To End the Deficits, Slash the U.S. “Security” Budget

President Obama’s proposed budget would cut federal spending to 8.3 percent of GDP in Fiscal Year 2011, down from the gargantuan 10.6 percent for the current year. Although still high by historical standards, that proportion could fall even more if the economy improves and if more political upheavals like the one in the senate race in Massachusetts occur, according to Ivan Eland, director of the Independent Institute’s Center on Peace and Liberty.

If that were to happen, Eland argues, the President might become the “deficit-reduction Democrat” that Clinton turned out to be–a fiscal antidote to the big-spending ways of his predecessor. Of course, Obama’s bailouts to the auto companies and others make it more difficult for him to achieve that status. But the possibility is real. However, for Obama to make meaningful progress on deficit reduction, he must slash the estimated $1 trillion that makes up the entire U.S. security budget, Eland argues.

Cuts of the size needed to make a lasting improvement would require Obama (and future administrations) to scale back U.S. military interventionism around the globe, according to Eland. The United States, Eland writes, “should dramatically retract its defense perimeter, thus cutting the U.S. security budget by half and saving more than $500 billion a year. Of course, doing this will not cut even half the annual $1.3 trillion deficit. But it is a start on throwing dirt back in the cavernous budget hole.”

“The U.S. Can No Longer Afford Its Empire,” by Ivan Eland (2/3/10) Spanish Translation

Putting “Defense” Back into U.S. Defense Policy, by Ivan Eland

The Empire Has No Clothes: U.S. Foreign Policy Exposed, by Ivan Eland

Partitioning for Peace: An Exit Strategy for Iraq, by Ivan Eland

Recarving Rushmore: Ranking the Presidents on Peace, Prosperity, and Liberty, by Ivan Eland

What a laugh, trying to latch on to the Clinton surplus to try and hide Bush’s deficits. REMEMBER; the PRESIDENT SUBMITS THE BUDGET and Bush’s were huge, the following is an excerpt from The Cato Institute;

Who’s To Blame for the Massive Deficit?

by Daniel J. Mitchell

The temporary increase in the national debt ceiling approved this month — combined with the prospect of a huge trillion-dollar-plus increase early next year — has once again prompted criticisms of President Obama for runaway spending and record deficits.

All this borrowing is only necessary, we are told, because Obama ran up $1.4 trillion of debt in his first year.

It’s true that the White House is pushing big spending items, not least of which is his multitrillion-dollar scheme for government-run health care. But many critics, either out of ignorance or malice, are blaming Obama for deficits that are not his fault.

Some Republicans, for instance, complain that Obama tripled the budget deficit in his first year. This assertion is understandable, since the deficit jumped from about $450 billion in 2008 to $1.4 trillion in 2009.
While this might make sense to a casual observer, it is largely untrue. The 2009 fiscal year began Oct. 1, 2008, nearly four months before Obama took office. The budget for the entire fiscal year was largely set in place while President Bush was in the White House.

From Think Progress;

INHERITING RECKLESSNESS: “Reagan proved deficits don’t matter,” Vice President Cheney said in 2002 when pushing for a fresh round of tax cuts. With this attitude in hand, Bush passed on a budgetary nightmare to his successor. Bush came into office with an advantage few presidents have enjoyed — a $230 billion surplus. But due to a $1.35 trillion tax cut in 2001, a $1.5 trillion tax cut in 2003, and a massive defense buildup through the Iraq and Afghanistan wars, Bush quickly blew through that surplus. The next president will “inherit a fiscal meltdown,” Senate Budget Committee Chairman Kent Conrad (D-ND) warned in February 2008, as the Bush administration projected a budget deficit of $400 billion. After the financial crisis emerged last fall and the ensuing bailouts, Bush’s budget deficit ballooned to over $1 trillion. As Center for American Progress Vice President for Economic Policy Michael Ettlinger explained, budget deficits swelled under Bush because his supply-side tax policies slashed revenues while failing to deliver strong economic performance.