Joel Poindexter
tenthamendmentcenter.com
May 24, 2012
Last week the Heritage Foundation hosted a speech delivered by Arizona Senator Jon Kyl, entitled “Why Conservatives Should Fund and Support a Strong National Defense.” The event was the annual Jesse Helms Lecture, designed “to highlight America’s founding principles.” It was given as part of the Heritage Foundation’s Protect America Month.
The intent here is not necessarily to give a word by word rebuttal of the Heritage report and Kyl’s speech, but instead – to address the overarching themes of his speech.
The Heritage report is prefaced with an abstract, featuring Thomas Jefferson’s declaration that “the price of liberty is eternal vigilance…” This idea, misapplied, forms the foundation of Kyl’s thesis, as vigilance, much like the word defense, is stretched to mean overseas intervention and military budgets of grotesque proportions.
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