Debt, Deficits, and Defense Cuts
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Accuracy in Media
Cliff Kincaid
08/19/2010
In line with Obama chief-of-staff Rahm Emanuel's admonition that no crisis should go to waste, the Obama Administration is preparing to use the matter of massive debt and deficits to push for drastic cuts in our national U.S. military budget. The proposed cuts, which total $960 billion, could leave the U.S. as a second-rate military power.
The plan is to use the $13 trillion debt and $1.4 trillion annual deficit to argue for radical cuts to national defense. President Obama has already appointed a National Commission on Fiscal Responsibility and Reform to look at long-term budgetary trends and vote on a final report no later than December 1.
Under the "Sustainable Defense Task Force" plan, the U.S. Navy would be cut to 230 combat ships (from a planned number of 313). Under President Reagan, the U.S. had come close to achieving a 600-ship Navy.
Other proposals include:
* Reduce the US nuclear arsenal.
* Slash spending on missile defense and space.
* Retire two Navy aircraft carriers and two naval air wings.
* Reduce F-35 fighter procurement by 220 aircraft.
* Cancel or delay the Joint Strike Fighter.
* End procurement of the MV-22 Osprey.
Rep. Barney Frank, one of the most left-wing members of Congress, created the "Sustainable Defense Task Force" that came up with the cuts and worked in cooperation with Reps. Walter Jones (R-N.C.), Ron Paul (R-Texas) and Sen. Ron Wyden (D-Ore.).
The "left-right coalition" making up the membership of the group included people from the Center for American Progress and the Cato Institute, both of them funded by George Soros. Another member came from the pro-Marxist Institute for Policy Studies.
Its members included:
* Carl Conetta, Co-Director, Project on Defense Alternatives (Commonwealth Institute)
* Benjamin Friedman, Cato Institute
* William Hartung, New America Foundation
* Chris Hellman, National Priorities Project
* Heather Hurlburt, National Security Network
* John Issacs, Executive Director, Council for a Livable World
* Charles Knight, Co-Director, Project on Defense Alternatives (Commonwealth Institute)
* Larry Korb, Center for American Progress
* Paul Martin, PeaceAction
* Laicie Olsen, Center for Arms Control and Non-Proliferation
* Prasannan Parthasarathi, Boston College
* Miriam Pemberton, Foreign Policy in Focus, Institute for Policy Studies
* Laura Peterson, Taxpayers for Common Sense
* Christopher Preble, Director of Foreign Policy Studies, Cato Institute
* Winslow Wheeler, Center for Defense Information.
The involvement of two officials of the libertarian Cato Institute confirms our fears, expressed in a previous AIM Report, about the influence of what we called the "Progressive Libertarians." We pointed out that these libertarians, sometimes mistakenly referred to as conservatives, have often collaborated with left-wing organizations and individuals.
We noted, "The seeds of this strange collaboration of interests were planted decades ago, when the pro-Marxist Institute for Policy Studies (IPS) held a seminar under the title of 'Left and Right,' featuring Marcus Raskin of IPS and Karl Hess, then an IPS fellow. The speakers at this 1969 event included economist Murray Rothbard and Jeff Liebling, the latter identified as 'former Youth for Goldwater' and 'SDS member.' Hess, a former Barry Goldwater speechwriter who died in 1994, traveled easily between left and right."
A September 1970 IPS seminar on "U.S. Strategy in Asia" was organized by Earl C. Ravenal, then an IPS Associate Fellow, who would later join the Cato Institute as a distinguished senior fellow in foreign policy studies. A book featuring the proceedings of the event reveals the participation of Morton Halperin, then with the liberal Brookings Institution and now a top employee of George Soros.
We noted that Justin Logan of the Cato Institute recently appeared on the Glenn Beck show along with another Cato scholar, Chris Edwards, who said that we should "pull back the foreign troops" and drastically reduce the U.S. defense budget. This will produce "higher security" for the U.S., he claimed.
Sounding like an anti-war progressive, Edwards charged that sinister arms manufacturers were pushing funding for unneeded weapons.
Obama had already cancelled the F-22 Raptor, the most advanced air superiority fighter in the U.S. inventory, at a time when the Russians are developing their own version of a fifth generation fighter.
The Cato Institute favored the Obama policy of killing the F-22.
On top of this cut, Secretary of Defense Robert Gates pledged on June 28 to cut $100 billion from the military budget over the next five years.
The left-wing IPS, a key component of the "progressive" coalition backing Obama, has been waging a campaign to have Obama veto more "unneeded weapons systems" and is urging the president to make the defense cuts "much deeper."
Editor's Message
On July 4, Independence Day, the Washington Post ran a sympathetic front page story about Attorney General Eric Holder "guarding the nation's safety." The front-page photo showed Holder in "the quiet of his kitchen" as he "weighs issues of national security."
In fact, in the preceding days, Holder and his top political appointees had been accused of failing to take action against the threat of violence at a polling station in Philadelphia. J. Christian Adams, an election lawyer who served in the Voting Rights Section at the U.S. Department of Justice, blew the whistle on how Holder's top lieutenants dismissed a voter intimidation lawsuit against members of the New Black Panther Party. Fox News video had shown members of the group, one of whom carried a night stick, trying to prevent people from voting.
Since the Black Panthers had a weapon that could have inflicted serious damage, and since the Black Panthers have historically been involved in violence, the question has to be asked if Holder's actions are in fact the prelude to actually sanctioning revolutionary violence.
Is this a crazy question? Recall that Holder was involved in the Clinton Administration pardons of members of the Weather Underground and Puerto Rican FALN terrorist groups.
Also consider that on February 16, 1970, a bomb filled with heavy metal staples exploded and ripped through the body of and killed San Francisco Police Sergeant Brian V. McDonnell at the Park Station police headquarters. Former FBI informant Larry Garthwohl has testified that Obama associates William Ayers and Bernardine Dohrn were involved in that bombing. More evidence is being gathered in the case.
Our media should be pressing Holder to bring charges in this case as well.
