Dave Budge has challenged me in a number of areas, as usual, and go see Electric City Weblog to get the full dose. NSFW.
The one area I wish to address here is the notion he puts for that I am comfortable with government domestically, but do not trust it with foreign policy.
I quote General Smedley Butler (a widely known citation):
I spent thirty- three years and four months in active military service as a member of this country’s most agile military force, the Marine Corps. I served in all commissioned ranks from Second Lieutenant to Major-General. And during that period, I spent most of my time being a high class muscle- man for Big Business, for Wall Street and for the Bankers. In short, I was a racketeer, a gangster for capitalism.
I suspected I was just part of a racket at the time. Now I am sure of it. Like all the members of the military profession, I never had a thought of my own until I left the service. My mental faculties remained in suspended animation while I obeyed the orders of higher-ups. This is typical with everyone in the military service.
I helped make Mexico, especially Tampico, safe for American oil interests in 1914. I helped make Haiti and Cuba a decent place for the National City Bank boys to collect revenues in. I helped in the raping of half a dozen Central American republics for the benefits of Wall Street. The record of racketeering is long. I helped purify Nicaragua for the international banking house of Brown Brothers in 1909-1912.* I brought light to the Dominican Republic for American sugar interests in 1916. In China I helped to see to it that Standard Oil went its way unmolested.
During those years, I had, as the boys in the back room would say, a swell racket. Looking back on it, I feel that I could have given Al Capone a few hints. The best he could do was to operate his racket in three districts. I operated on three continents.
That’s only one man’s opinion, but one that I have shared for years, that foreign policy is run at the behest of American corporations, and that all of our foreign policy apparati were formed to advance those interests, among them the World Bank, the International Monetary Fund, the Agency for International Development, the Alliance for Progress, not to mention the Jesuits and the Peace Corps. It is no accident that policy does not change as we switch from Democratic to Republican administrations. The people we elect are not in charge.
Do I trust my government to run foreign policy? Yes. I wish it would.
If these corporations are so big and powerful that they run foreign policy, why not domestic policy too? In large part they do, but there was an intervention of sorts called the New Deal, in which populist and progressive ideas were put in force – Social Security, unemployment compensation, SEC, Glass Steagall, and the Fair Labor Standards Act. Those things are slowly being undone. But these things were all done by government, and were good things. They are being undone not by government, but by private power, which has largely taken control of government.
So in answer to the question why do I favor government for domestic policy but not foreign, the answer is that I trust it to do both well, and wish it would.
*Part of the Bush Family legacy, and the source of much of its wealth.
Piece of Mindful 