Over at Obsidian Wings, a discussion of how the “defense is off-budget” way of thinking was not just a Bush invention, but right in line with Reagan’s economics. And how Republicans and the Pentagon are conspiring for their own ends to set the bar for defense spending so high, it cripples any chance of Obama being able to implement any of his progressive agenda.
While it is quite possible that the GOP decides on a return to the rhetoric of small government and fiscal discipline, the agenda sought under that rubric will remain the same: enormous outlays on defense spending, revenue-draining tax cuts and a masked desire to gut entitlement programs (and I haven’t even discussed the hypocrisy involved in pushing for an expansion of executive power and curtailment of citizens’ rights). Same as it ever was.
Yet, defense spending is, and has been, out of control for many decades, and the time of reckoning is approaching. We, as a nation, cannot continue to spend more on defense than the rest of the world combined and expect to be able to fund infrastructure, guarantee a minimum safety net and otherwise implement an effective government capable or responding to various crises, whether it be the aftermath of an event like Katrina, or a bailout out of the banking industry.
Now, there are some times — WWII types of massive military life-and-death situations come to mind — you damn the fiscal torpedoes and full steam ahead. Defense spending is “off-budget” then because everything relies upon it.
But in a world where we’re fighting asymmetrically against insurgents and radicals, defense operations and defense investment cannot be justified as magic money that can be spent willy-nilly. Neither is it fair nor reasonable that with a change in Administration that suddenly the budget needs to be balanced so as to pay for the endless Iraq War (and massive military investment around it and everything else) in lieu of, instead of in addition to, everything else. After not being asked to sacrifice for the last seven years, I’ll be damned if I think we suddenly (now that a Democrat is in office) have to choose between guns and butter.
And if we do, I’m going to lean toward butter. I don’t consider another nuclear carrier more valuable than S-CHIP, or a new missile defense system more important than expanded light rail investment or power grid expansion. I am not a Dove, and I’m definitely not in the “the Air Force should have to hold a bake sale” line of thinking, but the spending on the Global War on Terror and China and Russia and North Korea all need to be weighed and balanced and acted upon in conjunction with a domestic agenda. They are not indefinite off-budget blank checks, no matter how Bush and the GOP (and, let’s face it, Democratic) Congress have treated them the last several years, nor, if we start treating it as real money, do they trump all other causes.