Find Insurance Online

Rand Paul claimed when he was the republican nominee for the US Senate from Kentucky that there is not enough money just in welfare to cut the federal government’s deficit. Approximately 40% of the budget is military. So the candidate said, “Part of the reason we are bankrupt as a country is that we are fighting so many foreign wars and have so many military bases around the world.” The Tea Party is animated by opposition to the exorbitant levels of federal spending and indebtedness. Applying their frugality to foreign policy, the party could make a clean break from the neo-cons. If one believes that bureaucrats are incompetent in running the healthcare system in the US, one is apt to be dubious of plans to have bureaucrats create democracies abroad. Also, we can’t viably fight the neocons’ wars with the supply-siders’ tax rates—and a bankrupt country cannot defend itself.

According to Randolph Bourne, in War is the Health of the State, “As a general rule, the longer a war lasts, the more centrally planned and government-controlled the entire economy becomes.” Robert Higgs wrote in Crisis and Leviathan that among the effects of WWI were “massive government collusion with organized special-interest groups; the de facto nationalization of the ocean shipping and railroad industries; the increased federal intrusion in labor markets, capital markets, communications, and agriculture.” Thomas DiLorenzo points to these quotes and adds that inflationary war finance “inevitably leads to calls for price controls, which inflict even greater damage on the private enterprise system by generating shortages of goods and services.” Such shortages in turn can serve as an excuse for even greater central-planning powers. The Tea Party could thus have good reason in going with its principles for opposing even a standing army. Rand Paul wants the federal budget to be 80% national defense. “So I believe that the defense of our country may be the primary enumerated power. Does that mean I believe in a blank check for the military? No.” This, in short, is the argument for why the Tea Party could come out against the war machine and protest along side the left—albeit for different reasons.

Rand Paul’s mention of defense as the primary enumerated power is interesting because it hints of another possible counter-intuitive conclusion. Although defense is not primary (as regulating interstate commerce—preventing war between the states is another crucial power delegated to the US Government), the notion that the federal, or general, government be limited to its enumerated powers and that this be reflected in its budget does not exclude the states engaging in social spending.  In fact, the notion of fifty laboratories befitting a federal empire (of states, or countries) implies that the state budgets take on social spending.  That is, the Tea Party being in favor of federalism could mean that social spending (and thus programs) are to be handled by the several states individually rather than by the general government. In being for this shift, the Tea Party is not necessarily opposing social spending (only that which is done by the US Government—the general government of the Union).  Rarely is this distinction made, which allows for the federalists in the Tea Party to accept even universal health-care in any state where the majority vote for it through their legislatures. We typically assume that if someone opposes a program in Washington that the person doesn’t want it at all; it could be that the person is oriented to re-establishing federalism rather than being opposed to the policy itself.

So the Tea Party could come out with a lower US Government budget, with a higher proportion being spent on defense (but less than today), and at the same time leave it up to the several states to decide for themselves what sort of domestic programs they way.  I contend that an ardent federalist in Texas would not necessarily oppose Massachusetts having a single-payer system of universal health care as long as the majority of the citizens of Mass wanted it.  The federalist would object to the program being applied by the US Government because it would apply in Texas and because it would exceed the enumerated powers delegated to the US Government by the states.

Sources: Thomas Di Lorenzo, “Inflating War: Central Banking and Militarism are Intimately Linked,” The American Conservative (August, 2010), 16-18.
W. James Antle, “Rand Plan: Will the Tea Parties Turn Anti-war?” The American Conservative (August, 2010), 8-9.

"The most significant threat to our national security is our debt."
Micheal Mullen, Jount Chiefs of Staff Chairman, August, 2010.

The defense budget in 2010--$664 billion (not counting the Iraq and Afghanistan wars)--equalled that of the rest of the world combined.  One dollar of every five spent by the U.S. Government was for defense. The amount spent represents 80% growth since 2000. Why?  One reason: the big weapon systems oriented to fighting other empires (e.g., Russia and China). For example, $600 million for the littoral combat ship and $13 billion for amphibious landing vehicles (whose purpose has even been questioned by Sec. of Defense William Gates).  It would seem that the military contractors--the military industrial complex, moreover--are firmly entrenched and in control. That is to say, the defense spending is indicative of the influence of big business over government in the United States.  That this influence goes unhampered may tell us something about the leanings of our societal norms.

The House Republicans' "Pledge to America" formulated in 2010 promises to exempt the military from any cost-cutting that might be entailed in reducing deficit spending. Even so, Sen. Tom Coburn wrote, "Taking defense spending off the table is indefensible. We need to protect our nation, not the Pentagon's sacred cows."  This statement is significant because it gets at the problem of the debt and the influence of big business in government.  That is to say, it kills two birds with one stone.  Indeed, these two birds may well be the achilles heel of the United States as a viable entity or going concern.  The fatal flaw may well be within, rather than from an external threat.  This is the meaning of Micheal Mullen's statement above. To be sure, Republicans believe that defense is government's core function. Along with regulating interstate commerce, this is particularly true of the federal government.  It is less true, I would argue, of the state governments.  So the plank can be viewed as primarily federalist rather than in terms of limited government itself.  The probably-unfixable $14 tillion US Government debt and the consolidation of public governance in the U.S. into the federal government at the expense of federalism (and the checks therein) are related; both are indications of a basic inbalance that is unsustainable. In the face of this state of affairs, it is telling that the question in late 2010 was who should continue to get a tax.

Source: Michael Crowley, "The Sacred Cows," <em>Time</em>, December 13, 2010, pp. 55-58.