Maureen Groppe has an article in the Indianapolis Star indicating that the selective deficit disorder in Washington is bipartisan. (h/t BrianK for the SDD turn of phrase. Update, per BrianK, turn of phrase came from David Sirota.) When asked if they would support a tax to pay for the additional cost of war in Afghanistan, Senator Bayh, Senator Lugar, and Representative Pence all indicated they would not.
This indicates their concern about the deficit is selective. They raise the specter of debt only when the issue is something they would prefer not to pay for. Because these politicians oppose health care reform, frequently on the basis of cost, the question they should be made to answer is how the additional cost of war in Afghanistan benefits Americans more than would reform of our health care system. They have indicated through their selective deficit concerns, that paying for war in Afghanistan is a higher priority to them. They should have to identify how, specifically, this makes the lives of Americans better than would spending the same money on health care (or some other policy for which they cite lack of money).
In my mind, these politicians are in a different boat than those whose concerns about the deficit are across the board. The latter group can pretty much just say, about whatever the policy, “we don’t have the money; we’re not going to do it.” In any case, I don’t think you can call yourself a “fiscal conservative” or a “deficit hawk” just because the money you borrow is spent on wars abroad rather than on domestic projects.
One more good reason to be (at least) tri-partisan…
Let’s compare the outrage at a proposed soda drink tax to fund healthcare and the million dollar per soldier per year expense of deployment to Afghanistan.( Assuming the million dollar price tax is accurate;this figure has been widely quoted on news and political discussion recently. President Obama should have a tax proposal sent to Congress to pay for the deployment.
If we are comparing apples and oranges ( i.e, war vs healthcare ),as some will charge ,then let’s make the case in public forum just how apples are different from oranges….They are both fruits,so there’s similarity in a broad sense. All of use get caught in a logic vice when we are forced to be consistently logical. My contention is that cutting taxes makes government more desperate and less efficient,not smaller and more efficient,which is the spin.So when the money gets scarce the debate becomes a moral argument of the ‘bad people’ vs. the ‘good people.
My next door neighbor in Chicago used to take the ‘L’ to go work in loop at Social Security Administration as a claims adjustor.That’s how I look at government,my neighbor going to work.We all have a certain mindset.
Wish I could take full credit for the SDD, but I stole it from David Sirota.
Well, sure the deficit concerns should be selective. Would you rather prefer lawmakers who voted for every single possible measure of deficit spending? Not I, thank you. I like lawmakers drawing a few lines on the deficit spending, even if really late in the game.
Besides, I recall a certain blogger fanning the flames of candidate Obama’s rhetoric decrying “the failed Bush policies of borrow and spend”. Alas.
Not saying I didn’t use the phrase, “borrow and spend,” but my preferred terminology was “red-ink Republicanism.”
In any case, prioritizing is fine. But, if you are cool with additional spending for one thing that raises the deficit, don’t pretend the deficit is what’s holding you back from spending on the other thing unless you are able to explain why the former offers more benefits than the latter.
Since health care and Afghanistan are on the table, those are the two spending items that seem to need prioritizing. With health care, I know our system is screwed. I know that other countries manage to get similar or better results while spending half as much and that they do it through heavy government involvement. So, I see the need for government involvement and potential benefits there. I don’t even know what our ultimate goal in Afghanistan is, let alone what benefit I should expect to see if that goal is realized.
Our ultimate goal in Afghanistan — forgive me if I sound snide — is the same as the goal in killing off health care reform: The protection and expansion of income for the already-wealthy.
Although the government is afraid that some might game the system were health-care reform to pass, the bigger fear is that those getting rich off the current system will be at a loss for victims, and thus out of work. Nobody in power gives a s#%t about poor boys fighting and dying in foreign lands, especially when it benefits the same people who are already crushing the general populace here at home. And the Constitution gives them the power to do it — or so they make it seem.
It’s another trickle-down theory: Open a market for American business, and the money will flow. Only the only thing flowing will be the blood of those who can’t get work.