the King of Glory.
A Psalm of David. 1 The aearth is the bLord’s, and the fulness thereof; the world, and they that dwell therein.
2 For he hath founded it upon the seas, and established it upon the floods.
3 Who shall aascend into the hill of the Lord? or who shall stand in his bholy place?
4 He that hath aclean bhands, and a cpure dheart; who hath not lifted up his soul unto evanity, nor fsworn gdeceitfully.
5 He shall receive the blessing from the Lord, and righteousness from the God of his salvation.
6 This is the generation of them that seek him, that seek thy face, aO Jacob. Selah.
7 aLift up your heads, O ye gates; and be ye lift up, ye everlasting doors; and the King of glory shall bcome in.
8 Who is this aKing of bglory? The Lord strong and mighty, the Lord mighty in battle.
9 Lift up your heads, O ye gates; even lift them up, ye everlasting doors; and the King of glory shall come in.
10 Who is this aKing of glory? The Lord of hosts, he is the King of glory. Selah.
Bill Orvis White
October 25th, 2012
11:53 am
Thank you @Normal Free, Human Rights Thug…and liking it!
I am on a crusade to root out evildoers and secular progressive wherever they may exist. Folk like me will find you. Y’all can run, but you cannot hide.
Amen,
Bill
A little context to Romney’s proposed Navy expansion ~ AJC « Stop Making Sense
October 25th, 2012
12:51 pm
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ObamaRules
October 26th, 2012
9:23 am
promising to spend trillions more for “defense” when there is no threat to the U.S., just to get votes? Pathetic.
Barnacle Bill
October 27th, 2012
1:01 pm
So rightwingextreme wants our country to be thalassocratic. That is a good word for what he is advising, but he actually has no idea what it means, so he can look it up if he can find it in a dictionary.
Our present Navy has the power in one ship to out gun the whole fleet in 1916.
rightwingextreme says that the Chinese are not acquiring carrier technology. That is absolutely correct, the have ONE carrier and it is a left over, a ship dumped by the Russian Navy, that was old and outdated. It probably is not as large as our LHAs or or LPHs, neither much larger than a WWII carrier like Yorktown and those ships are not in the list of carriers, they are in the list of amphibious ships, the LHA carries jets, the LPH carry assault helicopters, both of the carry a myriad of Marines and their equipment and both have large hospital capacity to take care of wounded.
If we need ships, we can build them pretty quickly without the cost overruns and the delays in getting the ships on line today. In the early 1940s we built over 6000 ships in only four years. Necessity is the mother of invention. Some of those ships are still in use somewhere.
Ships sitting in port awaiting the money to man them and to supply them are worthless. That was a problem with the Cold War Russian fleet, they could nto afford to put them to sea. A full blown carrier has 4000+ men aboard and the amphibious assault carriers have about 3000. That means a large payroll and a lot of food and other supplies to keep them afloat. This would mean a massive buildup in both the Marine Corp and the Navy. Where in the devil is that money to come from, the top 1% income group certainly does not want to pay for it.
There is a very valid argument today that we don’t even need carriers. They, like the battleships of old, are about to be burdensom behemoths that can be destroyed with one missile of a type that even Iran has.
I have been on a ship for a year that was underway virtually all the time. We had precious little liberty and could seldom even get off the ship. That ain’t fun. But if you want a Navy big enough to cover the entire globe within 24 hours, that is what the life of those sailors will be.