"Make America great again" is the slogan of Donald Trump's election campaign, a campaign that has uncorked a veritable tsunami of anti-Trump proselytizing on web-sites across the political spectrum.
Here's why.
Trump is not only an outsider, he is, unlike the other candidates on both right and left with at least a tenuous claim to "outsider" status, an outsider with access to bags of cash.
That makes him more or less immune to the lobbying industry. Therefore, while the rest of the field in both parties gives you a range of foreign policy options that range from PNAC (original flavour) to PNAC (new and improved), Trump is free to trumpet (sorry) a truly new idea when it comes to America's foreign adventures.
Whereas every other candidate is waxing hysterical about "Putin's aggression," Trump wants to talk to the guy!
What a concept!
The establishment's take on the Putin "threat" is that America and her allies need to spend more money on defence. At the moment, the US outspends Russia on defence by at least a factor of seven, or seven hundred percent. Add in America's NATO allies, and that ratio rises to over 10:1. Toss in a few non-NATO American allies like Saudi Arabia, Japan, Korea, and Israel, and we're getting close to a ratio of 15:1.
Seriously folks, if that ain't stopping "Putin's aggression," no amount of further spending is going to make one iota of difference!
Now let's take a look at Putin's so-called aggression.
Exhibit A has to be the anschluss of Crimea. Hmm... A majority of Crimeans seem to be quite comfortable with their status. In fact, the vast majority of them voted for exactly that in a referendum.
Then there's Exhibit B. Georgia, another so-called "colour revolution" that failed to blossom in quite the way the master horticulturists in Washington planned. Those two exhibits pretty much sum up the dubious case for "Putin's aggression."
Neither exhibit is anywhere near failed-state status.
On the other hand, what have been the fruits of Washington's aggression over the past generation?
America has left a trail of failed states around the globe over the past fifty years. And for this it has a defence budget 700% greater than Russia's.
Here is step one in making America great again; trim back the US defence budget to parity with Russia's. Just imagine what could be accomplished by lopping 500 + billions off the defence budget!
Every year!
That would entail some sacrifices of course. All those colour revolutions in foreign lands will have to erupt spontaneously without billions in seed money from the American taxpayer.
America would lose it's status as the number one creator of failed states.
The number of people around the world who hate America would plummet!
And just imagine what America could become if even half of those savings were spent at home?
Post-secondary education could be free for every qualified applicant. An honest-to-goodness single-payer health care system would consign Obamacare to the dustbin of history where it rightfully belongs. And a nation-wide program of revitalizing America's infrastructure would create so much work that unemployment and poverty could be eliminated in months!
That's a start. America's rebirth would create even more benefits with some fine-tuning. End the insanely counter-productive war on drugs. End the abomination of for-profit prisons. End the adulation of job-destroying hedge fund operators.
And so on...
America would soon enough be greater than it's ever been!
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