Socialism And Imperialism Are Taking Us Down: Americans
Are Paying for Socialism and Imperialism
12 February 2010By Jacob G. Hornberger
In a February 6 editorial, the mainstream newspaper
the New York Times took note of the dangers of
out-of-control federal spending and soaring debt. In
2011 alone, the projected deficit is $1.3 trillion, an
amount that even the Times calls “breathtaking.”
But what is even more breathtaking is what Times
recommends that federal officials do. You’re not going
to believe this and so here’s the link to the
editorial so you can verify what I’m saying.
The Times is saying that U.S. officials must spend
even more money than they’re already spending, in
order to create jobs!
That’s right, on the one hand, the NYT editorial
board, which has to consist of some rather smart
people, says that “persistently high deficits are
harmful to the economy and the country’s long-run
security” and, on the other hand, says that the
federal government must spend even more money in order
to create a “jobs revival.”
That is economic nonsense in its purest form.
Now, consider this article — “Is Greece’s Debt
Trashing the Euro?” — that was published by the Times
on the same date as the editorial. The point it makes
is that Greece’s soaring indebtednesses is threatening
to bring down the entire Euro monetary system.
No doubt the NYT editorial board would say, “Greece
just needs to spend more money to create jobs.”
In its editorial, the NYT points out that Republican
criticism of the deficit and the national debt ring
hollow because the Bush administration did the same
thing. That’s of course true. But what the Times fails
to mention is what Bush did to cause federal spending
to soar out of control: He ordered the troops to
invade and occupy Iraq and Afghanistan.
Pardon me, but didn’t the NYT support those
imperialist escapades that enabled Bush to send
federal spending through the roof?
Don’t you just love people who rail against
out-of-control federal spending while embracing and
supporting the things that the spending is going for?
Consider Social Security, Medicare, Medicaid, food
stamps, and military spending — the programs that
everyone agrees are the root causes of out-of-control
federal spending and soaring debt.
The statists always call for reform, reform, reform.
The latest brilliant proposal, which the NYT endorses,
is a commission to study the problem, one that will
inevitably conclude, “The system needs reform.”
Hope springs eternal for the statists. All that’s
needed is more spending, higher taxes, and “reform,”
and socialist-imperialist paradise will finally have
arrived.
That’s just siren-song nonsense. What’s actually
needed is a repeal of all socialist programs,
including Social Security, Medicare, Medicaid, food
stamps, and all the rest, along with all the taxes
that fund them.
Yes, you read that right — repeal, not reform — and
immediate.
No, there will not be people dying in the streets.
Instead there will be the greatest outburst of
economic prosperity and vitality that people have ever
witnessed, along with the greatest outpouring of
voluntary charity. It just requires self-esteem,
self-confidence, self-reliance, and an unswerving
belief in one’s self, others, freedom, and God.
Moreover, it entails an immediate withdrawal from Iraq
and Afghanistan, where U.S. troops continue to kill,
maim, torture, incarcerate, kidnap, and destroy every
day. Yes, you read that right — withdraw immediately.
And not only from there, but also from Korea, Europe,
Japan (where the Japanese people are demanding an end
to the U.S. occupation of their country), Africa,
Latin America, and everywhere else. Why, it’s even
time to start closing military bases here in the
United States. The Cold War ended long ago, and all
the U.S. Empire has done since then is stir up trouble
to keep the warfare largess flowing to the
military-industrial complex.
Oh, and while we’re at it, let’s end the drug war too,
immediately. What possible justification for spending
money on this 35-year old failed, immoral, and
destructive program could there be, except that it
provides revenue (including bribes and asset
forfeiture) for public officials and drug lords?
Only by restoring a genuinely free-market,
limited-government republic to our land can we hope to
restore morality, freedom, harmony, and prosperity to
our land.
Americans Are Paying for Socialism and Imperialism
Both liberals and conservatives have long lamented
that Americans have not been bearing their fair share
of the costs of the U.S. Empire’s longstanding
imperialist escapades in Iraq and Afghanistan.
That’s ridiculous.
Consider the ever-increasing debt that is being added
to each person’s balance sheet. Each American
currently owes $40,000, which is his individual share
of the debt that the U.S. government owes its
creditors. Like it or not, the federal government,
through the IRS, wields the authority to collect that
money from you and everyone else.
On Thursday, the U.S. House of Representatives voted
to allow the feds to go $1.7 trillion deeper in debt.
According to an article in the Washington Post, that
amounts to an increase of $6,000 per person. That will
increase the amount you owe to $46,000. If you have a
family of four, your share of the government’s debt
will be $184,000.
Suppose the IRS decided to collect that money from
you. How easily could you pay them?
Of course, that’s not likely, as public officials are
fully aware of the anger and rage they would be
confronting if they used the IRS to collect that
money. Incurring debt is one thing but having the IRS
forcibly collect the money from the taxpayers to pay
it off is another.
Nonetheless, creditors who loaned the federal
government the money to pay for its welfare-warfare
state expenditures, such as the Chinese government,
ultimately want to be paid back. And the only way they
can be paid back is by the U.S. government’s forcibly
taking money from the U.S. citizenry and using it to
pay back the Chinese government and other creditors.
So, when the rubber hits the road and the feds need to
start paying off their creditors, how are they going
to get the money? Some will be in higher taxes, but my
hunch is not a lot. Historically, one of the things
that profligate officials fear most is a tax revolt.
Instead, they’ll simply print up the necessary money
and use it to pay off the creditors.
That will, of course, cause prices of most everything
in the United States to soar. It’s a convenient way to
tax people without letting them know they’re being
taxed. If prices soar, say, 25 percent while real
incomes remain the same, then people will have
effectively been taxed 25 percent.
The beauty of the scheme, of course, is that Joe and
Mary Sixpack will have no idea of what’s going on.
They’ll think that the problem is with greed, avarice,
business owners, bankers, and speculators. They won’t
have any idea that it’s the government’s central bank,
the Federal Reserve, that is taxing them through
monetary debasement.
As an aside, that’s one of the beauties of public
schooling and state-supported colleges and
universities. People go through these institutions
being taught that inflation is a mysterious and
fearful disease that strikes nations at random, like
the flu. The last thing Joe and Mary will suspect is
that soaring prices constitute government’s way of
forcing people to provide the money to pay off its
debts and financing its ever-growing expenditures.
This is where socialism and imperialism have led our
country — down a road to moral debauchery, dependency
on the state, damage to individual self-reliance and
personal independence, foreign anger and hatred for
our nation, ever increasing attacks on our freedom and
privacy, soaring expenditures and debts, and the
threat of national bankruptcy.
That sure seems to me that Americans are bearing a
fair share of the costs of Iraq and Afghanistan, along
with other parts of America’s welfare-warfare state.
My hunch is that as time goes on, an increasing number
of Americans will wish that they had listened to us
libertarians a long time ago.
Jacob Hornberger is founder and president of The
Future of Freedom Foundation.
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