What is the role of the federal government, if not "to provide basic services to its citizens in times of extraordinary need"? In the face of a generational pandemic, from which nobody is unaffected, why should the government throw up its hands and not spend?
I recognize that that is something of an ideological statement, and we're not going to get anywhere with non-falsifiable statements. So let's think of it a different way: you say that "debt is at dangerous levels" - how would you quantify danger? US Treasury yields, how we "finance" debt, are at all-time lows - which means that private buyers are willing to pay higher prices than ever for the safety of Treasury bonds. There is absolutely no quantitative evidence that more US government debt is dangerous; in fact, the evidence points squarely towards investors demanding more debt issuance, and thus government spending, given the extremely low rates.
Part of what makes federal debt dangerous is the fact that we can't possibly run the country without issuing large amounts of debt at this point. If debt continues to grow at the rates that is has been, eventually tax revenue won't even cover the interest on said debt. At some point the US will have to be issuing debt to pay off interest on other debt, assuming we aren't there now - haven't checked in a while. Even assuming that investors never realize how much of a house of cards this is, this continual increase in the money supply will eventually lead to a large amount of inflation, which will devalue the currency, increasing debt required, which feeds back into the loop.
Currently, we don't have a major problem manifesting, but judging from pretty much every other country that has run massive debt for an extended period, it is just a matter of time.
Ahh but the idea of defense runs straight into the chicken and the egg of public health. Correct me if you disagree with me, but if anything, the ability of COVID to have completely overwhelmed our medical infrastructure and overrun our country and really the world has made me deeply question whether we as a country have adequate defenses to any possible bioweapon attack. If we can't muster a good response to this, what happens if a modern version of smallpox or Spanish Flu hits? I mean, Congo has just been hit by a second Ebola outbreak.
This assumes that the money has been earned completely fairly. Every law or norm restricting black people (redlining, restrictive covenants, discriminatory hiring practices, etc) is effectively a subsidy to white people. Therefore, some of the dollars in their pockets are stolen, in a moral sense. Restoring some of those dollars is only fair.
Mind you, I'm not sure if it's practical, but that's the logic.
Imagine your parents stole a fortune from your neighbor and passed it on to you when they died. Does that money belong to you, or your neighbor/their children? I think the answer is common sense. The fact that you weren’t the one who originally stole the money is irrelevant.
I'm conflicted on this issue, I really understand the need and can persuade myself either way but it's not obvious.
Being black in America may be a special case that's worth trying to correct directly with something like reparations, but I'm not convinced you can right all historical wrongs by this logic generally. A lot of groups have faced terrible persecution throughout history.
American Indians, Jews, etc.
I personally don't find this line of questioning fruitful. The trouble is that word 'should'.
Philosophers call it an is-ought problem. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Is%E2%80%93ought_problem