Cost of War: More Than Half The World's Defense Spending - The Daily Dish | By Andrew Sullivan

More Than Half The World's Defense Spending - The Daily Dish | By Andrew Sullivan

Yesterday Arthur Brooks of AEI, Ed Feulner of Heritage, and Bill Kristol banded together to defend our bloated defense budget.

Some responses:
Gordon Adams responds

"Brooks-Feulner-Kristol fail to point out that it is economically impossible to get the deficit and debt under control unless all spending (and revenues) are on the table. Picking on the other parts of the problem, alone would mean gutting all domestic spending, eliminating much of Medicare and Social Security, or raising taxes into the 80% brackets. And, of course, what they (and, sadly, Secretary Gates) want to do – keep defense off the table – is political death to deficit reduction and debt control – everything will be on the table."

And Paul Waldman puts the debate in context:

"[T]oday, with the Soviet Union gone, we account for most of the world's defense spending -- 54 percent in 2009, according to a recent report. That's right: There are 195 countries on planet Earth, and if you added up the military spending of the 194 of them that aren't the United States, you'd still have less than what we are spending."