At a campaign rally over the weekend, President Trump dismissed Americans’ concerns over high oil and gas prices, claiming that it’s a small price to pay for the hundreds of billions of dollars “we” are making from these higher prices.
“We’re making a fortune,” he said. “Hundreds of billions of dollars. Trillions of dollars.”
People are paying a little bit more for gas, he explained, but it doesn’t matter because “we” are making so much money.
The question is, “Who is ‘we’?” We know it is not the American people. They are seeing wage stagnation, inflation, and more pain at the pump. An Economist/YouGov poll earlier this month found that inflation and prices are the top concern among Americans by a wide margin. And in second place were jobs and the economy.
The same poll asked Americans how they rate the state of the US economy and in first place – again by a long shot – was “poor.”
If “we” as in the American people were making hundreds of billions of dollars from the war, you would think these would not be their top two concerns.
But we understand what the President meant by “we.” He meant that part of the “private” sector directly or indirectly in bed with the government war machine. From oil companies to weapons manufacturers and everything in between, war and conflict drive up profits in well-connected corporations at the expense of the rest of us.
That is why we are in a constant state of war. Twenty years in Afghanistan and a similar length in Iraq. Endless bombing in places like Somalia. A twelve-year (and counting) proxy war with Russia in Ukraine. Military bases and covert operations across the globe.
And if we find that the largest military budget in the world does not deliver enough actual weapons to win a war? Well, that’s all good too: just double military spending and accuse anyone who objects of not being patriotic!
“Private” companies with enormous political power – many of them revolving doors between government and business – “make so much money” on war, as Trump would say. Whether these wars produce US wins, loses, or stalemates, these corporations in bed with government always win. The money-printing machine makes sure the money cycles into government-favored companies, while campaign contributions are made to the politicians who support the wars.
And if you don’t support the wars? You get the Thomas Massie treatment.
Endless war produces more corporatism, where the private sector does not exist to provide goods to compete in the free market, but to serve political power and strengthen governmental control over the population. Think of it as welfare for the rich at the expense of the poor. The result is tyranny.
This is the very reason our Founders intended to make it as difficult as possible to wage war. As well-educated students of history, they understood how the concentration of war-making power in the hands of one ruler or an oligarchy would impoverish the masses and lead to a moral and financial bankruptcy. They placed war-making power in the “people’s branch” – Congress – hoping that the people would hold their representatives accountable. We have strayed very far from what they intended and if we are to survive, we must reclaim that authority and responsibility.
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