Actually I found a breakdown in the Washington Post that did peg it at almost precisely 20%. Do you believe it’s reasoned to take the military budget in a time of war and use that as your baseline for the military slice of the pie?
Take the current cost of the war into account, and that figure drops 2.5 to 3.0% Of course the over budget total also drops, increasing the percentage a bit.
The point is, the military IS NOT the 80 to 83% of the pie, that needs to be cut.
Here’s what the Left does. It spends like there’s no tomorrow. Then when they get taken to the woodshed over it, they raise the issue of the only approved thing the government should be spending on, and that’s the focus.
And then folks on our side say, “Well, that does sound reasoned after all. If the left has to cut it’s 83%, we should be willing to slice and dice the 17%.”
Baloney!
I don’t approve of waste, but other than that I do want a very strong military at the ready.
Has the military been cut? Yes. We have half the Navy we did under Reagan. We have closed a number of military bases in the U.S. We instituted cost cutting measures across the board.
What other programs in the government can we address that did that? None. If you raise welfare, I’m going to call you on it. We both know we’re paying out too much money in this area. Oh they shift the titles around, but it’s the same old shell game it always was.
I know of people who were given less than half-time volunteer jobs where the government paid the salaries. Working much less than half time, these people were none the less deemed employed. It wasn’t considered Welfare anymore. These games are being jobbed on us all over the place.
I was responding to your statement, "Defense DOES NOT equal 20% of the budget either". Nothing more.