Elaborating on Thursday night’s announcement by the Pentagon that the military parade has been “postponed,” President Trump announced Friday that he personally cancelled the plan, and that it was local politicians in Washington D.C. who were to blame.
“When asked to give us a price for holding a great celebratory military parade, they wanted a number so ridiculously high that I cancelled it,” Trump insisted, adding that next year he expects the costs to go way down, and in the meantime he’ll “buy some more jet fighters.” $92 million could buy a fraction of an F-35 warplane.
Trump provided no specifics on the local costs, but estimates on the overall parade cost went from $12 million to $92 million. D.C. Mayor Muriel Bowser said that the parade would cost the city $21.6 million, and that traditionally the federal government reimburses a large share of costs for such events.
Other city officials say they were given too little time to plan for the needs of the parade, and had only been approached by the OMB on Tuesday to talk about the costs of the parade. This was a quick turnaround, apparently, because within 48 hours the Pentagon was frantically backing away from the idea.
Defense Secretary James Mattis, however, rejected media reports on the $92 million estimate, saying there was never any cost estimate at all, and claiming it was a made up figure.
The November parade was supposed to go from the Capitol to the White House, passing by the Trump International Hotel en route. The parade would include a large number of warplanes and other “symbols of American power.”
Trump wants us to look like North Korea for much cheaper than $92 million.
I guess sane people just can’t win. It looked like a win when the war mongering parade was cancelled. But the money saved on a useless parade is instead going to be spent on a useless (or worse) plane.
“Defense Secretary James Mattis, however, rejected media reports on the
$92 million estimate, saying there was never any cost estimate at all,
and claiming it was a made up figure.”
So in other words who cares what it costs. Crumbling infrastructure, lack of affordable health care, and a class of elite’s with complete immunity to the rule of law be damned ! We’re gonna get in front of the mirror and flex while promoting the POTUS’s overpriced shit hole hotel that will soon be yet another chapter 11 filing.
End the wars, bring our troops home from everywhere and then throw the biggest damn parade you can. You can pay for it with donations, which I’m sure would flow in as fast as can be, if it was actually a parade marking the end of this mess.
As for the expense of Trump’s big parade plan and blah blah blah blah blah fascists, blah blah blah, who cares? It’s a parade, it would be expensive sure, and it’s a waste of money, whatever, if you were worried about this parade get a grip, it’s the least of our concerns as a nation. Think about it, the people complaining about this as an expense just passed the biggest ‘defense” spending bill the world has ever seen, but boy they saved some real big money by pressuring Trump to drop the parade! I’m sure that will fix the budget right up and we will be out of debt in no time.
It would be nice if people got themselves worked up about our trillion dollar war/defense,spying,VA spending rather than a parade that costs about one hundred thousandth of that. But it does show you how a truly big number like a trillion is impossible to really grasp. Think about that again, Trump’s parade would cost about .00001% of the annual defense budget and somehow it becomes the big focus of attention. Talk about a red herring.
Yeah, been there, done that. The troops get paid whether they’re on patrol in BFE or marching down Penn Avenue. Planes gonna fly. Joe the Plumber doesn’t know if that F-18 overhead is straight from Afghanistan or is being ferried to the scrap yard. Joe the Plumber doesn’t know if that tank is the latest model of the M-1 or if it’s a 1970’s M-60. You want a parade, have a parade- it can be done for far less than everyone would have us believe. I’m not sure how the Navy is going to get missile sub on the scene, but there you go.