Now why the hell would the US be interested in building a missile shield (which won't work anyway) for Europe?

And Azerbaijan? Supposedly, this would be to try to knock out Iranian missiles. It is highly doubtful that Iranian missiles will ever be capable of sufficiently accurate guidance to hit targets thousands of miles into Europe. And to reach the US, Iran would have to build ICBM's, which is a level of technological competence that very few of even the world's richest nations have. Having an ICBM essentially means that you are a space faring nation - Iran has neither the financial nor technological resources to ever construct a marvel of the enormous complexity of a Titan II or a Saturn V. Puh-leeez.

Mark regularly loves to disparage Europe on this blog. For him, everything Europe represents - from its secularism, to its socialized mixed economies, to its multiculturalism, to its unfair trade practices, and on and on - is something to be reviled. So it is curious to me why Mark would be so eager to spend billions of our hard-earned tax dollars (money we don't have) building a needless missile shield supposedly to protect a bunch of ungrateful socialist Europeans.

The EU is quite wealthy (its combined GDP is more than the US) and very technologically capable. Let them build their own damn missile shield! I mean, if they want to flush that kind of dough on an unworkable pie-in-sky fool's dream, then let them!

"Now why the hell would the US be interested in building a missile shield (which won't work anyway) for Europe?"

Three word answer to my question: defense industry lobbyists.

Yep, raiding the national treasury by stoking people's fears has become the lazy and highly profitable preferred path for corporate America. Being so dependent on corporate welfare and cheap labor, it is no wonder US companies are becoming less competitive all the time. Like the "welfare queens" of yore, US big business has no incentive to work hard and innovate - they just ask for another handout from the government that they think they are entitled to.

We don't build much of anything in this country anymore - but we the tax payer will hand over hundreds of billions to build "Star Wars" boondoggles. In the end, the American people get fleeced, and corporate America gets fat and lazy.