The Zeitgeist with Howard Barbanel

 

The Kumbaya President

(This originally appeared in the Feb 10th issue of The South Shore Standard)

Pete Seeger and Joan Baez both recorded versions of Kumbaya in 1958 and 1962 respectively which became a paradigmatic anthem for the civil rights movement and all the utopian causes that were prevalent in the 60s. The song became standard fare at countless campfires at sleep away and scouting camps in the 60s and 70s among primarily affluent, white suburban youth – becoming  so ubiquitous so as to have lasting meaning decades later when using the song’s name as a political reference point. That the song’s provenance is derived from a black spiritual from the sea islands of South Carolina and Georgia only added to its appeal among liberals.

In the “Kumbaya” state of mind, everyone sits around together in a harmonious circle, clasping hands in multi-cultural brotherhood, ushering in an era of world peace and unending harmony (literally and figuratively). President Obama is in deep “Kumbaya” mode with the release of his proposed 2013 budget and the cuts he plans to make in defense spending while concurrently dramatically hiking taxes on anyone earning a few shekels.

The nig attention-grabbing “world peace” cut in defense spending, preparedness and deterrence is the President’s initiative to unilaterally eliminate 80 percent of our nation’s nuclear arsenal. This is an offer he’s got on the table while asking absolutely, positively nothing whatsoever from the Russians or the Chinese or anyone else with nuclear weapons for that matter. The President envisions a nuclear-free world, which, while it would be nice, doesn’t take into account the world’s realities.

Reality number one – Russia is ruled by a neo-fascist strongman in the form of Vladimir Putin who yearns for the day when his country will again bestride the earth like the colossus it was during the Brezhnev years. Russia is a country ruled by a man with little to no accountability to his public and who harbors illusions of grandeur combined with policies supporting rogue terrorist-supporting nations like Iran and Syria. Putin would like nothing better than to see an emasculated U.S., the easier to bully us and Europe around.

Reality number two – China is on a fast track to dramatically expand its navy, including the construction of aircraft carriers. They’ve got a space program going that’s not about collecting moon rocks. They’re also an authoritarian regime that backs repugnant nations like North Korea, not to mention the aforementioned Iran and Syria, among others. China holds way too much of our debt. If we become weaker militarily, we risk being reduced to vassal status.

Reality number three – the Islamic Bombs – Pakistan (a highly unstable country as it is) has nukes. Iran is moving at all deliberate speed to create them while developing missile delivery systems that threaten the entire Middle East and Europe. The Obama Administration, sanctions aide, is sitting on it’s hands while uranium gets enriched to a higher degree day by day. The Iranians don’t care about economic sanctions. Iran’s leaders have a martyr/kamikaze complex and wouldn’t care one whit if they sacrificed 20 million of their own people to kill a comparable number of “infidels” in Israel, Europe and elsewhere. At the very least they seek to dominate the Middle East and the essential oil supplies there – putting the West in a choke hold. The President did nothing two years ago to support the “Green Revolution” in the streets of Iran’s cities, ensuring the continued enslavement of its masses to the Mullahs. Iran is Syria’s main sponsor, along with the harbingers of hate in the form of Hezbollah and Hamas.

The President’s proposed 2013 budget also slashes about 100,000 troops from the armed forces. It cuts bases. It cuts aircraft. It cuts ships. It cuts weapons systems and weapons development. The budget proposes $472 billion in cuts over 10 years. More worrisome is the specter of another $600 billion in cuts in defense spending unless Congress can find a way to realize another $1.2 trillion in spending mandated by the Budget Control Act.

While our military preparedness is being gutted the President proposes nearly a billion dollars in various and sundry pork barrel “stimulus” spending to “create jobs,” when none of the enormous prior stimulus expenditures did a thing to staunch the recession.

Further eroding our strategic position are the never-ending deficits – another $1.327 trillion for 2012 with a similar number projected yet again for 2013. The deficit is now over $15 trillion with $5 trillion added to that in just the past three years – a level of government deficit spending not seen since the end of World War II.

The fiscally tottering and precarious nature of the social welfare state being envisioned and constructed by the Administration endangers the nation’s ability to defend its vital strategic interests around the world. And make no mistake, the world is a dangerous place with bad people and evil forces rampant. The bad guys have no interest in sitting around the campfire toasting marshmallows while singing folk songs. They mean real harm to the U.S. and our allies. The U.S. needs to be dominant economically and militarily to ensure world peace. Notwithstanding France and Britain’s foray into Libya last year, no other nation can be counted on to maintain stability, prosperity and civilization itself other than the U.S. The quickest route to global chaos is massive unilateral U.S. disarmament noxiously combined with fiscal policies guaranteed to hobble our ability to buy coffee let alone preserve world order.