The “Big Dick” Theory

The Pentagon Strangles Our Economy: Why the U.S. Has Gone Broke

While this article is enlightening to the ills of a military welfare state, I think it neglects a more thorough look at what occurs when a nation possesses an abnormally huge military. I like to refer to this idea (sorry, it’s crude) as the “big dick” theory. The theory, which is almost uniquely male (at least at the extremes, see: porn stars), basically says that if you have a unusually big dick you’re going to want to use it, regularly and unusually. I think the sheer volume of incursions of the U.S. military in the sovereign affairs of countries around the globe is ample evidence of this theory. We have an unusually enormous military and we use it regularly and most certainly unusually. Said another way, we don’t use the military in the direct defense of our country, however we tell each other that is being put to good use. The rationalizations for the use of this institutionalized violence have been by various and essentially rooted in irrational fear. This is illustrated in the blunt and overly UN-complicated rationalizations such as the “domino effect,” the “war on drugs,” the “war on terrorism,” the “cold war,” etc., etc., etc.

The magnitude of threat exaggeration in the U.S. is tremendous. In the same time frame (the past 50 years) dozens and dozens of nations around the world have NOT perceived such threats where the U.S. has and where in reality none has actually existed or at the very least the magnitude of the threat certainly didn’t warrant military intervention. While the military postures of these relative peaceful countries have assuredly been steered by their culture, our culture has been directed by what General and President Dwight Eisenhower warned us against in his farewell address, the convergence of “an immense military establishment and a large arms industry,” their pervasive institutional enormity and the very existence of which, as we’ve seen all too well, have encouraged their overuse.

And oh boy how we’ve used our “big dick!”

U.S. Infiltrated by Poison Candy Salesmen

The incredible sway of this country to the Right has occurred because the so-called voices of the Left have gone silent, only to pipe up once in a while to talk about increasing the minimum wage and other marginally Left band-aids. The elections, which could be used as great forums to help change the conversation in this country to the concerns of the people (see Left) have become nothing more than pageant shows, as candidate after candidate tries to appear moderate (see mediocre) while making appeals to the non-existent “Center.” The media is increasingly seen as “liberal” even as the stock tickers and constant market updates drone on and on, while employment issues are virtually ignored, labor unions are viewed as scourges despite all the benefits that today’s workers have derived from them and government “regulation” is the enemy of business everywhere, though it is the only thing that stands between us and anarchistic fascism. This country is clearly dominated by the Right and as far as those of us on the Left are concerned, it’s for all the wrong reasons; like the failure to observe that to speak on issues on the Left requires tremendously greater amounts of courage than speaking on the simple ideas of the Right, something tantamount to selling free candy to children.

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