Hidden Assets.(A)(EDITORIALS)

Budget: Those who seek cuts in the deficit like to point to the "massive" debts our nation is running up. Fair enough. But what about its equally massive assets?

Whenever Washington talks about deficits -- and the need to cut them -- get ready for a lecture on how we're saddling our children with debts they'll never be able to repay. But don't expect to hear the other side of the story -- or in this case, about the other side of the ledger.

Granted, some of the nation's debt -- now put at $6 trillion -- will be paid by future generations. That debt, however, hasn't been run up like some big Visa card. It's backed by enormous assets that are never mentioned mainly because it's hard to put a value on them .

The government's own accounts are a case in point. They show about $1 trillion in total assets, ranging from cash and securities to property, plant and equipment. But its listing is wholly inadequate.

While we agree government shouldn't tax or spend excessively, not all spending is wasted. And some of it goes for things that you can't quite measure. Fact is, the real value of U.S. government assets is much greater than $1 trillion.

Take the money that was spent building up the military during the Reagan years. It has been scored by budget hawks for creating "runaway" budget deficits that held back the U.S. economy. But that's the wrong way to look at it.

In fact, the defense buildup was one of the best investments this nation ever made. Its sheer size and technological breadth created a military of such awesome power that our main 20th century enemy Soviet communism closed up shop and called it a day. Our ...