Masterpiece Theater

03/21/19 • 49 min

In this episode, Chris, Bryan, and Melanie take a broad look at the administration's FY2020 defense budget request. They discuss whether or not it is the "masterpiece" that Pat Shanahan promised, and agree (!) that the budget process is in need of serious reform. They ask whether it aligns with the National Defense Strategy, what Congress (especially the Democratic House with many domestic priorities) will think of it, and how it will be paid for in a time of ever-growing deficits. Finally, Chris takes the secretary of state to task, Melanie is irritated with what's going on in higher ed, and Bryan welcomes a friend home.

Links

"Defense Budget Overview: United States Department of Defense Fiscal Years 2020 Budget Request"
Marcus Weisgerber, "2020 Budget Request Reveals Slow Shift Toward Great Power War," Defense One, March 2019
John McCormack, "Why Did Ben Sasse Vote to Uphold the National Emergency?" National Review, March 2019
Claude Berube, United States Naval Acadamy
"Overseas Contingency Operations Spending Would Be 2nd Largest Federal Agency," Taxpayers for Common Sense, March 2019
Fred Kaplan, "Trump's Record-Setting Military Budget is Bloated, illegal, and Doomed," Slate, March 2019
Daniel Larison, "Pompeo's Obnoxious Yemen Lies," American Conservative, March 2019
Daniel Larison, "The WSJ's Despicable Defense of the War on Yemen," American Conservative, March 2019
Bridget Bowman and Simone Pathé, "Meet the 12 GOP Senators Who Voted to Terminate Trump's National Emergency," Roll Call, March 2019
"Clear and Present Safety: The World Has Never Been Better and Why That Matters to Americans," CATO Institute, March 2019
"Two Roads to War: How (and Why) America and Britain Decided to Invade Iraq," CATO Institute, April 2019
Patrick Porter, Blunder: Britain's War in Iraq, (Oxford University Press, 2019)
Michael Mazarr, Leap of Faith: Hubris, Negligence, and America's Greatest Foreign Policy Tragedy, (Public Affairs, 2019)
Nicholas Kristof, "This 8-Year-Old Chess Champion Will Make You Smile,"New York Times, March 2019
Samuel Abrams, "When A Student Mob Came For My Job, My College Did Not Support Me," Spectator, March 2019
Steven Elbow, "UW Student Alleging Bias in Political Science Prof's Syllabus Now Expects Class to Be Objective," Cap Times, January 2019
Ben Leonard, "Admission Scandal Rocks Higher Education," Duke Chronical, March 2019

Links

"Defense Budget Overview: United States Department of Defense Fiscal Years 2020 Budget Request"
Marcus Weisgerber, "2020 Budget Request Reveals Slow Shift Toward Great Power War," Defense One, March 2019
John McCormack, "Why Did Ben Sasse Vote to Uphold the National Emergency?" National Review, March 2019
Claude Berube, United States Naval Acadamy
"Overseas Contingency Operations Spending Would Be 2nd Largest Federal Agency," Taxpayers for Common Sense, March 2019
Fred Kaplan, "Trump's Record-Setting Military Budget is Bloated, illegal, and Doomed," Slate, March 2019
Daniel Larison, "Pompeo's Obnoxious Yemen Lies," American Conservative, March 2019
Daniel Larison, "The WSJ's Despicable Defense of the War on Yemen," American Conservative, March 2019
Bridget Bowman and Simone Pathé, "Meet the 12 GOP Senators Who Voted to Terminate Trump's National Emergency," Roll Call, March 2019
"Clear and Present Safety: The World Has Never Been Better and Why That Matters to Americans," CATO Institute, March 2019
"Two Roads to War: How (and Why) America and Britain Decided to Invade Iraq," CATO Institute, April 2019
Patrick Porter, Blunder: Britain's War in Iraq, (Oxford University Press, 2019)
Michael Mazarr, Leap of Faith: Hubris, Negligence, and America's Greatest Foreign Policy Tragedy, (Public Affairs, 2019)
Nicholas Kristof, "This 8-Year-Old Chess Champion Will Make You Smile,"New York Times, March 2019
Samuel Abrams, "When A Student Mob Came For My Job, My College Did Not Support Me," Spectator, March 2019
Steven Elbow, "UW Student Alleging Bias in Political Science Prof's Syllabus Now Expects Class to Be Objective," Cap Times, January 2019
Ben Leonard, "Admission Scandal Rocks Higher Education," Duke Chronical, March 2019

Previous Episode

Playing the China Card

Join Melanie, Chris, and Bryan for a discussion of how to think about great power competition with China. Using Brookings scholar Tarun Chhabra's recent report "The China challenge, democracy, and US grand strategy" as the impetus for the conversation, our hosts dive into whether China's threat to liberal democracies is more of a challenge than that presented by the former Soviet Union, and if so, what America is willing to do to contest that challenge. Stay to the end to hear Melanie's inspired "Attagirl" for the senior senator from California.

Links

Tarun Chhabra, “The China challenge, democracy, and U.S. grand strategy,” Brookings Institution, February 2019
Seth Moulton, “Conversations on National Security and U.S. Naval Power: A Discussion with U.S. Rep. Seth Moulton,” Hudson Institute, February 27, 2019
Michael Tackett, “Five Takeaways From Cohen’s Testimony to Congress,” New York Times, February 27, 2019
Nina Siegal, “Rembrandt Died 350 Years Ago. Why He Matters,” New York Times, February 27, 2019
Aaron Blake, “John Bolton Tried to Explain Away Trump's Otto Warmbier Comments and It Went Poorly,” Washington Post, March 4, 2019.
Caitlin Flanagan, “Dianne Feinstein Doesn't Need a Do-Over,” Atlantic, February 24, 2019
Matt Schiavenza, “Time to Kill Daylight Saving,” Atlantic, March 8, 2015
Gabi Warwick, “Punxsutawney Phil wanted by Middletown Police for 'crimes against nature’,” ABC22Now, March 4, 2019
Christian Britschgi, “ Rand Paul, Tom Udall Introduce Bill to End the War in Afghanistan,” Reason, March 5, 2019
“End the Forever War,” Common Defense, March 5, 2019

Next Episode

The Pentagon Can Count Ships (But Not Much Else)

In addition to “being the taxpayers’ greatest investment,” Rolling Stone's Matt Taibbi writes that the Pentagon is also “the world’s largest producer of wrong numbers, an ingenious bureaucratic defense system that hides all the other rats’ nests underneath.” Last year, the Department of Defense became the last Cabinet-level department to submit to a comprehensive review of its books — and it flunked the audit. But Defense Department “never expected to pass it,” explained then-Deputy Secretary of Defense Patrick Shanahan. Whether it ever will — or is even committed to doing so — is an open question. In this week's episode of Net Assessment, Bryan, Melanie, and Chris discuss Taibbi’s scathing feature, aptly titled “The Pentagon’s Bottomless Money Pit,” and unpack his suggestions for how to fix the problem. Bryan has no grievances — life is coming up roses now that his beloved Virginia Cavaliers have made it to men’s college basketball’s Final Four (Cavaliers’ head coach Tony Bennett, naturally, earns his attaboy). Chris faults those who want to keep expanding NATO, and Melanie credits the Southern Poverty Law Center for (belatedly) doing the right thing.

Links