Eisenhower warns us of the military industrial complex.

Presidents may not hold anywhere near as much power as we believe. Eisenhower seemed to be very concerned in his warning of this when he was leaving office half a century ago: ▶ this video

Quote from that speech: "And it means, finally, that government at all levels, must meet its obligation to provide you with the fullest possible information outside the narrowest limits of national security--and we [the Kennedy administration] intend to do it" It's amazing how prescient he is of the mounting conflict between full transparency and full privacy and the battle over who should conform to one or the other. I've also been reminded of Eisenhower's warnings about the military-industrial complex: "This conjunction of an immense military establishment and a large arms industry is new in the American experience... We must never let the weight of this combination endanger our liberties or democratic processes. We should take nothing for granted. Only an alert and knowledgeable citizenry can compel the proper meshing of the huge industrial and military machinery of defense with our peaceful methods and goals, so that security and liberty may prosper together." ▶ this video

Pres. Eisenhower gives dire warning: 'We must guard against the acquisition of unwarranted influence, whether saught or unsaught by the Military Industrial Complex' (Jan. 17, 1961) ▶ this video

Self-preservation. By killing innocents, we incite more people to hate us, thus an increased need for more "defense". ▶ this video We failed to listen. Sorry, world.

▶ this video President Dwight D. Eisenhower's famous exit speech of 17 JAN 1961 warning of the dangers of the "military-industrial complex."

The biggest threat we face is our tendency to enslave ourselves in the name of a perfect society. "Our government has kept us in a perpetual state of fear — kept us in a continuous stampede of patriotic fervor — with the cry of grave national emergency. Always there has been some terrible evil at home or some monstrous foreign power that was going to gobble us up if we did not blindly rally behind it by furnishing the exorbitant funds demanded. Yet, in retrospect, these disasters seem never to have happened, seem never to have been quite real." -General Douglas MacArthur July 30th 1957 Eisenhower warned us. ▶ this video