Why Democrats Have Not Cut Off the War's Funding

Gary North explains why Democrats aren't really anti-war:

Why don't liberals ever suggest that the government lower taxes after a war is over?

I have watched liberal politicians for 50 years. I have never heard one of them call for tax reductions after a war. Always, they say, "Now let's spend the money that the IRS collected, plus the money we borrowed, on the poor. Don't lower taxes."

With whatever the money the public was willing to pay to fund the war, the Democrats want to spend forever: to seek votes of the poor and votes of guilt-ridden middle class liberals.

This is why you rarely see liberals vote against a war. They love what war does: expands the level of taxes that voters will accept. Then, when the war goes sour – and only then – they call for peace. They don't call very loudly. The only way for Congress to get peace is to cut off the funding. But Democrats refuse to do this because they hate tax cuts more than they hate war.

Jim Wallis is typical. He calls himself a radical Christian. He campaigns as a defender of peace. That is all to the good. But he does not send out letters telling his donors to call on Congress to stop the war's funding immediately. That would alienate his Democrat donors and his contacts on Capitol Hill, who are unwilling to do anything this controversial. Instead, he calls for an end to the war on these terms: the government gets to keep all the money that went for the war, permanently, in order to give to welfare bureaucrats to spend on the poor (after deducting their salaries and overhead).

The welfare state is a constant war against property rights.