An American who can't say no
By: Patrick J. Buchanan
Posted: January 24, 2005
1:00 a.m. Eastern

© 2005 Creators Syndicate, Inc.

Historians celebrate his predecessor Truman and his successor JFK as near-great. Yet, Eisenhower is ignored. A positive-passive president, he is called, at best an average president.

Yet, what did Ike accomplish? He took office in 1953 and in six months ended the no-win war in Korea. With a million illegal aliens here, he ordered them home in "Operation Wetback." They went.

He built up U.S. armed forces to where we were invincible. When the Hungarian Revolution erupted, Ike refused to send troops beyond the bridge at Andau. America stayed out, and the revolution was snuffed out by Soviet tanks. But there was no war between America and the Soviet Union.

When the British, French and Israelis launched an invasion to retake Suez from Nasser, who had nationalized it, Ike ordered the Brits and French out, threatened to sink the pound if Prime Minister Eden balked, told Israel's David Ben-Gurion to get out of Sinai or face the wrath of the man who had commanded D-Day. All obeyed.

Ike gave us peace and prosperity, balanced the budget, and went off to play golf at the all-men's Burning Tree Country Club, where this writer was a summer caddy. Once, as I was walking out the long driveway at Burning Tree to walk to River Road, to hitch-hike back to D.C., the president's limo approached.

I put out my thumb, and got Ike's famous smile and a wave as he passed by. Ike was a leader who could say no. He was what we needed after the disastrous tenure of Harry Truman, who had left office with an approval rate of 23 percent.

Today, America is a country that cannot say no. The backslapping of Republicans notwithstanding, we do not have a true or tough conservative in the Oval Office. There is no conservative party in Washington. And we shall pay a historic price for it.

Under President Bush, the U.S. government collects 16 percent of the GDP in taxes and spends 20 percent. We have a deficit of close to 4 percent of the economy.

Yet, as the Washington Post's Robert Samuelson writes, Social Security, Medicare and Medicaid – which already consume 7 percent of GDP – will rise to 13 percent in 2030, i.e., the federal take will rise to 26 or 27 percent of our economy.

Thus, the problem. If the feds are taking in 16 to 17 percent of GDP, but spending 26 to 27 percent of GDP, how do we close the gap? Do we raise taxes 10 percent of GDP, or raise the deficit to 10 percent of GDP?

As Samuelson writes, just to close the coming gap in Social Security, Medicare and Medicaid would require a $700-billion-a-year tax hike. That would sink the economy.

Now, consider our foreign debt, the largest in history.

In 2004, the U.S. trade deficit will come in near $600 billion. In November, at $60 billion, it was running at $720 billion a year, with the merchandise trade deficit approaching $800 billion.

We are borrowing 6 percent to 7 percent of GDP abroad to finance our purchases abroad. Japan and China are lending us the hundreds of billions we need each year to cover our purchases of foreign goods. Why are our lenders so generous? Because it enables them to siphon our manufacturing base out of America, into Asia.

By putting us into bottomless debt and hooking us on their products, they are making us a dependent nation – dependent on them.

Why do we Americans not use our own savings, if we feel we must buy beyond our income? Because the average American saves nothing, about 1 percent of what he earns. Never before have our people been so deeply in family debt, on credit cards, mortgages and car loans.

From every standpoint, America is a nation over-extended, living beyond its means, mortgaging its future for the present.

Then, consider our military commitments. President Bush is expected to ask Congress for $100 billion in supplemental funds to pay for the Iraq and Afghan wars. As we do not have the money, we shall have to borrow to fight these wars.

Beyond the fiscal cost, there is America's strategic deficit. With 150,000 troops in Iraq, 40 percent of them Guard and Reserve, with 9,000 in Afghanistan, our 500,000-man Army is stretched to the limit. Our Navy is falling below one-half the 600 ships of Ronald Reagan's Navy.

Yet, the Bush Doctrine calls for us to fight Iran and North Korea to keep them from going nuclear. The neocons want Syria attacked. Beltway elites are raising their fists at Russia and demanding Ukraine be brought into NATO. Meanwhile, China appears to be building its forces for the ultimate showdown with Taiwan.

America is a nation over-committed, over-extended in every way. And the IOUs are coming due.

Historically, I've agreed with Buchanan very few things--but since he has given up his aspirations for the presidency, I've found him to be a bit more tolerable.

I think there's something to say for that--when people don't have to twist around their viewpoints to become elected, they tend to make more sense.

I feel the same way about Newt Gingrich. I still disagree with him, but I know he's a learned and intelligent man, and since he's not running for office, he doesn't spout the same kind of poisonous bullshit that he and Buchanan are so well known for.

--PunkDavid

Another thing, Pat Buchanan, even at his worst, was someone whose patriotism I never questioned as being anything but 100% genuine. I cannot say the same for President Bush and his people.

--PunkDavid

I almost mentioned Newt in my original post as a comparison. He's a frequent guest on O'Reilly's show, and I witnessed quite the "progression" on his part as time drifted further away from when he stepped down as Speaker.

To mimic your last post a bit:

I feel the same way about Ralph Nader. Too bad I disagree with him on a grand majority of what he says.

Say what you want about Buchanan, he has been spot-on, 100% correct in his analysis of the Iraq war since it was first mentioned.

I highly recommend his new book.
There's plenty of food for thought in it.

[unnecessary post=simpleschoolboy]
*pats self on back for bemoaning the lack of real conservatives before catching any hint of Mr. Buchanan's article*

Hey, even if the idea isn't originally mine, I still reserve the right to ponder something that isn't as kicked around as say... gay marriage.
[/unnecessary post]

I need to add an OMGWTFBBQ here.

Man has a point.

Thanks for the responses. I too agreed with parts of the article, in particular his analysis of the military and the Iraqi situation.

I think that these types of articles are a very good start towards increasing understanding of both sides within this forum.

Pat Buchanan=Uniter?!?

--PunkDavid

Not that far, but it is interesting to see that at least some of us have found some common ground with a conservative viewpoint such as his.

Uniter? I don't think even Pat would admit to that!

Newsflash: Buchanan still doesn't like Bush

http://www.humaneventsonline.com/article.php?id=12168

Bush Is Running Out of Alibis
by Patrick J. Buchanan
Posted Feb 03, 2006

"The road of isolationism and protectionism may seem broad and inviting, yet it ends in danger and decline," railed President Bush in his State of the Union. Again and again, Bush returned to his theme.

"America rejects the false comfort of isolationism. ...

"Isolationism would not only tie our hands in fighting enemies, it would keep us from helping our friends in desperate need. ...

"American leaders from Roosevelt to Truman to Kennedy to Reagan rejected isolation and retreat."

Why would a president use his State of the Union to lash out at a school of foreign policy thought that has had zero influence in his administration? The answer is a simple one, but it is not an easy one for Bush to face: His foreign policy is visibly failing, and his critics have been proven right.

But rather than defend the fruits of his policy, Bush has chosen to caricature critics who warned him against interventionism. Like all politicians in trouble, Bush knows that the best defense is a good offense.

Having plunged us into an unnecessary war, Bush now confronts the real possibility of strategic defeat and a failed presidency. His victory in Iraq, like the wars of Wilson and FDR, has turned to ashes in our mouths. And like Truman's war in Korea and Kennedy's war in Vietnam, Bush's war has left America divided and her people regretting he ever led us in. But unlike the world wars, Korea and Vietnam, Bush cannot claim the enemy attacked us and we had no choice. Iraq is Bush's war. Isolationists had nothing to do with it. To a man and woman, they opposed it.

Now, with an army bogged down in Afghanistan and another slowly exiting Iraq, and no end in sight to either, Bush seeks to counter critics who warned him not to go in by associating them with the demonized and supposedly discredited patriots of the America First movement of 1940-41. His assault is not only non-credible, it borders on the desperate and pathetic.

"Abroad, our nation is committed to a historic long-term goal. We seek the end of tyranny in our world," said Bush. "Some dismiss that goal as misguided idealism. In reality, the future security of America depends upon it."

Intending no disrespect, this is noble-sounding nonsense. Our security rests on U.S. power and will, and not on whether Zimbabwe, Sudan, Syria, Cuba or even China is ruled by tyrants. Our forefathers lived secure in a world of tyrannies by staying out of wars that were none of America's business. As for "the end of tyranny in our world," Mr. President, sorry, that doesn't come in "our world." That comes in the next.

"By allowing radical Islam to work its will, by leaving an assaulted world to fend for itself, we would signal to all that we no longer believe in our own ideals or even in our own courage," said Bush.

But what has done more to radicalize Islam than our invasion of Iraq? Who has done more to empower Islamic radicals than Bush with his clamor for elections across a region radicalized by our own policies? It is one thing to believe in ideals, another to be the prisoner of some democratist ideology.

Bush has come to believe that the absence of democracy is the cause of terror and democracy its cure. But the cause of terror in the Middle East is the perception there that those nations are held in colonial captivity by Americans and their puppet regimes, and that the only way to expel both is to use tactics that have succeeded from Algeria in 1962 to Anbar province in 2005.

Given the franchise, Arab and Islamic peoples from Pakistan to Iran, Iraq, Lebanon, Gaza, the West Bank and Egypt have now voted for candidates with two credentials. They seemed to be devout Muslims, and they appeared dedicated to tossing America out of the region and the Israelis into the sea.

With opposition also rising to his free-trade policy, Bush reverted to the same tactic: Caricature and castigate critics of his own failed policies. "Protectionists," said Bush, pretend "we can keep our high standards of living, while walling off our economy."

But it was protectionists from Lincoln to Coolidge who gave us the highest standard of living on earth. And the record of Bush's merry band of free-traders? The largest trade deficits in history, a $200 billion trade surplus for Beijing at our expense in 2005, and 3 million lost manufacturing jobs since Bush first took the oath.

If America is angry over what interventionism and free trade have wrought, George Bush cannot credibly blame isolationists or protectionists. These fellows have an alibi. They were nowhere near the scene of the crime.

It is George W. Bush who is running out of alibis.

Nice read MIB. Buchanan's dead-on.

I agree with a lot of "Bush is Running Out of Alibis," but can Vietnam really be called Kennedy's war? I don't think that path was set in an inevitable motion before he died.

while i disagree with pat a great deal of the time, i find him to be intellectually interesting in his stances on things and frequently his arguments are based on his own pragmatism. EXCEPT when it comes to Nixon. THe man is a Nixon apologist and will never cease to have that bias, hence his love of Ike.

Um, wow I have all kinds of problems with that latest Buchanan article. Two points:

1. Isolationism is not the way forward, and in a world as interdependent both economically and culturally, it would be geopolitical suicide.



Well, first of all, I'm not sure how he can look himself in the mirror and say that the WWII problem was aided by isolationism. Secondly, whatever truth there may have been in the doctrine has been emptied out by our increasingly globalized world. Thirdly, it is hardly the only alternative to Bush's neo-con inspired foreign policies. There are more diverse, nuanced and effective ways to conduct foreign policies.

Buchanan's piece reminded me of the following quote, because he seems not to understand this.



He's clearly not alone in this regard--because the Bush Administration doesn't understand it in the slightest either.

2. Protectionism is not what made America wealthy. Quite the opposite. Free trade is what has increased America's wealth, and indeed power in the last 50 years. How can you say "power is what is necessary for America's security", and then promptly pull the main weapon of power out of the equation?

Close America's markets off from foreign investment, foreign ownership, increase barriers to trade (subsidies, tariffs etc) and you have sure way of ensuring the country's freefall into economic irrelevence.

Coolidge.... Coolidge, is Buchanan high? Calvin Coolidge's do nothing economic philosophy is one of things that lead to the Great Depression. Big Business did great under Coolidge, but what of the lower and middle classes? He forgot to figure in that if people don't have the money to buy the goods Big Business is producing eventually there will be a crash because demand will dissappear. I'm not saying you should overly regulate business, there should always be a balance. Calvin Coolidge is not a model for long term econmic success.

I was going to snip the last three paragraphs(but that seemed to be a bit dishonest);I don't think Pat has thought the trade issue through(perhaps he can't think past isolationism).

Insofar as foreign policy goes, when discussing the use of the military, Buchanan's approach is as good as any. As I stated in this thread a year ago, his analysis of the Iraq situation has been spot-on since the invasion was first even pondered.