If the South Dakota Democratic Party hasn’t locked in a challenger against John Thune, may I nominate rancher and peace activist Marvin Kammerer?
In a letter to the editor published in the Native Sun News, Kammerer calls into question Senator Thune’s leadership and judgment on bringing the F-35 fighter jet to Sioux Falls. Echoing the sentiments of Larry Kurtz, Donald Trump, and an F-35 test pilot, Kammerer says Thune seems more interested in serving the military-industrial complex’s business model rather than national security:
The term national security is an ambiguous concept used by pork barrel packers and enhanced by their politics of fear to bleed the middle class people of their hard earned money for the security and greed of corporate America. We must remember that a former President and commander of the European theater during World War II, Dwight D. Eisenhower, warned us about the threat of our military industrial complex and the imperialist tendency that follows.
Mr. Thune, consider the following: share with the public what is written in these articles found at WWW.pogo.org have to say about the F-35:
- http://www.pogo.org/about/press-room/releases/2015/congress-pentagon-must-re-evaluate-f-35.html
- http://www.pogo.org/about/press-room/releases/2011/ns-jsf-20110923.html .
Winslow Wheeler, an analyst for POGO called the F-35 the airplane that will eat the Pentagon.
At the same time, the Air Force is planning on retiring the A-10, a very good troop support aircraft. I suggest interested parties also read: http://www.pogo.org/our-work/reports/2015/suggested-congressional-oversight-priorities-and-legislative-reforms.html .
The Center for Defense Information was started in 1971 with the help of real patriots including Admiral Carroll and Admiral Zumwalt. The people of POGO are not phony patriots. They can and will question military spending and waste for the people of the United States. It is up to us as citizens and patriots to demand that our government representatives use and share these sources of information with all of us.
Democrat and Republican congressional people are guilty of using national security as pork barrel and campaign enhancement. Pimping for the military establishment that Eisenhower warned us about is the same as pimping in the flesh market [Marvin Kammerer, letter to the editor, Native Sun News, 2016.01.13].
I don’t know if I can convince Kammerer to run for Senate, but whoever does should keep Kammerer’s letter and sources handy to ask Senator Thune some pointed questions about his military priorities.
Marv is one of the most upstanding, straightforward persons that I know. Marv has been working all of his life to forge better relationships between natives and non-natives and has worked to protect unci maka (Mother Earth). Marv would definitely shake up the US Congress.
Let the draft movement begin!
Senator thune was part of a senate sub committee that cancelled the space shuttle program. That sub committee’s reasoning for scrapping the program? Too expensive. Yep, the space shuttle program over it’s thirty years of existence from 1981 to 2011 was too draining on the American taxpayers wallet. That cost over it’s 30 year lifespan in inflation adjusted dollars was 119 billion dollars. mr thune chopped it because our military industrial complex had much more sinister ideas for spending American tax dollars. The f35 program is now 20 years old and still in the development stages. It can’t dogfight. It’s too heavy. Our current F16’s beat it in any regard as a fighter. Yet the the f35 costs at least 4 to 10 times more depending on configuration. Right now, after 20 years of development, the f35 has drained the taxpayer of over 400 billion dollars. Before its fully developed, it will drain us of over 1.5 TRILLION dollars. All for an aircraft that will probably never see military combat because of its myriad of shortfalls. BUT, it will look really great at air shows. So, we shut down the space shuttle program after 119 billion, and are willing to spend 1.5 trillion on a failed aircraft? Senator thune? FAIL.
More info here.
http://www.stopthef35.com
We should be launching and landing Space Shuttles in South Dakota. Forget a bigger air base; we should have a spaceport!
$119 billion for 30 years of Space Shuttle action? Cool! $400 billion spent already on the F-35? Wow—talk about mixed up priorities! Good comparison, Mike K!
Thune nothing more than a yes man, and Mcconnels photo op poster boy.
Great post, Cory.
He is the type needed to be on the down ticket in this presidential race. If that someone would show true progressive mettle then they would have a shot at winning. Bringing up this boondoggle of a crappy plane that will not work in a battlefield situation is just another failure in the tall guys empty briefcase. The A-10 is what is needed, relatively cheap and dependable for ground troops. If we absolutely have to have boots on the ground, then those boots should be protected.
A-10s are pretty neato.
I’m sure Russia thinks the F-35 is a bad idea.
https://www.facebook.com/AllenCliftonFP/posts/738543019576694
The real issue is that this plane still does not fly in combat and it still does not perform. It is just like Thune in so many ways, it does look good though for several billion a copy. The Russian planes do not fly either as the new ones are grounded over Syria because they also cannot do combat. So both sides have out trillion-ed one another on failed systems while veterans go homeless and hungry on our streets and on the streets of Russia as well. Kammerer is right on with his outlook. The only thing South Dakota will probably get is to watch one of these worthless prima donna’s crash. http://sputniknews.com/military/20160120/1033399790/f35-jets-test.html Look for it in February or March or 2021.
Please, Mr. Kammerer, we need you in the Senate.
Just to touch on the space program. Almost every bit of high technology we have originated with our space program.
I’m sorry, Mr. Kammerer, but as a military protester and general rabble-rouser from Piedmont or thereabouts you don’t stand a chance to beat Mr. Thune. The Democrat Party would be better off to enlist a rabble-rouser like Messrs. Sibby or Newland to land on their side of the fence and run because they have political cache and name recognition. I do like your hat and scarf and that would get you some votes, but not enough for you to spend tens of thousands of your own hard earned rock-painting money to flail at that windmill. Don’t let these fellow goad you into it, I’m just sayin…
Trump Brags About Big Defense. Bree, is It? She has the fear/schmeer thing Going. But I wish I Were A Cartoonist after Palin’s Trump Endorsement Today. Republicans Are Pulling For Some True Idiots If I May Apply That Word Toward Super T and Baby Momma Superwoman Sarah. Please Just This Once God Save Us.
Bree didn’t read Cory’s post. The F-35 loses against every Russian weapons system.
But just think of the great photo op, Thune standing next to an F-35 in a g-suit, holding a helmet, proclaiming, “Mission accomplished, South Dakota!” And, Grudz, don’t you think that the hat and scarf would get as many west river votes as Noem’s tight jeans and horse? :-)
Loren your forgetting the basketball.
I think people were voting for Noem’s horse. South Dakota values= horse sense.
You’d never see her horse taking selfies on the Great Wall,would you?
Why would anyone want to support development and production of a plane with such a bad reputation when our tax dollars would be better invested into rebuilding infrastructure?
I think Marv would be an excellent candidate. He has a lot of passion, is a good speaker, and is not ashamed to be a liberal. Would he win? Maybe not. But Marv would bring up issues that no one has seriously discussed in South Dakota, or anywhere else. Thune likes to pretend he’s conservative with our tax dollars, but he’s really pretty liberal when it comes to handing out cash to crony capitalists and the military-industrial complex. I think Marv would be to Thune’s right on fiscal conservatism, and he might eat away at the Republican rural vote.
Now Larry. Give it time.
We are not in an air superiority war with Russia but we are under contract with Saudi to sell them advanced weapons systems so they keep oil prices low enough to keep Putin from amassing an even bigger fortune.
Meanwhile, South Dakotans are suffering from a lack of health care because the state’s GOP congressional delegation is under contract to extirpate American Indians.
Prevalence of obesity in American Indians was 13.7% for men and 16.5% for women, which was higher than the US rates of 9.1% and 8.2%, respectively. Obesity rates in American Indian adolescents and preschool children were higher than the respective rates for US all-races combined. Clearly we need to all exercise more and the new buffalo commons will help.
We are always in an all front superiority war with Russia, at all times.
Donald, bringing up issues not normally discussed is a pre-requisite to winning. We won’t know if someone like Marvin could win until we get a candidate who talks like Marvin… and I sincerely hope we get to test that thesis.
grudz-would suggest making Native Americans walk even farther to vote or see their doctors and get to schools?
Yes, Bree. We force that upon them. And when they get too big for their britches we initiate a takedown of oil prices forcing them out of competition. Happened in the mid eighties and currently in the mid teens.
The Russians are not girl scouts bearing cookies, Les.
The F-35 is an aircraft we should make for the Russians.
No, Mike. You are from Iowa so I wouldn’t expect you to understand the situation here in South Dakota, but making people walk to see doctors or carry their groceries a long ways isn’t as good an idea as getting good grocery stores into their communities. We don’t all have a Joe the Trader store around the corner like you all in Iowa do.
Mr. Kurtz, we should make if for the Russians on their budget. This thing is all glitter and no go, kind of like Thune.
exactly, jerry or like trump.
I grew up with a framed photo signed by Curtis LeMay of the XB-70, another boondoggle that never made it into the arsenal. We are truly a doomed species.
We are not doomed Larry. Have a little faith.
Grudz,are you selling me wolf tickets? Are obese South Dakotans-including Native Americans-that much different from obese iowans or anyone else? Apparently it is you who doesn’t understand. Don’t you get it?
Are you old enough to know what a Cold War is, Bree?
I am old beyond my years, Larry.
Marv lives where noise from military aircraft would be overwhelming for most of us. Sioux Falls does not need a plane that is four times louder than what is based there now. If the F-35 is really necessary it should be deployed where its effectiveness would be better tested.
I see no reason not to build it here, Larry. It’s a nice area.
could someone remind us which part of the F-35 is being manufactured in the chemical toilet?
Bree there are 60 million of them and 360 million of us.
Mrs. S, why are you no longer the wheat queen of Sully County?
Do not call me Mrs. S.