For Thee But Not For Me

I was listening to the Imus this morning and Rep. Harold Ford Jr. (D) of Tennessee was on talking about how the US needed to increase funding to the Iraqi government so that they can increase training and procurement for Iraq's military so that they can defend their nation against the insurgents. This was under the guise that there's a growing dissatisfaction with the US among Iraqis.

...One we've got to accelerate what we're doing in terms of helping to train their military security forces because the government is really only as strong as it's ability to defend itself and to defend it's policies. It's clear they cannot do that alone right now. Two, we've got to help them build the institutions and the pillars that make up a free society. It's important to be able to vote, but it's also important to have transparency in government, it's important to have transparency in your banking institutions and it is important to have transparency at how your government functions in every way to guarantee freedom of speech and freedom of religion. I mean those are the tenants that really make up what we define as Democracy here in our country...

Umm.. logic test here. If increasing funding for Iraqi government to defend itself against its enemies is a wise and prudent course of action, why is there such opposition to providing the US government with the same? The US needs to have the tools available to defend itself against its enemies too, or is it politically inconvenient to defend the US? [ed: last part is rhetorical... you already know the answer.]

One political party consistently votes down military and intel appropriations, especially certain senators from Mass., while the other pretty consistently supports military, intel, and defense appropriations. Guess which one won the last election because people are uncomfortable about the defense of the US in the hands of that political party.