Plenty of places for reductions.(public expenditure)

Despite the extravagances, we are repeatedly assured that no significant federal reductions are possible. Last year, then-Speaker Tom DeLay (R-Texas) boasted about how spending had already been pared as far as possible, issuing a challenge to find any other cuts. The House Republican Study Committee, led by Rep. Mike Pence (R-Ind.), did just that--quickly coming up with potential cuts (over 10 years) of $500 billion. Merely delaying the institution of the prescription drug-benefit program for a year--allowing time to fix some of the problems already foreseen with its implementation--would have saved $31 billion.

Such "frugality" proved too much to stomach for many inside Washington and outside. Indeed, the Times' Herbert seems to think famine, pestilence, and death will follow the meager nick of less than $40 billion over five years. To the contrary, this is the proverbial drop in the bucket, being a reduction in baseline spending of barely 0.3 percent from expenditures of al most $13 trillion. Keep in mind this is not a real reduction--but a decrease in the ...