And don't think I don't realize...

...a military can drive an economy.

Buying weapons and their parts from your domestic dealers, that are domestic employers. Running the bases that fund towns. Paying soldiers. World War 2 vs The Great Depression.

But I believe that national debt capital could employ producers instead of destroyers. And they could be taxed just the same to keep the system going.

And seeing as government investment, and the economic stimulus it creates, need not generate profit, (Hence, "The National Priorities Project estimates the total cost for the war in Iraq, thus far, as 204.6 billion dollars. "[East Stroudsburg University, The Weekly Professor, June 23rd, 2005]), perhaps we could turn our economy towards fighting this:

Mauritania's deadly daily poverty

"Sitting in a feeding centre in Mauritania, one-year-old Mohamed Nour's stomach is swollen but not with food. His bony wrists are thicker than his arms.

Yet his proud mother Selka is adamant that she has enough to feed her son. He eats as she does, once a day.

'We had porridge yesterday and the day before and three days ago we had couscous,' she says."(BBC News.com)

I mean, if we (As in We the People, not we, the corporations within our state) are not making a buck either way, maybe we could drop bread and vitamins instead of bombs.

And when our bases close, we could give those towns something else to make besides soldiers.

Capitalism and Communism, in the functional history sense, aren't that much different. The government still decides spending priorities for a large part of the economy.

Here's ours: Where Your Income Tax Money Really Goes

What if more of that money was spent fighting abject suffering, instead of people.

It would still employ us.

(And on a personal side note, yes, I totally cited an East Stroudsburg University professor, rather than what he cited. A little shout out to the Poconos.)