The Deficit Commission appointed by President Obama is recommending far more modest cuts in defense spending than the
Sustainable Defense Task Force convened by Barney Frank, Ron Paul and others; 372 billion dollars in 5 years, rather than 960 billion in ten. Far more could be trimmed from either set of recommendations, still leaving the U.S. with massive military superiority over the other nations in the world. However, it will be a struggle simply to get the Deficit Commission's recommendations adopted by Congress.
NPR ran a half-hour
Talk of the Nation segment recently on the Deficit Commission's recommendations. The two discussants they brought in were both conservatives, but the conversation is worth listening to in order to hear what even conservatives are recommending given a military budget that has grown absurdly since 9/11/2001, so that nearly 1/2 of all federal discretionary spending is now directed to the military. You can listen to or read the NPR segment at:
http://www.npr.org/2010/11/15/131334547/deficit-commission-calls-for-defense-budget-cuts?sc=emaf
Of course, a substantial amount of whatever is taken out of the defense budget is going to have to go into deficit reduction, but a certain portion should be redirected into more projects like the solar thermal energy plant being built in the Mojave Desert by BrightSource Energy. You can find out more about this promising effort, and link to a story about the accompanying environmental controversies, by going to
http://e360.yale.edu/content/feature.msp?id=2334 and reading Todd Woody's articles in
Environment 360
BrightSource
BrightSource Energy, which built this demonstration solar complex in Israel, is building a 400-megawatt solar power plant in Southern California.
