Bottom lines in budget battles
Re “Battle of the budget,” editorial, Feb. 11
Your editorial appears to accept the massive change in U.S. foreign policy chosen for our country by the neocons and President Bush in the aftermath of 9/11. After Afghanistan, Bush and his neocon supporters began pursuing an expensive and risky foreign policy of preemptive war and aggressive interference in other nations’ affairs.
Following the debacle in Iraq, we have had little discussion about whether such a policy is either necessary or effective. Might not we be trying to run the world too much and at too much cost to our economy for our own well-being? Might not there be less-intrusive and less-expensive policies that will give us greater security?
Although it’s important to spend our defense dollars wisely, it is more important to be wise about the foreign policy upon which we spend them. The latter debate is the one we need to have first.
CHARLES FINCH
Huntington Beach
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In lemming-like fashion, your editorial goes along with Defense Secretary Robert M. Gates’ congressional testimony that the country should be spending at least 5% of its gross domestic product on defense. You also state that the nation needs to be prepared to confront any number of potential threats, from Al Qaeda to a more conventional aggressor.
What regional military power even exists to take on the military might of the United States? Al Qaeda is a ragtag group of international conspirators who slipped through our porous national defense in September 2001 to create havoc in the United States.
Devoting about 1% of our GDP would be more than sufficient to confront these security and defense threats if they were managed properly.
If The Times called for an administrative change in Washington, it would move the discussion forward. By acquiescing to the drumbeat of this incompetent administration, it becomes part of the problem.
BEN C. GRAGE
San Diego
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Re “A budget shell game,” Opinion, Feb. 10
Rather than passing a nonbinding resolution, Congress should use the power of the purse to directly confront one of the central issues of the Iraq war: Is it worth it? I suggest that Congress craft a bill for a fixed-period tax to support the war. I would envision a special five-year income tax assessment to raise about $200 billion each year. It should automatically expire in five years. The total funds raised, about $1 trillion, would go a long way toward paying for the Iraq war. I would suggest a flat tax on all personal income above $100,000.
If the Iraq war is the central front on the war on terror and is essential to the well-being of the United States, then passing this legislation is a no-brainer. If the war in Iraq is not important enough to ask for us to make sacrifices, then there is no point continuing and we should bring our troops home.
We have enough financial crises looming in the future; let’s pay for the Iraq war today with our strong economy (and with President Bush in charge) rather than pass it along to our children and the next administration.
SCOTT RYCHNOVSKY
Irvine