What value are you placing on an American life? When you come up with one, put it in a math equation, and I'll be happy to give you my take on the cost/kill. Remember, we had to abandon the gold standard to finance the war in Vietnam ultimately leading us to position we are in today. We didn't win that one and we don't have that option again.
The Ukrainians don't get to decide if they wish to fight ad die. Zelenski gets to decide, and also remember, he cancelled the the March 2024 elections so that the people CAN'T decide. How much sense does it make to claim you're helping save Ukrainian people from a tyrannical dictatorship while supporting their "democracy" that is transitioning to... a tyrannical dictatorship?
Do you honestly believe the world has been shocked into submission by the our support to our allies and ability to win wars? Because it certainly doesn't seem that way. Conflicts are popping off all over the place at rate greater than our ability to quell them. Quite the opposite, our strategic opponents smell blood in the water and are further emboldened by obvious inability to actually win anything.
Ok, so everyone knows the financial system is on life support and the days are numbered. Today, you can go to the bank, withdraw cash, go anywhere you want, and exchange it for something of value. Replace your vehicle, do some home repairs, invest in equipment for a small business, etc. You can also use it to help someone who needs those things more than you. Our government, knowing the end is near, could just as easily take those coupons with an expiration date, and trade them for hard, durable assets. They have a choice. They could improve infrastructure, roads, bridges, schools, factories, etc. They could convert that cash to power plants, oil reserves, food reserves, raw materials, border security, and other things that would sustain the American people through an economic downturn.
Instead, they choose to convert those soon to be defunct dollars to "foreign aid" and send them overseas while telling you the baddies are conspiring to sap and impurify your precious bodily fluids. Why would they do this? Because a large portion of that public debt and "foreign aid" returns to them, personally, in the form of checks to offshore banks, business deals, board positions, consultant fees at defense contractors, overperforming investments, etc. Then, they can convert those dollars to real assets for themselves instead of real assets for you. The senior deal makers at the top have zero concern for your best interests. As a matter of fact, most of them are so far removed from the average American, or Ukrainian, or Israeli that they can't even understand your needs or perspective.
Most, not all, are playing Monopoly with the productive value you, not them, have brought to the American economy. And it is a game for them. In Monopoly, they're given a random opportunity to make a transaction or exchange. When a conflict happens, such as the one in Ukraine or Israel, it presents vast numbers of these opportunities. The game only progresses in one direction, that is fewer people end up with more money, and eventually if the game is allowed to continue ad infinitum, one person ends up with it all.
So knowing that conflict presents more random opportunities to conduct these random transactions (thereby increasing the probability of enriching oneself), what is the greater incentive, investing in peace and prosperity at home, or investing in, or even promoting, conflict abroad?