As noted earlier, the empire feeds off the republic. Every year hundreds of billions of dollars, the lion’s share of the discretionary budget, goes to the military to maintain its global web of bases, pursue its numerous wars, provide for its mercenary armies, and bolster its authoritarian satellite regimes.
We the people are sinking into ever harder times in order to sustain imperial dominion. In the United States we witness a skyrocketing military budget and national debt, the worst recession in decades, over a trillion dollar annual federal deficit—along with record profits for the Pentagon contractors and record profits for the Wall Street plutocracy. For 2011 President Obama budgeted $50 billion in foreign aid, twice the amount of the previous year. As noted earlier, foreign aid mostly aids corporate contractors and corrupt Third World vassals. Obama also doubled the US State Department budget to almost $52 billion, signaling an increase in interventionist initiatives.
Well into his presidency Obama and his national security state continued their direct and indirect involvement in various wars (Iraq, Afghanistan, northern Pakistan, Somalia, Yemen) while leveling military threats against Iran, Venezuela, and North Korea. In 2010, instead of sending medical and rescue aid to Haiti’s earthquake victims (as did Cuba), Obama sent in 15,000 marines to keep order and make sure no insurgency might develop. This is the same US Marine Corps that engaged in years of repression and killings in Haiti decades ago and supported more recent massacres by proxy forces. At the same time, the president declared a freeze on all discretionary social spending and human services within the United States itself.
The immense cost of maintaining a global empire has left us with a republic in decline. The annual US trade deficit reached almost $50 billion by 2010. The United States was now the biggest debtor country in the world, with an accumulated debt of close to $15 trillion, much of it owed to China and other foreign governments. Basic domestic services were being eliminated by state and local governments that faced record insolvency. Federal allocations to states and municipalities were declining by 10 percent or more each year. Public hospitals were closing for lack of funds, libraries were reducing their hours, schools were being shut down, and teaching staffs were being cut. Medical costs continued to skyrocket. Public services for the very poor and disabled were being reduced; firefighters and police were being laid off. Meanwhile, the White House was considering cutbacks in Social Security and Medicare.13
The country’s infrastructure was at risk, with water and sewage systems needing repair along with bridges, roads, tunnels, shorelines, levees, reservoirs, and public transportation. Aging mass transit systems lacked funds for maintenance, upgrades, and sufficient service even while more people were depending on them. In summer 2010, one city was trying to save funds by turning off a third of its lights, and a number of local governments were breaking up roads they could no longer afford to maintain, turning them into gravel.14
Inequality in income and wealth was increasing. Real wages were declining while homelessness grew. As of July 2010, upwards of 30 million Americans were out of work or seriously underemployed with only part-time jobs, with no sign of a dramatic turnaround. At least thirty-two states—unable to pay unemployment benefits to citizens in dire need—borrowed billions from a US Treasury that itself was trillions of dollars in debt. While hunger was growing amid the most destitute, Congress cut almost $12 billion from food stamps allocation.15
Impoverishment of the republic is seen as a bad thing by people who think that government should play a role in advancing social betterment. But the reactionaries seek to transform America into a Third World nation, rolling back the social wage and bringing living standards more in line with the free market paradise of Indonesia. For them, drastic cutbacks in public spending and a decline in wages are just fine. Hence, the costs of empire serve a multifold purpose: assuring plutocratic supremacy abroad with a strong military, fat-profit contracts for corporate America, and defunding human services at home.
The republic is bled in another way: the empire continues to tighten its grip on our democratic rights. The statist psychology fostered by perpetual war makes democratic dissent difficult if not “unpatriotic” and provides an excuse to circumscribe our civil liberties, such as they are. Under newly enacted repressive legislation, almost any critical effort against existing policy can be defined as “giving aid and comfort to terrorism.”16
After hardly two years in office, President Obama claimed the power to incarcerate individuals for life and execute US citizens without charges or due process. He adopted his predecessor’s secret prisons and Patriot Act gag orders. He contrived new ways of denying habeas corpus. He granted complete legal immunity to officeholders who had committed serious crimes in the previous administration. His own administration operated without the transparency promised during the electoral campaign. Special operation forces were deployed in at least seventy-five countries by 2010, up from sixty the year before. “Obama has allowed things that the previous administration did not,” claimed one official.17
As of 2011 the Obama administration was seeking authority from Congress to compel Internet service providers to make our Internet records available to government investigators. Under the pretense of fighting terrorism and espionage, security agencies would be able to track protestors and dissidents at will, undermining the Fourth Amendment of the US Constitution, which states that people have a right to be secure in their persons, houses, papers, and effects against unreasonable search and seizure.18