Small government conservatives and foreign policy

1. 66

   innersmiffposted 11 years ago

   There are a great many self-ascribing 'conservatives' who preach small government yet support one of the main contributors to the expansion of the US government: interventionist foreign policy.
   
   Somehow, those who preach balanced budgets and sane spending will balk at the notion of cutting a cent from the military budget. The truth is that a large military and perpetual war provides the best incentive for the expansion of the state. Conservatives rightly criticise massive domestic spending, as it adds needless bureaucracy, more often than not causes no effect, or the opposite effect of what was intended and promotes economic inefficiency. This does not change as soon as we're talking about foreign policy.
   
   A great deal of the budget is spent on the military-industrial-complex bureaucracy, dealing with lobbyists, and as these special interests are made dependent, they will always be looking for excuses to sell weapons. This is one contributing factor to war - our men and women sent out there to die. Militarism begets militarism, and the bigger the military gets, the greater the need to expand in order to protect their gains.
   
   Military expansion has been exponential since the end of the Second World War, yet it cannot be said that the United States has made any significant progress in promoting peace across the globe. In fact, the 20th century was the bloodiest in history. The illusion is that the middle-east 'got bad' and turned against the west, when in fact the instability there is a result of the almost constant intervention and slaughter there in the last century. Militarism produces 'blowback' in the form of resentment and galvanisation, and again, funds are needed to deal with it. The 'terrorist threat' that arises from this is also an excuse for expansion of the state at home in order to prevent it.
   
   It's clear that a large military shores up the state's power, and creates an environment for expansion. This is an appeal to real small government conservatives to be consistent and reject the neocon agenda of perpetual war.

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2. 66

   innersmiffposted 11 years ago

   Come on.

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   1. 60

      Barefootfaeposted 11 years agoin reply to this

      Is it not also maybe a good  idea to be able to defend yourself?
      Does everything this nation does have an ulterior motive?

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      1. 60

         John Holdenposted 11 years agoin reply to this

         Do you not think spending two and a half times more than the next nine biggest armed forces in the world combined just to defend yourselves is just a little bit over kill?
         
         And that's defending a country that is still practically unreachable by most other countries.

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      2. 66

         innersmiffposted 11 years agoin reply to this

         Nobody is suggesting the abolishment of self-defence. There is room for sensible defence without gallivanting around the world blowing up countries left, right and centre. Don't act like it's one or the other.

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3. 60

   John Holdenposted 11 years ago

   Small government conservatives is an oxymoron.

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4. 0

   Sooner28posted 11 years ago

   Crickets huh? 
   
   Another area liberals and libertarians can agree!  Stop the police state and the imperialist wars overseas.  I like to ask people, in addition to assassinating American citizens it deemed "terrorists," what if Germany, or Britian, or Australia were constantly involving itself in the internal affairs of the United States?  You  would never know when that drone flying over is going to launch the next missile of death. 
   
   Americans, rightfully so, would demand these countries leave immediately and stop meddling in what should be our national autonomous decisions.  If these actions had continued for years, and one of these countries also had control of our natural resources, do you think the reaction would be positive, and  the powerful in these countries would ignorantly wonder, "why do they hate us?"  Clearly not.

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5. 64

   maxoxam41posted 11 years ago

   It only shows the duplicity, the hypocrisy of our politicians. I have to reckon that one raised my curiosity in his authenticity and it is Laurent Louis, a member of the Belgium parliament, who denounced publicly neocolonialism and refused to participate by voting against the majority. How many of them will claim their political divergence and stick to their principles? Eisenhower warned us of the granding power of the military industrial complex, what did we do? Nothing. Now that we are overpowered what is our resort? To nourish the beast or to kill it?

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6. 60

   knolyourselfposted 11 years ago

   Eisenhower was the military industrial complex so a bit of an ironic
   teaser.

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   1. 64

      maxoxam41posted 11 years agoin reply to this

      Was he or was he subjected to it? Why did he only warn us at the end of his tenure versus at the beginning?

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   2. 0

      Sooner28posted 11 years agoin reply to this

      True, and he was president when the Shah or Iran was put in.

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7. 0

   JaxsonRaineposted 11 years ago

   Yup, pretty messed up.
   
   I laugh at people who say we can't cut our military spending. First of all, we could cut our spending by anywhere between 10-30%, without affecting our current level of operations at all. That's just inefficiency.

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   1. 66

      innersmiffposted 11 years agoin reply to this

      Part of that might come from the Keynesian perspective that military spending can stimulate the economy. It's nonsense, of course.

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