Conservatives and Republicans: Obama Taking Money From Military To Pay For Agenda
Here's the spin you should expect to hear in the coming days and weeks: Obama and the Democrats are cutting defense spending (read: making Americans less safe) to free up money to spend on separate liberal agenda items.
There were whisperings along these lines a couple weeks ago, but the framing appeared in full force yesterday in the Wall Street Journal in an op-ed by Thomas Donnelly and Gary Schmitt of the American Enterprise Institute.
They write: "Mr. Gates justifies these cuts as a matter of 'hard choices and 'budget discipline,' saying that '[E]very defense dollar spent to over-insure against a remote or diminishing risk . . . is a dollar not available to take care of our people, reset the force, win the wars we are in."
But this calculus is true only because the Obama administration has chosen to cut defense, while increasing domestic entitlements and debt so dramatically.This thinking has already made its way down the road to Capitol Hill. Rep. John Sullivan (R-OK) complains that "[w]hile the administration is socializing business and spending by the trillions, they want to cut spending that is essential to the safety of our homeland." He's joined by a number of Republican members of the House Armed Services Committee, including J. Randy Forbes (R-VA), who made the more explicit argument that the supposed cuts aren't just coincidental to domestic spending initiatives, but actually a result of them.The budget cuts Mr. Gates is recommending are not a temporary measure to get us over a fiscal bump in the road. Rather, they are the opening bid in what, if the Obama administration has its way, will be a future U.S. military that is smaller and packs less wallop.
"Today's announcement of defense cuts is a reaction to the fiscal strain caused by trillions in bailout and stimulus spending, rather than a result of regular strategic review and overall threat analysis," Forbes said. His home state of Virginia trails only the District of Columbia in per capita defense spending.
It's important to note that defense and domestic spending are not zero-sum--they do not come out of a single, finite pool of federal funds. The Congress can (and may very well) radically change the administration's proposal and further increase the bottom line, and it is not prevented from doing so because of other major spending initiatives.
Late update: Spencer Ackerman catches Schmitt and Donnelly citing Ku Klux Klan founder Nathan Bedford Forrest in their critique of the first black president and his plans for the Pentagon.
Josh
Matt
Eric
Brian
This is so frustrating. Not only are they lying to score cheap political points and protect their little pet projects, they're also distracting from the much more serious question of how we can actually reduce the military budget. Our current military spending is insane, and if this increase in the war machine is political fodder, actually getting it under control is going to be impossible. Which, I suppose, is exactly what the warmongers and war profiteers who run Republican foreign policy really want.
April 8, 2009 11:44 AM | Reply | Permalink
Republicans are showing who they represent - huge corporations. Overall defense spending is actually being increased, but that matters to them not one bit. The key issue to them is that billionaire defense contractors not be weaned off the wasteful corporate welfare spent on weapon systems. That more money will be spent on our soldiers is worse than useless to them. The ruling elites whom Republicans represent have no use for any spending that increases wages, benefits, training and education of any segment of the working class.
April 8, 2009 12:14 PM | Reply | Permalink
So where's the freaking pushback?
I hope the Administration has planned a response.
It's important to note that defense and domestic spending are not zero-sum--they do not come out of a single, finite pool of federal funds.
Important? More like critical. With Obama getting hammered for the continuation of the Bush torture policies on the left, and Rush et al for everything on the right, something is going to stick. And if reforming the military budget is important, they're going to have to be on offense out there, and so far, it's only Republicans.
April 8, 2009 11:48 AM | Reply | Permalink
This is one thing that annoys me about the Obama administration is that they are very reactive not proactive. Surely they should have foreseen that the GOP were going to respond in this manner.
April 8, 2009 11:55 AM | Reply | Permalink
I think it tends to be more proactive than Democrats typically are. However, Democrats are profoundly bad at anticipating the Republican response and planning accordingly.
They remain the Charlie Brown of politics, and Republicans remain Lucy.
April 8, 2009 12:00 PM | Reply | Permalink
That's because there's another name for attempting to guess everything your enemy is going to do and preempt it: borrowing trouble.
April 8, 2009 12:13 PM | Reply | Permalink
Gimme a break, NCSteve. Who couldn't have anticipated that Republicans would be chattering about a Democratic President being "soft on defense" and "cutting the budget"?
Seriously?
They're going to say that no matter what happens with the budget. Democrats can't be expected to anticipate that?
April 8, 2009 12:19 PM | Reply | Permalink
What I mean by "borrowing trouble" is that it's possible to predict Republicans will say all kinds of crazy shit, but 90% of it just gets ignored by the MSM. There's no way of predicting which particular piece of insanity will catch the MSM's strategy.
Trying to preempt a particular crazy piece of shit, among all the other shit the Republicans are flinging, it is the best possible way to fixate the media's attention on it. It says, HEY, WE THINK THIS PIECE OF SHIT IS REALLY, REALLY IMPORTANT, SO LET'S ALL FIXATE ON IT FOR A WEEK OR TWO!
Obama's habit of laying back for a day or three to see which piece of recently flung crazy shit actually catches the MSM's fancy has served Obama well for the last two years and has yet to do him any actual harm. Ditto his habit of ignoring alarmist frenzies for an immediate response in the comment sections of leftwing blogs.
Also complicating the decision tree, we're headed into Easter weekend. For purposes of the news cycle, Friday starts at about 4:00 pm EDT tomorrow and this flapdoodle stands at least a 50-50 chance of dying out on its own.
April 8, 2009 12:47 PM | Reply | Permalink
I agree with the strategy of sitting back and waiting to see what sticks, most of the time. Not this time.
Yes, I know I'm just a crazy left wing anonymous commenter screaming for Obama to do SOMETHING RIGHT NOW!!@#! but my concern over the "He's soft on defense" argument that you could have reasonably predicted MSM would, of course, settle on, is that it may handcuff him from accomplishing other goals. Like, for instance, shining some sunlight on the Bush torture policies. Something that is infinitely more important than winning some stupid spin war. But losing that same stupid spin war might make it impossible to address the torture issue.
April 8, 2009 12:57 PM | Reply | Permalink
I think many people are frustrated because the President doesn't respond when they want him to. He tends to let things marinate for a while, then responds when he is ready. I have no doubt he will be talking about the defense budget, but he has established a pattern that he releases information, lets it sit there for a period of time, then addresses the concerns that are raised.
It's actually good project management. The President allows for enough time to let people air their concerns, but in the background he has already anticipated what they will say. Just because he doesn't address the concerns up front doesn't mean he hasn't considered them and thought them through.
April 8, 2009 12:38 PM | Reply | Permalink
You are granting the premise, CT Voter. Here is the response:
"The defense budget was increased by 11 billion."
April 8, 2009 12:04 PM | Reply | Permalink
You know that, I know that, Gates knows that, but who's out there making that argument?
That should be the first thing every member of the Administration says about the defense budget. And the last thing.
We've got Beck and Co. out there talking about how Obama is going to take people's guns away. We now have Republicans pushing, hard, the "Obama is soft on defense" theme, and using this defense budget as evidence of that. Call me an alarmist, but I don't think this is a good combination for the Obama Administration.
April 8, 2009 12:16 PM | Reply | Permalink
Anybody who falls for Beck's insanity or the tired, old, "Dems are soft on defense", BS did not and will not vote for Obama or any Dem congressional candidate. People are losing too much sleep over this. Both sides of the political spectrum need to come to terms with the fact that this isn't 2002 or 1984. Times have changed.
April 8, 2009 12:23 PM | Reply | Permalink
ow Boren has added his voice to Inhofe’s chorus. “The administration’s announcement today of sweeping changes to key defense programs is a significant concern,” Boren said in a statement posted, tellingly, on Inhofe’s Web site. “Even in tough economic times, providing a strong national defense for the American people should remain a top priority of the federal government.”
Boren added that “it is important that we empower our military commanders by providing the resources they need” and called for the Obama administration to “keep these realities firmly in mind.”
Get that? A Democrat. Blue Dog, of course. It's not just Republicans who are running with this "soft on defense" theme. And sure, Boren's doing this because his gravy train is getting trimmed, but that isn't what will be reported about.
"Even Democrats are concerned that defense appears to be getting short shrift from Obama" blah blah blah.
April 8, 2009 12:39 PM | Reply | Permalink
Note that the complaints against this shift is coming from Red state Dems and Repubs where their constituents rely on the MIC for jobs.
April 8, 2009 12:57 PM | Reply | Permalink
I'm just not that worried about this. As I noted in an earlier post on this subject, the WH doesn't need to pushback on this - other than simply noting that the budget is actually increasing - because this isn't going to work. Gates is face of this new Pentagon budget proposal and he's a Bush admin holdover, a Republican, and a military/CIA veteran. McCain, another Republican and vet, enthusiastically endorsed Gates' proposed budget. This isn't 2002. People don't buy this crap anymore. I mean, both presidential candidates - and we can see this from McCain's response to the proposed budget - ran on cutting fat from the Pentagon budget. That's what this does. And taking that stance didn't hurt either of them. Congressfolks whose districts will lose money are obviously going to come out against this. And so will the wingnuts because it affects their obsession, missile defense. Most Americans know there is fat in the military budget and even if they think this is a net budget cut - which it is not - I'm sure they expect some reductions given the economy and the fact that we are gradually withdrawing from Iraq. The only people this will work on are the lunatics who shoot cops because they think Obama is going to take away their guns. And those people hated Obama before he was elected.
April 8, 2009 12:20 PM | Reply | Permalink
I don't think they should stop there, I think the military should seize all guns in the u.s.. Then sell them overseas to help pay for minority health care and education. That'll get the right in a tizzy, maybe buy all households in dem states a new hdtv and provide free internet so we can blog about our liberal ways. If we have any money left over lets build fences around all the red states to keep them in, don't need any conservative nut job in my state!!! Yes we can!! Now that the gop has figured us out it's time to let all of america know our plans for world domination!!! MUhahah
April 8, 2009 1:13 PM | Reply | Permalink
We are not on the campaign trail folks! Gibbs can answer these questions and I'm sure the O team will be on the talk shows. Stop trying to win every single battle.
April 8, 2009 2:52 PM | Reply | Permalink
This could be another case where Obama is setting a trap. Usually when the Republicans are allowed to spout off without a quick rebuttal, the Administration is allowing them to go on record with their criticisms before finally blasting them away.
Also worth noting that there is a lot of publicity about the size of the defense budget - something you never usually hear talked about. I wonder how many folks realize just how big the yearly expenditure is and how they feel about that. I wonder if the majority of folks will think it's simply too big - maybe that's what the Obama Administration wants.
What would happen if this story gets big enough to warrant another prime time press conference? How interesting would it be for Obama to pull out a power point presentation showing the defense expenditures of various countries. US being over $651B, and #2 China being at $70B and #3France at $60B.
Yearly defense spending for the whole world is $1.47T, NATO combined is $1T. China, Russia, Pakistan, Iran, NK, and Venezuela combined spend a little less than $150B.
April 8, 2009 3:55 PM | Reply | Permalink
These Republicans and conservatives are lying about Gates' recommendations for purely partison reasons: to harm Obama. Instead of putting America first, they are putting politics first. They claim Obama and Gates are gutting defense, when in reality they are restructuring it and increasing spending by $21 billion.
These attacks are beyond disgusting, and Gates, Obama and everyone who cares about our security should use this to show the American public that these Republicans and conservatives would rather America be less safe than see Obama succeed.
April 8, 2009 5:36 PM | Reply | Permalink
Gimme a break, NCSteve. Who couldn't have anticipated that Republicans would be chattering about a Democratic President being "soft on defense" and "cutting the budget"?
Seriously?
They're going to say that no matter what happens with the budget. Democrats can't be expected to anticipate that?
m65 kamagra
June 6, 2010 7:58 AM | Reply | Permalink