Joel Mathis

That's what Bentley Rayburn suggests at National Review today: Congress should remember that we are still facing very real threats. Today, we are fighting wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, and fighting al-Qaeda across the globe using intelligence and special-operations forces backed up with Predator drones and other modern technologies. We’re also protecting the nascent democratic movements in Libya and elsewhere, expanding operations to hot spots like Yemen, and rotating home a fighting force worn down by a decade of repeated, extended combat deployments. Terror attacks are on the rise as the threat spreads around the globe — according to the National Counterterrorism Center, there were 2,534 terror attacks worldwide in 2010, nearly triple the 945 recorded five years ago. I found that last paragraph interesting, so I went to the National Counterterrorism Center website. I couldn't verify Rayburn's numbers, but I did find a couple of other very interesting charts in the NT

As politicians promise to start cutting spending in Washington after this fall's elections, there's growing talk -- even among some Republicans -- that it's perhaps time to cut defense spending. That has, predictably, generated a backlash within the GOP. Ben and I tackle the topic in our column for Scripps Howard this week. Here's my take : Yes, America can and should significantly cut its military budget. Our military isn't built just to defend America and its interests, but to bestride the world like a colossus: There are significant deployments of U.S. troops and personnel in Europe and Asia, and commands charged with readiness to project American military power on the remaining inhabited continents. This has had benefits -- we've helped keep the peace in Europe, by and large, for more than 60 years, which is an extraordinary accomplishment. But American taxpayers continue to pay dearly for the privilege of maintaining the most awesome military in world

This is a theme that gets repeated a lot, but I'll pick on Marc Thiessen for repeating it. Here he is at The Corner today: The New York Times has a front-page story today on the growing momentum on Capitol Hill to cut defense spending. It is not surprising that in an age when the Democrats are showering money on almost every domestic initiative known to man, the one area they would seek spending cuts is the defense budget. But Thiessen is lying. Let's look at the New York Times story for an explaination: Mr. Gates is calling for the Pentagon’s budget to keep growing in the long run at 1 percent a year after inflation, plus the costs of the war. It has averaged an inflation-adjusted growth rate of 7 percent a year over the last decade (nearly 12 percent a year without adjusting for inflation), including the costs of the wars. So far, Mr. Obama has asked Congress for an increase in total spending next year of 2.2 percent, to $708 billion — 6.1 percent higher than the peak u

Via Twitter , Peter Suderman points out that Republicans plan on campaigning this fall against the federal deficit, but have no plans to actually do anything about it if they take Congress. See Sunday's "Meet The Press" for confirmation . In response to such complaints, National Review's Robert Costa points to Eric Cantor's YouCut website , which he describes: Cantor debuted YouCut [in May]. Its premise is simple: Each week, Americans can vote for their favorite of five potential spending cuts on the web (or via text message to 68398). Cantor works to bring the winner to the House floor. With one click, you can help to shape the House GOP agenda. “It allows us to focus on out-of-control federal spending, the number-one issue for millions of Americans,” Cantor says. “For us, it is an unprecedented online project.” Unprecedented? Whatever. It's also incredibly piddly and lame. Look at the current options YouCut offers for a vote. * Eliminating unnecessary C

That's the question for this week's Scripps Howard column. I take a slightly fatalistic approach : Actually, the debate is already over. Americans may be worried about their jobs, but it's possible they're even crankier about the growing national debt. Politicians in Washington D.C. are responding accordingly, with President Obama even calling on most federal agencies to reduce their budgets by 5 percent. With a bipartisan deficit commission now on the job, those cuts may just be the beginning. Perhaps that's as it should be: The bill for decades of deficit spending – in good times and bad, under both Republican and Democratic presidents – was going to come due sooner or later. It appears now may be the time. But Americans should understand one thing about the belt- tightening: It's gonna hurt. Federal spending doesn't just prop up unpopular programs, after all: Right now, it's helping keep teachers and police officers on the job while states and ci

Via Paul Krugman , a graphical representation of how the two Bush tax cuts, the Iraq War and the new health reform law impact the federal budget: Stuff like this is why it's so hard for me not to think of the Tea Partiers as, essentially, sore losers .