Call it “pay as you fight.”
After months of listening to conservatives caterwaul over deficits and health care, senior House Democrats want a graduated surtax on individuals and corporations to pay for another big drain on the treasury: the Afghanistan war.
Lord knows I'm no legal scholar wise in the ways of Washington, but isn't providing for the common defense one of the first things our government is supposed to provide?
How is it that paying to fight the war we are in is from borrowed money? Isn't that pile of money one of the first things we take out of what we actually collect as tax revenue?
If national defense isn't considered paid by actual revenue but borrowed money, what exactly in our budget is paid for by revenue? The arts? Highways? Public television? Education funding to the states? Stimulus payments to non-existent congressional districts? An Energy Department that doesn't want to look for energy? Polar bear mating habit research?
Any money we currently spend on national defense should not be considered borrowed money.
