Separating Foreign and Domestic Policy

The third element (Chapter 4 Territorial States) in "Geopolitics" textbook by John Agnew 1998-2003, makes a common assumption in the social sciences that foreign affairs and domestic policy can safely be considered separate.  Separating the two is impossible under the Peace Economics theory.  When the single most important obstruction to economic growth is military spending, all foreign policy must choose between a strong domestic economy and strong projection of power internationally.  That is the fundamental flaw in all empires, leading to the decline of empires in the long run.  Coercion may have some positive feedbacks in the short run and being at the top may attract talent from all over the world, but high military spending will corrupt the economy and drive up crime and corruption and create an unhealthy society (what I call empire decay) that will stall progress across the board in the long run.  Military spending is at the heart of both the domestic and foreign policy situations.

Peace Dividend  

Many people believe and even teach that the United States did not experience a "Peace Dividend" after the end of the Cold War.  Nothing could be further from the truth.  It's true that the shift came over time, with the military budget from 1985 to 1999 pretty much level at $250 billion a year.  But a detailed look shows that inflation was high in the beginning of that period and low at the end.  The percent of GDP for the military was 6.5% at the start and 2.9% by the end of that period, with tremendous prosperity especially in the low military industrial heartland Great Lakes states of the North Central area known as the Midwest.  National economic growth rates doubled (Peace Dividend) from the Reagan military buildup eighties to the post-Cold War nineties, but regionally the Bi-Coastal economy (Atlantic Seaboard plus California) showed much less change:  leading the way in the low growth eighties, thanks to 80% of the military buildup going there, and trailing the low military high manufacturing states of the Big Ten football conference in the nineties boom.  Only the third great economic force, the Kondratiev Wave of technology and generational growth, made both the boom and balanced budgets possible by the end of the nineties, only to be squandered by the Iraq War.  California had four times the military research of any other state in the eighties but is now just an average military spending state.  California has America's two main ideas industries, Silicon Valley and Hollywood and a huge young talent migration from the East.  Still as seven of the ten wealthiest counties in America are in the greater Washington DC area, power and wealth have gravitated to the most militarize area of America over the decades.  Not knowing what causes what allows cases to be made for many false and misleading half-baked theories. The patient thoroughness of an engineer has unearthed the meaningful verities in economics and the global warming cycle.

Corruptions of Empire    

Choose your enemies well, for soon you will be like them.  If Islamic extremists have gone off the deep end, so too has American domestic and foreign politics under Trump.  Marginal issues rise like illegal immigration that had been at record lows until the recent turmoil in Central America.  Focusing on taking sides in the Shia Sunni struggles looks small minded for the leading superpower as are the endless faceless drone campaigns across the Muslim world.  Stirring up chaos and meddling everywhere inevitably will boomerang.  The endless hate campaign of the president's twitter storms is wearing people out across America.  The president's tirades against the press, legal institutions, truth, law, and anyone with a different opinion look like the moves of a third world dictator, not the leader of a great democracy.  The president has abandoned his many pledges to the middle class and installed a swamp region of favoritism for the rich and powerful.  Now the Mueller report comes out with a shocking list of endless misbehavior.  Corruption has become the norm thanks to the conman from New York.  The title of one of the many books is "Everything Trump Touches Dies."  Comparisons with Caligula, the crazy emperor of Rome, seem to fit so well.

Seventeen great conclusions of the Reuschlein Theories:

https://www.academia.edu/37217512/Findings_and_Special_Claims_November_2017_2_pages

Please cite this work as follows:

Reuschlein, Robert. (2019, April 23), "Foreign Domestic Difference" Madison, WI:  Real Economy Institute.  Retrieved from: https://www.expertclick.com/NewsRelease/Foreign-Domestic-Difference,2019180102.aspx

Dr. Peace, Professor Robert Reuschlein, Real Economy Institute,

Nominated Vetted 2016 (2 Web Looks), Given Odds 2017 (3 Web Looks), Strongly Considered 2018 (48 Web Looks, one million words) for Nobel Peace Prize, a favorite in 2019 (double pace of last year 47 in 7 months) for Nobel Peace Prize to be announced Friday October 4^th, 2019.

Contact: bobreuschlein@gmail.com, Info: www.realeconomy.com