The Hill News

If you believe the national debt and the federal budget deficit are urgent priorities, a Congressional budget hearing on February 28 offered insight into why it’s so difficult to restrain government spending.
 
Testifying before the Senate Budget Committee, Secretary of Defense Leon Panetta attempted to fend off reductions in spending at the Department of Defense, told Congress that the budget couldn’t be balanced with defense cuts alone. He said further cuts to his department would “hollow out the force and inflict severe damage to our national defense.”
 
One might be skeptical of Panetta’s claims that further savings in defense spending are impossible; the realities of waste and fraud in the defense procurement process are well documented. But on an essential point, Panetta is right: if we’re going to get our national spending problem under control, it’s going to take a much broader approach to budget reform that requires putting e! verything on the table.

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