The Amash Rebellion
Foreign Policy, military spending, and the "fiscal cliff"
Americans are sick and tired of war, they are incredulous when they see their own country going down the tubes while our preening politicians plot "regime change" in faraway lands, and they positively hate "foreign aid. So why – if the US is a "democracy," and government reflects the popular will — are we threatening Iran, training Syrian "rebels," and increasing military and economic assistance to key allies? The reasons are rooted in our two party system, and the "left-right," red-state/blue state mindset that dominates our politics.
While the two major parties are in conflict so often that "responsible" centrists make whole careers our of descrying "Washington gridlock," on the other hand their relationship is also characterized by symbiosis. With the Democrats as the party of the Welfare State, and Republicans the party of the Warfare State, when budget time rolls around the debate boils down to guns-vs-butter (to conjure a phrase from the Sixties). This showdown at the congressional corral usually results in the Democrats getting their butter, the Republicans getting their guns, and we just keep printing and borrowing money.
That’s the deal that has kept what Murray Rothbard called the Welfare-Warfare State humming, lo these many years, with nary a peep of meaningful protest from either the left or the right. This cozy arrangement, however, is coming apart.
What’s different, this time around, is that the "fiscal cliff" looms large. In belated recognition of the fact that we are, after all, bankrupt, and living on borrowed money (and, perhaps, borrowed time), our esteemed solons have set up a "fiscal cliff" scenario: if a budget agreement isn’t reached in a specified time period, "sequestration" will go into effect, with huge cuts (huge, that is, by Washington standards) slated to take effect in virtually every area of government. Yes, even including the "Defense" Department – but it’s best to ignore the howls coming from the Pentagon, the neocons, and the military-industrial complex.
That these "cuts" in the military budget will actually keep spending at an historic high underscores a typical Washington ruse: anything less than projected spending (which is always ascending) is a "cut," even if it isn’t. Ever since 9/11, military spending has skyrocketed, and – in spite of everything, including our looming "fiscal cliff" – shows no signs of slowing down.
That this level of spending is unsustainable without tax increases, or an "austerity" budget that would create some real pain for the most vulnerable and politically powerless, has created a conundrum for the Republicans, who are supposedly opposed to tax hikes. Backed into a corner, they must choose between their love of lavishing taxpayer dollars on the military — even going against the recommendations of the Pentagon — and their "principled" opposition to higher taxes.
Guess which choice they’re making.
Rather than cut a single dime from a trillion dollar military colossus, they’re suddenly "open" to the idea of "revenue enhancement" (never say the t-word!) – and the GOP leadership is busy purging those conservatives who have spoken out against this brazen betrayal. Reps. Justin Amash (R-Michigan) and Tim Huelskamp (R-Kansas) were recently kicked off the House Budget Committee for not toeing the party line on military spending. Walter B. Jones, the heroic Republican congressman who made passionate speeches against the Iraq and Afghan wars, formerly on the Financial Services Committee, has met the same fate, along with a passel of House conservatives who have signaled their willingness to consider real cuts in military appropriations. As Rep. Amash put it:
"I can tell you that to different degrees, Tim Huelskamp and even Walter Jones have taken positions on military spending that are a little more open to compromise on that issue — working with Democrats to try and find ways to reduce spending… I don’t know if that’s the common thread for sure, but it’s certainly true about all of us that we’re more open to that. I think they [Republican leaders] are willing to raise taxes to avoid any defense cuts, and I think they’re willing to take any deals, even bad ones, to avoid defense cuts."
The neoconservative charlatans who constitute the intellectual and political leadership of the GOP have never really believed in their small government "no-new-taxes" rhetoric: that’s just boilerplate they dust off and display on purely ceremonial occasions (like presidential primaries). When push comes to shove, however, and they are forced to choose between fiscal sanity and America’s imperial pretensions, they always choose the latter – or, at least, the leadership does.
What’s significant here is that there is a growing grassroots hostility on the right to our foreign policy of global interventionism, a movement that was finally given a voice and a vehicle by Ron Paul’s historic campaign for the Republican presidential nomination. Tens of thousands of activists from all sides of the political spectrum came together to work at the grassroots and energize a youth-oriented movement that amazed the "experts" and gave the folks at Fox News nightmares. The nightmare is that the Republican deal-makers, who have sold out their conservative constituency time and time again on the tax issue, are finally facing a rebellion within their own party – one that threatens to put them out of business.
That’s why John Boehner isn’t exercising his usually hyperactive tear ducts mourning the demotion of Amash and friends: the Speaker, not known as a harsh disciplinarian, cannot tolerate dissent on this issue because it’s at the root of the bipartisan symbiosis that keeps the Welfare-Warfare State alive and growing. Amash and his fellow Ron Paul Republicans won’t "deal" on the budget, they won’t engage in the guns-for-butter log-rolling Boehner is so eager to engage in, and so they have to go.
If you find this depressing, think again: for the first time since the days of Robert A. Taft, there is open dissent in Congress when it comes to paying the cost of empire. While such "isolationist" sentiment has always been popular outside the Washington Beltway – a fact constantly bemoaned by our interventionist elites – that such heresy is now being heard in the hallowed halls of Congress, rather than just on the talk-radio circuit and around kitchen tables, is good news indeed.
For many years, Ron Paul’s was a lone voice in Washington: when some "foreign aid" boondoggle came up for a vote, his was often the only dissenting "nay!" He’s retiring, now, to pursue the fight for liberty in other venues, but the echo of his principled dissent will still be heard in the growing caucus of Ron Paul Republicans he leaves behind in Congress. On the left, too, there is a growing contingent of Democrats – albeit not nearly enough — who are joining with their pro-peace GOP colleagues to demand real cuts in military expenditures, as this joint letter makes plain.
At a time of shrinking resources, and all-around austerity politics, the guns-for-butter deal-making in Congress is no longer tenable, either financially or politically. People on both sides of the political spectrum are finally waking up to reality: the American empire is bankrupt. We are faced with a stark choice: retrenchment or decline. Republican rhetoric about a new "American century" fell flat on its face in November, and if that party is to have a future – which, at this point, is somewhat in doubt – it is in dire need of an ideological makeover.
In the orgy of post-election gloating that has dominated the liberal-left media, we’ve heard much about how the Republicans need to ditch their anti-tax "dogmatism" and get with the tax-and-spend zeitgeist confirmed and supposedly "mandated" by Obama’s victory. Grover Norquist, author of the "no tax hike" pledge, has become the favorite whipping boy of the MSNBC crowd. We have heard from the David Frums of this world, who largely agree with this critique and excoriate the "Tea Party" types for their insensitivity to the requirements of "practical" politics. But of course a neocon like Frum would rather the GOP abandon its no-new-taxes pledge than to cut a single dime from, say, our $3.5 billion annual tribute payment to Israel, or the $300 million per day we spend on prosecuting the war in Afghanistan.
The kind of makeover the Republicans need was previewed by Ron Paul, when he pointed out we could solve our immediate budget crisis if only we would cut ourselves free of the burden of empire. When the nascent Republican grassroots rebellion against the neoconservative dogma of perpetual war and empire-building becomes a veritable revolution, that is when the GOP will arise from the ruins of its self-destruction. That revolution will triumph when some canny Republican politician finally realizes that it isn’t the fiscal consequences of our foreign policy that are the problem – it’s the policy itself, i.e. the bipartisan interventionist consensus that keeps US troops stationed in Germany more than half a century after the end of World War II.
This prospect naturally poses a mortal threat to the present Republican leadership, which is why Boehner is cracking down: but that’s all to the good. It shows they’re afraid – and, what’s more, they have good reason to be afraid.
For years, we here at Antiwar.com have been hammering away at conservatives who take their "small government" ideology seriously, hoping to convince them that, as the old-fashioned conservative Garet Garrett put it:
"Between government in the republican meaning, that is, Constitutional, representative, limited government, on the one hand, and Empire on the other hand, there is mortal enmity. Either one must forbid the other or one will destroy the other."
The Amash rebellion is one sign that our message has not fallen on deaf ears.
NOTES IN THE MARGIN
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Buy the second edition of my 1993 book, Reclaiming the American Right: The Lost Legacy of the Conservative Movement, with an Introduction by Prof. George W. Carey, a Foreward by Patrick J. Buchanan, and critical essays by Scott Richert and David Gordon, here.
Buy my biography of the great libertarian thinker, An Enemy of the State: The Life of Murray N. Rothbard, here.
And, don’t forget, I write a monthly column for Chronicles magazine, where I really let loose: you can subscribe by going here.
Read more by Justin Raimondo
- Destiny and Decline – December 11th, 2012
- ‘He’s Killing His Own People!’ – December 9th, 2012
- Pearl Harbor: Roosevelt Knew – December 6th, 2012
- Rachel Maddow, War Propagandist – December 4th, 2012
- A Note to My Readers – December 2nd, 2012
Johnny in Wi.
December 13th, 2012 at 11:39 pm
Boehner is just the puppet. It is Cantor who is pulling the strings. The real purge the Republicans need is to get rid of leaders like Boehner, Cantor and Ryan and replace them with real sane conservatives. One thing is sure real change will never come from the Democrats. They are owned lock stock and barrel by the Israeli lobby, who provides 60% of the party's funds, mostly from laundered foreign aid money. The Republicans get nothing from their endless support for Israel. In fact they have gone down the tubes since they turned Middle East policy over to the neocons in 2000. The Republicans have sold out for peanuts. Another great essay Justin.
Yonatan
December 14th, 2012 at 2:55 am
Geez, not again. What the parties say they are for is irrelevant. They are what they do – which is to feather the nests of leading politicos, to pander to large corporations and pledge allegiance to a foreign country. There may be minor differences in presentation, but underneath the facade they are the same.
richard vajs
December 14th, 2012 at 4:32 am
No-one should expect the "imperialists" to give up easily. There will still be aid going to Israel and a war being fought wherever oil can be found or a gas pipeline run long after Granny has to go back to eating cat food and Medicare quits doing knee replacements and cataract surgeries. The neo-cons are at heart, vicious bastards
nomorewaryouprats
December 14th, 2012 at 6:17 am
Justin, I believe you intended 'decrying', not 'descrying', in the second line of your second paragraph.
The Amash Rebellion « Libertarian Hippie
December 14th, 2012 at 9:20 am
[...] [...]
David
December 14th, 2012 at 9:41 am
What are you afraid of? Smash black face of American policy and its stooges. Overthrow the terrorist 'leaders' in Washington NOW. Areblack and white sheeples willing to move their behind or other people should do it for them? Down with terrorist stooges in washington who run the terrorist industry around the world.
RickR30
December 14th, 2012 at 9:48 am
Republicans are at a crossroads. Are they going to continue they have been for the last years and go extinct, or are they going to go back to the way there are supposed to be and survive. Are they going to continue to represent the degenerate 1% and no one else or are they going to go back and fight for the Middle Class? The people aren't fooled by their cheap talk anymore. Things are very clear. If you oppose any tax hikes whatsover for the rich then you're putting the interests of the 1% ahead of those of the country. Do that and the Republican electorate will shrink to 1% or rather a fraction of that as plenty of 1%ers are leftists anyway.
Republicans won't be saved by falling into the politics of identity trap. Pretending to love women, blacks, illegals, homosexuals, and abortions is only going to get people to vote Democrat. Republicans still have a chance- represent the Middle Class. But as Republicans are too ignorant, stupid, and uneducated to see the simplest things, they'll continue to represent empire, a handfull of billlionares, israel, other traitors. The delicious irony- the empire they created is going to be the cause of their own demise.
MvGuy
December 14th, 2012 at 10:06 am
Yaaaaa….. It's crunch time …….. Again…. But as long as the Fed can "Create" money….. the show will go on… As Mr. Raimondo points out…… the war and butter wagons have been lashed together with electoral necessity… There is no easy ending of what has profited those with foresight… for so long. The Imperial Gravy Train IS America… Always has been and, baring some catastrophe will always be…… What's different now is that the dollar is walking a tightrope which history (and common sense) tells us leads to ruin and yes…. "catastrophe"… And that closer one would hope… will be the fall of the mighty, and greatly propped up Dollar…!! The reason that the usual suspects and platitudes aren't werking quite so smoothly, is that "catastrophe" has been spotted lurking round by the big banks and in backroom late night whisperings……. and all the real players (China, Russia, even Mexico) seem to be buying gold….. Can the wall at the end empire's fiat money tunnel be moved again and again and again…???
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December 14th, 2012 at 10:50 am
[...] Justin Raimondo: The Amash Rebellion [...]
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Strider55
December 14th, 2012 at 2:07 pm
The Republicans get nothing from their endless support for Israel.
Quite true, the same as their pandering to illegal aliens. All the pledging allegiance to the Israeli flag, all the blood & treasure squandered on the proxy wars for Israel, all the kowtowing to Nut-and-Yahoo, and Obozo still took 70% of the Jewish vote. Earth to RNC: The Jews are not your political friends! The vast majority are implacable socialists. They are also virulent enemies of the 2nd Amendment (the commendable exception of JPFO noted). Florida would be a GOP lock if not for the majority Jewish liberals in and around Miami, known elsewhere as "Condo Commies." IMHO the party also needs to purge the fundamentalist "Christian Zionists" who have been the Lobby's biggest fellow travelers/dupes/useful idiots (choose one).
wars r u.s.
December 14th, 2012 at 2:15 pm
The republicans got bibi to campaign for romney. Of course that might make nothing look better.
Mike
December 14th, 2012 at 4:27 pm
"Americans are sick and tired of war…."
They are? Justin, it seems to me that most just don't even care anymore.
Oswaldwasalefty
December 14th, 2012 at 6:59 pm
No Susan Rice for Secretary of State. Instead it looks like we're going to get the old hawk John Kerry instead.
"Americans are sick and tired of war…"
The reality is that most Americans can go with their everyday lives as if the war isn't happening. The effects on the average American are more economic than anything else. Our communities aren't being physically destroyed by August Obama's global drone wars.
Meanwhile, Augustus getting misty eyed in his response to the school shooting in Connecticut today:
http://www.nypost.com/p/news/national/emotional_o…
This would been the perfect moment to ask Obama if the lives of children in rural Afghanistan and Pakistan are as valuable as the lives of those school children here in the U.S.
Remember Clinton back when the Columbine, Colorado school shooting happened right in the middle of Clinton's bombing of Serbia. Clinton said that we need to teach our children to resolve their problems with words, not weapons.
RichardKanePA
December 15th, 2012 at 2:34 am
Wonderful article but it left out Bernie Sanders and Barney Frank or asking the reader to urge their rep to join the cut military pork chain,
http://www.scribd.com/doc/116298735/Bipartisan-De… http://readersupportednews.org/pm-section/26-26/1…
http://my.firedoglake.com/richardkanepa/
richard vajs
December 15th, 2012 at 5:30 am
Americans WILL be sick and tired of war if and when they ever realize that the evil of killing always comes back to the killer. We killed many children in Iraq (Our former Secretary of State, Ms Albright even thought that "it was worth it"), we are killing them in Afghanistan and we provide the Israelis with the weapons to kill them in Gaza. Why are we surprised and saddened, that in the end, our children get killed here and in the same manner? The Universe may not be fair, but it seems to always even things out.
RichardKanePA
December 15th, 2012 at 12:09 pm
RE: The Republicans get nothing from their endless support for Israel.
Justin Amash gets smeared for being supposedly antisemitic,
You are make his job harder. The US has always been pushed around by lobbyists. The word Banana Republic comes from Dole Banana. An embargo on Cuba, except that right wing Cubans can send as much money back home as they want is screwing up the US economy, not Cuba. All over the world more powerful people run over weaker ones. The Anglos overran the Saxons.
Two things are unique when Pennsylvania overran Indian lands like the other colonies did, local Quakers kept trying to compensate Indians for there loss. And in Israel progressive Jews keep trying to help the Palestinians
Some people who have harsh words for Israeli policy nevertheless don’t like praise from those who think there should be never be any religious state
muggles
December 15th, 2012 at 2:34 pm
Excellent article by Justin. The main problem is psychological. Average Republicans stubbornly refuse to recognize the plain fact that their supposed leaders are neocon stooges of foreign powers and the military industrial complex. All of this hideously costly military hardware and endless series of failed wars to create (new) failed states is leading to a legacy of bankruptcy and moral corruption.
Yet people prefer to believe comforting lies told to them by "leaders" than acknowledge the truth seen plainly before their eyes. "It can't happen here" is the operational mindset. Fortunately a courageous chorus of truth tellers, from Ron Paul to a select group of left progressives continues the fight. Truth will win out over lies. The children of today's Republican rank and file see it; soon their parents will find it impossible to deny.
Mike
December 15th, 2012 at 4:15 pm
Hope you're right Richard. I know I'm sick to death of war. In the words of Clarke Cable playing Fletcher Christian:
"I'm sick of this bloodshed."
abe
December 15th, 2012 at 6:47 pm
I know the Repubs are ass wipes for Neocons. But what about filth like Obama sucking up? My hope is Chuck Hagel in Defense. Hagel is NO friend of israeli Likud! By the way I am not going to get into a FEMA truck to be re-educated { consentration death camp} No way I will die on my doorstep fighting, not die of starvation like the Jews did! Better get a gun before government tries to take them away.
Enoch Powell
December 16th, 2012 at 3:41 pm
There is no two party system. There is a single party composed of selfish elitists and they are arranged in two factions that, as you said, have a symbiotic relationship. That's bad enough, but the relationship is out of balance in favor of the Leftist pathology. Obama represents the faction of our one-party system that is literally the enemy of its own country. The GOP has become the whipping boy of the Leftists. The Leftists need something to hate and so the GOP, as the de facto party of the more decent sort of White people, is the Leftists' government-approved scapegoat and all-around captive focus of their hostility.
You will note that GOP candidates now cooperate with the politically-correct speech codes with which the Leftists have censored any talk about the true problems of the U.S.: Third-world immigration, out-of-control parasitic dependency on taxpayer money by nonWhites, the collapse of the rule of law replaced by selective enforcement, the government's criminal behavior, affirmative action, the truly insane wars of the past 20 years, the deconstruction and redefinition of debt as a substitute for a sound economy, etc. That coward, Mitt Romney, didn't even open his mouth about these things. He just fulfilled his role as designated victim for the openly criminal Obama to defeat.
It's no accident that the U.S. has declined as we have succumbed to a hostile invasion of third-world savages, legal and illegal, unleashed on us by the Democrats in 1965. The GOP has been too cowardly to even raise a feeble protest about this.