The President Obama-backed-and-signed stimulus package of 2009 was in the $700 billion range before cost overruns bumped it to above $800 billion. Some people have argued about the size vs. effectiveness of that spending bill, thus missing the point. The $700 billion target was a wholly political number. It was payback.
Congress had passed the Troubled Asset Relief Program, or TARP, the year before for $700 billion to bail out the financial institutions and added a bit on top of that. TARP was viewed as servicing Wall Street, and Wall Street was seen as a Republican interest. Now Democrats, firmly in power, wanted to shower their own constituents with largesse.
That is how things work in Washington, D.C. Candidates can talk about reform until they are red or blue in the face. If the two parties are not willing to let their own sides take a hit, even a minor one, we will never get meaningful spending reform that finally tethers ends to means, until it is far too late.
That’s why the constant Republican drumbeat about a “hollowed out” military that needs to be rebuilt at some expense is so damn depressing. Republicans can promise to pay for a build-up by rooting out “waste, fraud and abuse” in government spending. That’s not how things are actually going to go in the real world.
In any government with divided power or a filibuster or the threat of losing seats in the next go-round or anything other than a coalition composed of 100 percent die-hard, glass eating spending hawks, Republicans will give on the domestic spending side in order to get more money for a bigger military.
Deficits will continue to rise, just in time to hit the coming entitlement wave of $100 trillion or so between Social Security and Medicare, head-on. Good luck affording much of anything after the financial tsunami rolls over us, including a world class military.
The “hollowed out” theme is also, to be blunt, a lie. To be diplomatic, it’s a gross evasion of the truth. Listen, not only does America spend more on its war-making capability than any other country but more than the next seven biggest spending countries combined. Last year, America spent more than China, Saudi Arabia, Russia, Britain, India, France and Japan put together, according to figures released this month by the Stockholm International Peace Research Institute.
Would it really hurt the national defense if America outspent only the next six nations or even — shudder! — the next five?
That’s about what would have to happen if America finally decided to get its financial house in order. Democrats would have to stop shouting down basic spending and entitlement reforms that most Republicans and fiscally sane Democrats claim they want to pass. And Republicans would have to allow for deep cuts in corporate welfare programs (bye bye, Export-Import Bank!) and, yes, allow for a smaller military.
Defense spending would have to be reevaluated and reformed to produce more bang for fewer bucks. It could still be top-of-the line and well-staffed, but it would have to be geared toward actual defense, toward protecting America’s demonstrable national interest, not nation building or democracy promotion or other costly feel good flim-flam. America would have to look after its own interests first, and pick any other fights sparingly. No more Iraqs. No more Libyas or Syrias or Yemens.
My sense, from watching the GOP primary process unfold, is that rank-and-file Republican voters would be wide open to any new national defense approach that did a better job of husbanding our country’s blood and treasure than what we’re doing right now. Would Republicans in D.C. be willing to go there, to pull us back from the brink of financial ruin?
Jeremy Lott is the Washington Examiner’s night editor.
