> It’s not that it’s not worth the expense, it’s that we’re unable to continue funding global peace and prosperity ourselves. And we shouldn’t have to.
That's just explaining why it's not worth the expense.
The reason what you're doing here - pointing to the national debt as a reason not to spend on a particular thing - is so fallacious is twofold:
1. There is always a national debt
2. There are always things we spend money on, nevertheless
What this fallacy avoids is the necessary question of prioritization. Some things we'd like to spend money on are more important than others. In truth, there's always money for any given thing. There's never money for everything we might desire to spend money on.
"Well, it’s worth it, we just can’t" is just nonsensical. It's either worth it or not, and making that decision requires some work.
It's a fallacy that's used by politicians all over the political spectrum, and it's highly useful for them. "We cannot possibly afford that thing you are asking for" is a lot less alienating to voters than "it's either that thing you are asking for, or this thing my donors have demanded."
It’s Hacker News, not an essay. It isn’t fallacious, it’s an abbreviation.
It would be possible for us to continue propping up our allies who seemed (until Trump made it clear we might just take our ball and go home) completely uninterested in meeting the defense obligations agreed to, but it would come at a cost that would bankrupt us without us making other major sacrifices. We shouldn’t have to make those sacrifices to ensure the security of people who claim to be allies but don’t meet their own contractual obligations. I don’t find myself agreeing with Trump on very much, but on this one, he’s not only right, he’s the only person who could have caused any change. No other politician of either party was ever going to convince Europe to significantly increase military spending, even with the threat of Russia at their door.
It’s fairly obvious that was meant, and your comment is basically just the standard hacker news “aaaaactually”
"Propping up our allies" in Europe and therefore having a great deal of sway in international affairs netted the United States a great deal of money for a very long time. There's a longer argument to be had (one directly related to what Piketty is saying) but clearly no desire for it, which is fine.
Look at the chart representing the US national debt (or debt to GDP) and pick a point at which you say "wow, that's when we started borrowing beyond our means." I rather doubt the date you pick will be anywhere close to the time eight decades ago when the US decided to start "propping up our allies." That worked well for us financially for a really long time, and the contributors to the current debt crisis lie elsewhere.
That's just explaining why it's not worth the expense.