To Henry M. Rainone, president of the Pittsburgh Council of the Navy League of the United States and writer of the letter “Bigger Navy worth cost” (June 20 and TribLIVE.com): We already spend more on defense than the next 15 countries totaled and they are all allies.
In case you hadn't noticed, the country is broke. Maybe you could take up a door-to-door collection in Upper St. Clair and raise a billion dollars or two from your neighbors.
You also mention how “(t)he people of Pittsburgh proudly produce steel and major machinery for shipbuilding to this day.” Mr. Rainone, the steel mills died in 1985, during the beginning of President Reagan's and the Republican Party's genocide on unions and the middle class.
President Eisenhower was so right when he warned about the military-industrial complex way back when. If we had only listened, we might not be in the massive debt that “tea party patriots” are constantly whining about.
On the front page on the same day your letter ran was the news story “U.S. scraps $7B in military items it can't bring home from Afghanistan” (June 20 and TribLIVE.com). Maybe the Pittsburgh Council of the Navy League can recycle some of this $7 billion in scrap.
Joe Lucas
South Side
