You can practically see Putin smiling as he reads in Pravda that the USA’s next president is likely to be a penny-pinching commander-in-chief.
The next U.S. president, John McCain or Barack Obama, is expected to be a penny-pinching commander in chief when it comes to buying new military weapons. And that’s bad news for the Air Force’s push to buy scores more F-22 Raptors, a supersonic jet fighter built to dominate enemy airspace.
Putin probably planted the article…. which doesn’t mean it won’t be true, especially if we still have a Democrat Congress.
Personally, I’d rather own an F-35 VTOL craft; better commuter vehicle, doesn’t need a landing strip. And besides, then I’ll be able to do something about it when the Russians invade the USA via Mexico after staging in Venezuela, with help from the Chinese in Panama and Cuba.
October 1st, 2008 2:00 pm
I am a bit confused on one point…Several (ok, alot) of your posts seem to advocate a smaller federal government, while others seem (I think) to advocate increased (federal) military. To me these two stances seem to contradict each other…but I could be mistaken. (for example, your ‘chicken litte’ post appears critical of government attempts to bail out its citizens, but isn’t teh US military really the ultimate example of one huge governmental bail out system?
October 1st, 2008 2:13 pm
Hmm… no contradiction. The proper role of government includes the military. It does not include providing health care, propping up failed businesses, being the national retirement system, and about a zillion other things it actually does.
I’m not an advocate of the “largest possible military”. I am an advocate of the ability to fight two MAJOR wars simultaneously, while retaining sufficient reserve to deal with the unexpected here and there at the same time. By my lights, Iraq is not a MAJOR war, on the order of either the Pacific or European theaters in World War II. Neither is Afghanistan. The fact that we seem stretched to do both at once is evidence that our military is not large enough to carry out its necessary commitments NOW, let alone in the future, especially given the military buildups of both Russia and China, and the fact that both are attempting to destabilize our own hemisphere.
While I didn’t write the “chicken little” post, I fail to see how you can connect the military to a “bail out”. A “bail out” implies some entity unable to carry out its obligations, and so needing help from another entity. How does that apply to the military? In your analogy, are they the bailers? Or the bailees? Or? Explanation, please.
October 2nd, 2008 4:03 pm
“Hmm… no contradiction. The proper role of government includes the military. It does not include providing health care, propping up failed businesses, being the national retirement system, and about a zillion other things it actually does.”
I guess that mostly just depends on what you think a government is for, right? I guess if you’re going by the constitution, in the preamble alone I believe that government is said to be obligated to provide for the defense of the people within the country, but doesn’t it also say that it is supposed to promote the general wellfare? It seems to me that healthcare and a bunch of other things could fit under that umbrella. (I am no constitution expert, though, so please bear that in mind.)
As for the military as bailout, I can think of several wars that seem bailout-ish to me. The Vietnam war included a commitment by politicians in America to keep communism from spreading (among other things, I’m sure) but of course the politicians themselves could not do it, so they sent in the military to try and rectify the situation. Now, you might say, “the politicians and the military are both part of the government and are not seperate entities, therefore this is not any kind of bailout.” While this has merit, I would counter that (whether officially or not) the big businesses of America are related to the government in much the same way that the military is related to the government. I know that “officially” big businesses are distinct from the government and the military is not entirely distinct from the government, but i would question whether in practice this is actually true.
October 2nd, 2008 10:49 pm
“doesn’t it also say that it is supposed to promote the general wellfare?”
Maybe we can discuss this better if you can name some things that the government should NOT do to help the people in the name of “the general welfare”. Historically, “the general welfare” meant to the people who wrote it that the government would enforce contracts, maintain courts, police, general peace, etc. It did not mean giving anything to anybody, it meant clearing away barriers to people being productively able to give things to themselves via their hard work. The problem with starting to give money to people by taking it away from other people is that it’s impossible to say where it should stop. So, if we’re to continue this part of the conversation, can you name some things government should NOT pay for, or give to people, and should not ever do in the future?
Let’s review the meaning of the word “bailout”. It means rescuing someone, it may mean helping someone do something they should have been able to do on their own, etc.
There is not rational sense in which the military “bails out” the rest of the government. Each has its job, they are different jobs, and they don’t overlap that much.
Let’s be really, really clear about who is being “bailed out” by the current congressional action. It is NOT business, primarily, nor is it homeowners. It is congress itself. Congress is bailing itself out with your money. That’s because, eventually, it’s going to be clearer and clearer to people that the main scoundrel in this IS congress, not greedy loan officers and wild-eyed homebuyers. Congress created the incentives for those other two groups, by trying to rewrite the laws of economics to make it possible for people who really couldn’t afford it to buy a nice home. Predictably, after jiggering the rules a little bit, with not too much ill effect, they jiggered the rules a lot more, with a LOT of effect (“No down? Bad credit? No job? No problem!”). For awhile, this helped some congress creeps get re-elected.
So, congress is bailing out ITSELF, to continue to get re-elected. That’s because congress made ridiculous promises (you decide if they were REALLY promoting the general welfare), then congress pretended there wasn’t a big problem with Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, for so long that now they see their only option to preserve their own power, and continue to get re-elected, is to do the bailout, all the while blaming each other for its necessity.
American “big business” is not related to government in any way remotely similar to the relationship of the military to the government. If you want to pursue that notion, you’ll have to produce a LOT of evidence. It just isn’t there. However, regarding the relationship of government to business, what there is of it is due to government trying to regulate business, while business tries to buy access to the government officials doing the regulating. Given the sheer power of government, the basic position of big business with regard to government is self-defense.
October 3rd, 2008 12:36 am
As someone much smarter than me has observed: “…promote the general welfare” as stated in the preamble to the U.S. Constitution and “guarantee” the general welfare, (as attempted by those with a decided Socialist bent) are worlds apart and a very important distinction to understand. Another way to say it is this: I want every U.S. citizen to have equal opportunity in life. But I do not want our government to try and force an equal outcome for all.