[sinkspur]

He has hardly increased military spending at all. If he had asked for a $600 billion defense budget, Congress would have given it to him.

No they wouldn't have. Rumsfeld is trying to modernize the military, not just throw money at defense contractors.

[Zack Nguyen]

Sure they would have, if Bush had said back in October, "This is what it will take for America to remain safe and to bring our enemies to justice."

What eveidence do we have that Rumsfeld is looking to modernize the military? That costs money. The fact is that we really aren't spending all that much money on defense as a percentage of GDP.

Logic says that the Bush Administration is politically caught between a rock and a hard place - a defense budget capable of building a military machine that can crush our enemies would require spurning some of the piglets that pant at the federal nipple. It would mean no $190 billion farm give-away. And that would mean weathering an unpleasant political storm.