Is
There a Shred of “The Greater Good” Left in American
Society?
One
has to wonder, looking at the “defense” budget for next
year. The House of Representatives has passed a military budget of
$778 billion for the coming year. As usual, it passed with only a few
criticisms, one of which was that it’s a “reckless misuse
of resources.”
Looking
at such spending, one would think that there never was an opportunity
for a “peace bonus,” after the collapse of the Soviet
Union, when the U.S. was the last empire standing. Instead, it seemed
to push the country into an even greater frenzy of production of
killing systems and weapons of war. It’s called the
military-industrial complex, but it is more appropriately called the
military-industrial-congressional-academic complex. It takes all
those parts to come up with the machinery that, since the end of
World War II, has killed more civilians than what are described as
“enemy combatants.” This situation is an ongoing atrocity
and should be identified as war crimes. Instead, the deaths of whole
families are considered “collateral damage,” as if they
were a munitions dump.
The
Congress has even gone further, increasing the National Defense
Authorization Act (NDAA) by $25 billion more than President Biden
requested. That amount, according to some estimates, would be enough
to vaccinate the rest of the world, if the U.S. had its priorities
straight. Doing that would be helpful in curbing the spread of
Covid-19 and its variants, including its trip back to the U.S.
Apparently, the powers that be in the U.S. are incapable of
listening, and hearing, the scientists whose job it is to point out
these facts. They are not likely to want to help vaccinate the poorer
countries, they would rather bomb them. It’s not just the
right-wingers who are to blame, even though many of them still claim
that the pandemic is a “Democratic hoax.” Hospital
workers have a different take on that.
There
are, as well, more-liberal citizens who want to curb U.S. spending on
the rest of the world, using the “we’ve got ours, fend
for yourselves” attitude, never thinking that, in some ways,
the world has become a little smaller, since it has been universally
connected by trade, travel, and communications, especially through
the Internet. Money changes hands easily, as does the potential for
disease in a smaller world.
So
does the capacity for destroying populations, especially those whose
land holds resources that the U.S. and other rich nations want, mean
anything? As desired resources begin to run out in those rich
countries, the eyes of the big corporations turn toward the countries
in which the people are poor, but their land is rich. It is often the
case that the elected officials in said poorer countries do not
cooperate in giving up their resources and a military solution is
indicated. These are the actions of empire.
While
a family of wage earners might have to account for every penny, just
to pay for housing, food, clothing, and medical care (when they can
afford it), the Pentagon never has to worry about outspending its
budget. All the generals have to do is ask Congress and its compliant
members will grant their wishes and the president will sign the
legislation. No questions asked.
It
isn’t just the generals who want the money. There are the
thousands of CEOs of the defense industries. There are countless
thousands more who benefit from working in those industries and,
especially, those who benefit from the presence of military bases in
their states and communities. All have a vested interest in keeping
the military and defense industries overflowing with money.
Who
are these people? They are those whose livelihoods depend on the
largesse of the military for paychecks, large and small. They are
people who work in the PX on the ubiquitous military bases in the
U.S., making a modest wage. They work at higher wages (usually union)
in the high-tech factories that make weapons systems, bombs,
missiles, planes, ships, and motor vehicles. In other words, they are
just like you and me. Any shrinkage in the military budget is a
potential threat to their livelihoods, so they will fight to keep the
airbase or training camp in their backyard. It’s a human
impulse to want to keep getting a paycheck, but there is always a
price to pay.
We
can keep the defense jobs, but risk draining money from schools,
hospitals, health care, decent housing, and nutritious food, and all
of the social programs that are a great benefit to the elderly, the
children, the handicapped. What happened to the Build Back Better
bill that was proposed by President Biden? It started out at about $6
trillion, then it got whittled down in a hurry to about $3.5
trillion. After Senators Manchin and Synema (both Democrats) were
done with it, it came down to less than $2 trillion and many of the
social programs that would help hard-working wage earners were cut
out. It might take another decade or two before the opportunity comes
along that will provide such needed help to vulnerable Americans.
To
show that it’s rank-and-file Americans who are just as
responsible as the generals and their sycophantic politicians for the
perpetuation of an ever-growing military and defense budget, just
have a look at who turns out at a public hearing on the question of
the closing of a military base in the U.S. It’s everyone, from
the cashier at the PX, to the mayor and every politician in the
vicinity. Few of them are willing to give up a dime. It’s the
lifeblood of their communities. Don’t think it wasn’t
planned that way. They just sprinkle some of that money across the
country and get people dependent on it to run their local societies
and the thought of losing it causes great stress.
The
other motivating factor is fear. Fear is the great motivator and for
the past 100 years, the propaganda of the right has been effective in
causing great popular support for development of every kind of
military weaponry and every “improvement” in the training
of a growing population of soldiers, sailors, pilots and technicians,
and more. All to protect us from whatever enemy that has been
conjured up for us to contemplate in our dreams.
Everything
has been done to weave the military and “defense” into
our daily lives, to such a degree that for the most part, we cannot
imagine life without it. The heroes who are hailed every day on local
television news shows are military, who have served in one war or
another. Or, no war. That they served is enough to make them heroes.
“Thank you for your service,” they are told. There are
few teachers, scientists, doctors, or novelists who are treated or
hailed as heroes and it’s likely that they never will be. They
are not woven into our daily lives like the military and they are not
backed up by generations of public relations as the military has
been. The difference is money. The perception is that war bases bring
money into local communities. The others cost money and that’s
why the likes of Manchin and Synema can slash their programs, their
pay, their very workplaces, and then vote enthusiastically for
budget-breaking increases in the war budget.
To
a great degree, we are all responsible for the waste of war and
weapons budgets that hurt the most vulnerable Americans. Whether we
are talking about Pentagon spending, mitigation of climate change and
global heating, providing for our elders, children, and disabled, we
are all responsible for the current condition.
