Good point Julian. Spending on healthcare, repairing infrastructure, cost of food stamps, etc. pores money back into our general economy, something that spending money on foreign bases, etc. does not.

One thing: it is very important to wind down the size of our military very slowly because we have made a commitment to supply jobs long term in return for being in the military and the sacrifices that entails. My solution is to bring most service people stationed overseas home as soon as we can manage that - better to spend the money inside the USA while maintaining our employment commitments to people in our military services.

Interesting to think a factor could be my grandparents still living their piece of the American Dream.