When the White House announced its proposed “America First” budget in March, the introductory message from President Trump stated, “In these dangerous times, this public safety and national security Budget Blueprint is a message to the world—a message of American strength, security, and resolve.”  To put this in more straightforward terms, the most important thing we can put our money towards is having the biggest, scariest military with the biggest, scariest weapons so that everyone, everywhere knows that America is big and scary and they better not mess with us.

But here’s the thing:  America already has the biggest, scariest military.  With a budget of over 600 billion dollars—which is roughly seven times the military budget of the country with the second-biggest, scariest military (Russia)—America has more active frontline personnel, more tanks, more aircrafts, and more submarines than any other nation in the world. Trump’s new plan would add to this budget by over 50 billion dollars. 

In order to pay for this increase in military spending, Trump’s proposed budget would slash funding to such entities as the Department of Health and Human Services, the Department of Education, and the Environmental Protection Agency.

This is where I start to get confused. 

President Trump says he’s going to make our country “great” again, “safe” again, that it’s going to be America first.  And I just can’t keep from wondering how, exactly, he manages to do this without health, education, and, (let’s not forget this one, because it’s pretty important) the environment.  Mere days before Trump—inspired by images of “beautiful babies” and a “vital national security interest of the United States”—ordered an airstrike in Syria, a budget cut for the EPA proposed eliminating two programs that protect American children from lead poisoning. And the “America First” budget proposes cutting funding from teacher training and after-school programs, as well as from programs designed to benefit disabled students. 

I don’t know about you, but I’m not feeling super-safe right now.  I mean, unless the White House plans to protect America’s children from lead poisoning and illiteracy with tanks and submarines, we’re going to have some pretty serious vulnerabilities. 

This is not the age in which soldiers marched off to battle while their wives and mothers knit wool socks to send to the front and planted victory gardens in their backyards.  We live in an era where war is nebulous and omnipresent.  Our enemies aren’t specific countries but ideas.  We have a War on Terror, but how can you wage a war on terror?  Can such a war even be won?  Or rather, can it be won with tanks? 

These are dangerous times.  Because of the obesity crisis in America, today’s kids are the first generation with a shorter life expectancy than their parents.  Because of pollution, much of it at the hands of the oil industry, we have seen whole towns with contaminated water, whole states suffering from manmade earthquakes resulting from fracking.  There is an enemy, but it won’t be intimidated by an increased number of troops, won’t be stopped missiles, won’t by kept out by walls.  The enemy is already here, among us, within our borders.  The enemy is ignorance.  The enemy is confusion.  The enemy is fear. 

America is big and America is scary, but we don’t need anyone else to mess with us because we’re already messing with ourselves.  We focus on threats from beyond our borders while the enemy within robs us with one hand and poisons us with the other.  We are like people inside a burning house who believe we will be safe if we install some bigger locks. 

Or rather, that is who President Trump believes we are. 

I believe that a good number of us know that the house is on fire, or that, at the very least, we smell some smoke.  I believe we are not going to stand quietly by while this administration starves those departments and agencies which provide for and protect our health, our education, and our environment in the service of fattening up a military that is already very well fed.  I believe that President Trump is preparing for a fight.  And I believe that, though he will likely be surprised by those from which it comes, he is definitely going to get one.