I oppose increasing defense spending, partly because I think that the process is very loosey-goosey and parochial, but also partly because of my noninterventionist philosophical bent. I think that, in legitimate cases of genocide, intervening is appropriate if military intervention can do some good. But having this huge, ever-expanding military only means that, for one, we spend lots of money on worthless military junk because it's in some congressman's district, and two, having a huge military means that you're going to use it more, which means more wars. I realize that al-Qaeda attacked us on 9/11 for reasons that can't be rationalized, and I'm not an isolationist or pacifist, but doesn't it seem likely that having a huge military means it will be used when other options are available? Maybe not by someone like Barack Obama (though time will tell) who seems to sincerely believe in diplomacy, but by someone like George W. Bush, whose affected cowboy inclinations ought to have poisoned the well of empire forever. Or perhaps not: if Reinhold Niebuhr's argument in The Irony of American History was fundamentally that American foreign policy is actually an extension of disagreements over domestic policy, then it makes sense that Republicans would
This is exactly why the neocons have begun hassling Bob Gates's budget. Part of it is parochial, sure, these guys don't want to lose jobs in their districts. Wonder why so many of the dissenters are from Oklahoma and Virginia? You shouldn't. But part of it is that the neocons know that a smaller and more effective military puts the end to their dreams of empire. So they're trying to argue that a defense hike is a defense cut, and if they succeed in derailing it, we can say hello to empire for some time to come. I hope that Obama dedicates himself to this--it'll give some jackass wingnuts and "moderate Democrats" like Dan Boren an excuse to mouth off--but it's the first step in rolling back George Bush's imperial vision, and in ending the prevailing paradigm in which war is an easy, first resort. The right argument to take is to say, if neocons say that Gates's plan makes America less safe, respond by saying that the Republicans don't know how to make America safer, as 9/11 happened on their watch. They do know how to fight disastrous wars that fatten up their defense contractor buddies. They know how to do that.
Look, I realize that we have enemies in the world, and we have to protect ourselves. But we spend nearly half the world's defense expenditures. Almost more than the rest of the world combined. And when one considers the virtual unanimity that our greatest threats come not from nations (not one of whom can defend themselves militarily against us) but from insurrectionaries and terror groups that don't fight that way, at least let's do what Gates says and buy things that help us fight that threat? With Republicans, as always, we get a clear image of a party that has forgotten how to be responsible.
P.S. Oh, yeah, and by the way, why are the congressional armed services committees dominated by Southern conservatives, even among Democrats? Wouldn't it be better to get some balance on those committees?
