Hassan: making America safe (again)

When reading Maggie Hassan's seething foreign policy statement, I wonder: what back-scratching went on for her to receive Hillary Clinton's endorsement?

She's wrong off the bat:

The most fundamental responsibility of any government is to keep our people safe and secure – because the safety of our communities is the bedrock on which all else is built.

This is wrong for two reasons. First, logically, not all governments are equal. The Soviet government's fundamental responsibility was not to keep their people safe. It was to bring about the idyllic state of communism. The American government's fundamental responsibility is to protect person and property. This is not the same, for really it means that the (stated) goal is to keep us free. The idea of keeping us safe means that the government has the power to forbid us  (at bayonet) from doing dangerous things, and to command us to do healthy things. I'm confident that Hassan believes this.

Further, even stating this is not quite true. Government is composed of different people with different machinations. The purpose of government is to use coercive power to gain advantage, as best stated by Bastiat:

Government is the great fiction through which everybody endeavors to live at the expense of everybody else.

Rothbard's Anatomy of the State is a must read for defining what government is, and what it isn't

Hassan is correct when she says "America has the strongest armed forces in the world," if by "strongest," she means "most expensive." The US government spends more on the military than every other country combined. Yet, her next statement is muddled:

...we must remain the greatest force for good and ensure that the use of our military might is a last resort.

It is largely a positive value judgment of the status quo. The translation: we must maintain the US government's highly interventionist foreign policy, its vast spending, its vast empire, its vast trail of d destruction around the world. The "last resort" comment is a token to those who might disagree. It's meaningless, because the current policy, which she supports, is strike wherever there is a problem. Every example she cites promotes military interventionism as a first resort.

She goes on to pat herself on the back for her mulcting the taxpayer to pay for the ever increasing militarization of the NH police (state and local). Active shooter drills instill fear in children (making them docile citizens), and paying for more police on the roads is just a tax hole to support uniformed bureaucrats driving around aimlessly (and often far above the speed limit).

Hassan supports "strengthening our military, confronting aggression, and maintaining America’s global leadership." She already noted that the US military is already the "strongest;" what else needs to be done? What can "global leadership" mean other than being the policeman of the world? What does this comment mean for the hapless taxpayer at home? What does it say about blowback? What do her "increasing airstrikes" say about her view of the resulting deaths of innocent people?

Hassan supports "including by strengthening security at our borders, improving vetting for all entryways into the country, preventing terrorists from buying guns, and upgrading our nation’s cybersecurity." What does all this mean other than vastly increasing domestic surveillance and increasingly regimented society? Maybe more of the useless "sobriety checkpoints," where we dare not assert our right to travel freely?

Hassan's comments on Iran, Isreal, Russia, and China are nothing but the usual neocon narrative. Forget the fact that these countries are thousands of miles away. Forget the fact that their histories are far more complex and storied than she would bother to learn. Certain countries are good guys; certain countries are bad guys. The US empire determines the narrative and is the judge, jury, and executioner, all paid for by you and me.

Of course, what Maggie Hassan statement would be complete without some nod to the social justice warriors? The US government needs to bomb Syria so that people who say they're neither male nor female can use someone's private bathroom.

This is a scary statement. It could have been read by Dick Cheney himself (Guantanamo and all!). What it means: Hasan is bought and paid for by the Powers That Be. Don't trust her to look out for you. She's just another plastic politician.