Commrade, Where's my Overseas Empire Gone?

In 2009, the unfortunate part is that someone actively engaged in addressing looming problems is all that is required to appear magical.

On a different note, a section (Part I Section D) of the 2000 Green Party Platform...

"With half of all discretionary spending now going to the military, the president requesting spending even the Pentagon thinks is wasteful, and the Congress proposing even more than the president requests, Greens believe the more than $300 billion DEFENSE BUDGET MUST BE CUT. The Green Party calls for military spending to be cut by 50% over the next 10 years, with increases in spending for social programs. Preventive diplomacy, a strong economy and humane trade relations are our best defense. We must maintain a viable American military force, prudent foreign policy doctrines, and readiness strategies that take into account real, not hollow or imagined threats to our people, our democratic institutions and U.S. interests. Even so, Greens seek strength through peace."

This plank represented the primary reason for casting my vote for Nader in 2000. In 2001, a colleague asked me to change my position regarding the military budget. The position I took was that it was too soon to know with any certainty which position was correct.

Today, I re-cast my vote for Nader in 2000. While there would have been down-sides--perhaps some nationalized banking, maybe a little no-bid (i.e. communist) government contracts to those deemed most deserving, or government subsidies for failing energy technology secured by proximity with government officials, meanwhile those few trying to better themselves would have lacked even basic armor that could have afforded them a minimal standard of protection as they soldiered their way through the poor masses, but there was potential for a singular upside that would outweigh any left to us by this opulent decade of decadent capitalism.

There's an old saying in Tennessee, that any competent politician or break-even gambler is familiar with, "Don't throw good money after bad." Even the least pessimistic economists acknowledge that pre-proverbial River Rubicon as long crossed. Yet mistakes were made and maxims can sometimes be broken in order to save the maxim. Yet that is the commitment that I am willing to make after a hypothetical eight year run of psuedo-socialism that in no way culminated with an Orwellian War crippling empires to a tune the loyal Greek Alcibiades couldn't keep up with.

Perphaps, hypothetical governments shouldn't be encumbered with ancient history. More recently, what did George Washington think of foreign entanglements? Or, youtube Eisenhower on the military industrial complex. Does Woodrow Wilson sound like he was perserving a solid foundation for capitalism when it came time to reflect on his signing of the Federal Reserve Act:

"I am a most unhappy man. I have unwittingly ruined my country. A great industrial nation is controlled by its system of credit. Our system of credit is concentrated. The growth of the nation, therefore, and all our activities are in the hands of a few men. We have come to be one of the worst ruled, one of the most completely controlled and dominated Governments in the civilized world no longer a Government by free opinion, no longer a Government by conviction and the vote of the majority, but a Government by the opinion and duress of a small group of dominant men." -Woodrow Wilson

I would be HAPPY if this was a subprime housing problem. I would be HAPPY if this was laissez-faire capitalism. I would be HAPPY if the bible's actual position on usury was persued with the half the zealorty as the bibles infered stance on abortion. (To take issue with this statement, and what you are intended to infer from my links, I will not acknowledge anything lacking a position other than the bible is twice as clear about abortion as it is about usury. Enjoy explaining quickening.)

You who hope that Obama fails, to You, I posse these ironic questions, what has changed, what will change? A party, yes. A face, yes. But dare say the requiste resounding chorus of NOTHING and I will yell, Where the BAUK (this links to an NPR story that may be offensive to some audiences) have you been for eight long years, PATRIOT?