Trade dwindles in unstable locales. Your hometown could become one of them were it not for our military forces. Naturally, that would only be the first symptom. A robust capability for national security is the bedrock foundation upon which business, such as yours, is built.
We don't agree on this point; it might be interesting to argue it further, perhaps in another thread. I think I can demonstrate pretty vividly that coercive government forces always screw up everything they attempt--even when it's well-intentioned--when compared with the way that free-market forces would deal with the same problem, including national security.
You see right now Barak, no one has the combat power to wage war with us in a manner that would result in the supremacy of the instigator. Sure, there will always be terrorism just like there will always be crime. It could be a lot worse though if there were no one to strike at the center of gravity of terror organizations like we do. I can't do it by myself. You can't. The police can't. That leaves the military forces.
Again, we disagree.
First, the reason international terrorists are angry with us in the first place is because of the international adventurist meddling that our politicians have been able to accomplish using the direct or indirect threat of our huge military. The free market would find other, non-coercive, cheaper, less offensive ways to accomplish its goals.
Second, the military forces have not exactly covered themselves in glory when it comes to "striking at the center of gravity of terror organizations." Osama bin Laden is still at large, and the Afghans are claiming they want the Taliban back. Nobody can say for sure that Saddam Hussein is dead or in custody, and the Iraqis are getting pretty fed up with their new Pax Americana, what with all the looting, violence, and weapons confiscations.
Third, the reason the military has been unsuccessful is not that our soldiers are incompetent or immoral, but simply because they have been grievously misused. International terrorism is not the sort of centralized threat against which a military force is useful. It--unlike Naziism, for example--does not spring from a leader, or from a party: it springs from a
cause. You can't assassinate or conquer a cause with military force; if you remove one leader, another will spring up in his place. The way to deal with a diffuse threat like international terrorism (assuming you've already been too stupid to avoid provoking it by providing the cause in the first place) is with a diffuse defense like an armed and independent citizenry. (Do you hear of terrorist attacks on Switzerland? No? Me neither. There are two reasons for that: first, they don't go around sticking their noses in other people's business and pi$$ing them off; second, they all have guns.) We are in something of a jam in this country, because we A) have already pi$$ed off the bad guys, and B) we have a mostly-disarmed citizenry that is heavily dependent on a burgeoning government. However, sending the military out to make even more folks angry enough to sponsor or join the terrorists isn't the answer.
It's interesting to watch the Bush administration at work, because governments learn very, very slowly, if at all, and it's likely that the sort of grand strategy the US military uses against international terrorism in foreign countries will be roughly the same as that it will use against citizen militias in this country when the time comes. One can watch and learn. Tanks and artillery and aircraft aren't much use against them, but a persistent and well-connected network of "pockets of resistance" can really harsh their mellow.
How nice it must have been sitting back here in the rear with the beer, writing computer programs under the umbrella of protection afforded you by the most lethal military force ever to range the face of this Earth.
We have very different perspectives. In its current incarnation and employment, I think the US military endangers me much more than it protects me. I've said it before: my individual liberties are in much more danger from Baby Bush than from Saddam Hussein. Hussein has never so much as tickled a single one of my liberties; Bush, on the other hand, created the Department of Homeland Security and signed the USA PATRIOT Act--and started the biggest unprovoked war of naked aggression since Abraham Lincoln. And now he's effectively colonized a Middle Eastern country full of angry Muslims.
Does that make
you feel safe?
But I think you have a bit to learn about selfless service, gratitude and loyalty to your nation just the same.
Yup--different perspectives. I don't believe I exist to serve my government; I believe the government exists to serve me--that is, to secure my unalienable rights, deriving its just powers only from my consent. (Pop quiz: do you know where those words come from?) And it's been doing a pi$$-poor job of that lately, while extorting from me enough money every year to buy a nice car or a large safe full of guns. So if I owe any gratitude or loyalty to the US government, then yes: I guess I do have a lot to learn about gratitude and loyalty.
Oh, and as far as the military coming after you, they'll do as duly elected officials tell them.
Just as the Gestapo and the Schuetzstaffel did, you mean? I know: that's what I figured.
