Why No Debate on Military Spending?
This week's military budget is a post-World War II record -- $611 billion without counting the full costs of the war in Iraq. Yet none of the candidates for president are talking about it.
Even Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton, the most likely critics of at least some aspects of the Pentagon's bloated budget, have remained silent. In fact, they would like to increase it, in large part to make way for their respective proposals to add tens of thousands of troops to the Army and Marine Corps.
Secretary of Defense Robert Gates and Joint Chiefs of Staff chairman Michael Mullen have gone even further, proposing a "floor" on mililtary spending of 4% of GDP (the equivalent of current levels) even after the end of the war in Iraq.
