This article was jointly produced by Foreign Policy In Focus and InTheseTimes.com.
Since Republicans took control of the House of Representatives earlier this year, the so-called “Freedom Caucus” — the badly misnamed right-fringe of the congressional GOP — has been flexing its influence.
Caucus members are deeply invested in an agenda that would increase inequality and enrich corporations and billionaires, strip hard-won rights from people of color, immigrants, women, and the LGBTQ community, destroy the environment to enrich fossil fuel companies and slash social investment for the poor.
And yet surprisingly, some of these extremists are also—sort of—calling for cutting the military budget. Does that provide an opening for anti-war progressives looking to cross the aisle? Unfortunately, no.
Of course cutting the military budget is an urgent necessity — both to halt the destruction that military spending enables and to free up the funding needed for social investment at home. But this group of right-wing lawmakers can’t be trusted to do either.
Cutting military spending is an urgent moral need
Some Democrats have criticized the GOP for even considering military cuts. But no progressive — inside or outside of Congress — should defend our bloated military budget.
This year, Congress is giving the Pentagon and the nuclear weapons arsenal $858 billion—which accounts for more than half of …read more
Source:: Institute for Policy Studies