The Pentagon bailout

The giveaway to the Wall Street bankers wasn’t the only shell game being played out in Congress these past weeks. Wall Street got all the attention, but there was another huge giveaway that Congress approved with little discussion.

The Associated Press reported on Sept. 24, “The legislation came together in a remarkably secret process that concentrated decision-making power in the hands of a few lawmakers.” In the middle of the unfolding financial crisis, on Sept. 27, the Senate approved the $634 billion spending bill, which gives $488 billion to the Pentagon and $25 billion to the giant auto companies. It also gives Big Oil offshore drilling rights. Now it’s on Bush’s desk, waiting for his signature.

But that’s still not the whole story. According to MilitaryBudget.info, which uses government figures, the total estimated military spending, when all items are included—Pentagon, “atomic energy defense activities,” Homeland Security and “other military and defense-related operations”—will be $783 billion this year and $858 billion next year. And that estimate was made before the recent increases passed by Congress, nor does it cover expected demands for additional monies for the occupation of Iraq and Afghanistan.

The military-industrial complex is a cancerous growth that comes out of the inherent tendencies in capitalist production. The only defense involved is defending the super-profits of the big capitalists.

Capitalism is in crisis. The crisis is not caused just by the greed of the Wall Street bankers. That greed may exacerbate the crisis, but it doesn’t create it. The crisis is rooted in capitalism. The crisis comes from capitalist overproduction.

The term “bubble” is often used as a way to describe it in the media, without revealing that the bubble is the result of the destructive tendencies of capitalism. Capitalism is based on a competitive drive for profits and those profits must keep expanding or there is a collapse. It has nothing to do with production of what is needed by society.

The gargantuan sums pumped into the military-industrial complex have been the government’s response to capitalist crises since the Great Depression of the 1930s. Over the last eight years, the government has launched countless wars and invasions and poured trillions of dollars into military spending. This has delayed the capitalist crisis, but cannot prevent it.

Military spending has been like a drug pumped into the economy to dull the pain of a capitalist catastrophe. But like a drug, more and more is needed to keep away the pain. The drug of military spending cannot cure the disease. Eventually, no matter how much drug is applied, the full sickness does break out.

The Pentagon spending bill just passed by Congress is like throwing more dollars to the drug dealers. That won’t heal the crisis and at this point can only make it worse, since it just inflates the government’s already huge debt. The only government spending that would really matter right now is spending that would cushion the people from the capitalist crisis. Spending that protects homes, jobs and health care. To get that, however, will probably require kicking the capitalists out of Washington.