Panel Argues For "Super Committee" Cuts To Be Private Until Finalized

In a paneled discussion hosted by the Brookings Institute on Friday, three fiscal experts discussed the deficit’s impact on American national security and foreign policy.

Panelists included ,  and e at Brookings. Michael O’Hanlon, director of research for Foreign Policy and the 21st Century Defense Initiative, moderated the discussion. 

“We have a new opportunity now to solve the real problem and this deal may be the first step towards a positive resolution,” Alice Rivlin, senior fellow of economics studies at the Brookings Institution, said about the new deficit-reduction bill. 

The deficit-reduction deal, signed by President Obama on August 3, requires between $400 million and $1.5 billion of cuts from the national security budget, most of which is projected to come from defense. 

According to Rivlin, there are three critical moves to reduce deficit spending; reduce the growth of entitlement spending, reform tax codes to ensure increased tax revenue and cap discretionary spending.

Rivlin explained that the fastest growing major category in the defense budget is healthcare and major cuts need to be made. 

“The TRICARE For Life Program is an extremely generous and costly healthcare program that should be monitored,” Rivlin suggested.

TRICARE For Life is a Medicare supplement entitlement for medicare-eligible military employees and their dependents that have little co-insurance or deductible.

Former National Security Adviser Stephen Hadley echoed Rivlin’s sentiments and said that it is not fair to the active military force that the retirees have as good of a deal as it does.

“We let people retire after 20 years when they are fairly young and they can get other jobs but they still receive military retirement. Let us lengthen the period of service… so we pay them but we also get something for it in terms of our contribution to the military. There is an interaction and a set of reforms that can both make the military better and more effective and less costly,” Hadley said.

But, according to Senior Fellow Peter Singer, director of the 21st Century Defense Initiative, it is not as much about what to cut as it is about how to cut.

“We need to focus on the how question. What are the principles by which we might go about it smartly? Identify where real savings are versus false savings,” Singer said. 

“We have to be willing to question 20th century assumptions about 21st century national security,” Singer continued. “We have personnel benefit system that is designed for the generation of mad men that is now the generation of google. It’s expensive and doesn’t fit their needs.” 

Singer also suggested cutting areas in Pentagon spending, such as the National Missile Defense program. 

“We have spent more on that project than we spent on the entire Apollo space project that put a man on the moon,” Singer revealed. 

Over the past 27 years, the U.S. government has spent an estimated $150 billion on the National Missile Defense program and the success rate is a mere 8 out of 15, according to Singer. The Apollo mission, which successfully put man on the moon, cost an approximate $100 billion. 

All three panelists agreed, however, that whatever the “super committee” decides to cut should be kept quiet until it is finalized. They suggested some form of a non-disclosure agreement so ideas will not be immediately shut down as they are circulated in the press and people won’t hear about various cuts without understanding the context they are made in or the strategic trade-offs.

OMB Director Remains Cautious Of Fragile Economy

By Rob Sanna- Talk Radio News

Peter Orszag made his last public address as Director of the Office of Management and Budget Wednesday and lauded policies that have helped the economy begin to recover. However, he believes that the economy is far from fixed.

“We are back from the brink, but not out of the woods,” Orszag said. “The most pressing danger we now face is unacceptably weak growth and persistent unemployment, rather than outright economic collapse, more needs to be done.”

According to Orszag, the deficit is predicted to drop from of 9.2% of GDP to 5% GDP by 2015, which is the fastest deficit reduction since the end of World War II.

Orszag touted the Health Care Act and said it will drive down health care costs which will help the status of a the country’s struggling economy. In addition to lowering health care costs, the OMB Director says government spending is being reduced through cutting outdated or inefficient programs.

Orszag said that critiques against a rising defit are ill informed. Orszag argued that radically reducing the deficit would hinder the progress of an already weakened economy and job market.

“It would be foolish to dramatically reduce the deficit immediately because that would choke off the economic recovery before it had a chance to develop adequately, but it would be equally foolish not to reduce the deficit significantly by 2015, because it would seriously imperil economic growth at that point”

Sec. of State Clinton Previews U.S. Agenda For U.N. General Assembly

By Ravi Bhatia, Talk Radio News Service

Secretary of State Hillary Clinton discussed Friday the U.S agenda for the upcoming United Nations General Assembly (UNGA), touching on issues such as the Obama administration’s missile defense strategy, the conflict in the Middle East, nuclear proliferation and the threat posed by Iran.

While she read her speech at the Brookings Institute in Washington, D.C., she discussed the “ambitious” intentions of the Obama administration at next week’s UNGA in New York, and alluded to a long term goal of a world “with no nuclear weapons.” While fielding questions, she reflected on the state of American foreign policy today.

“For many years, [the U.S] outsourced our policy and concerns about the nuclear program to others to try to intervene with and persuade Iran to change course,” she said. “So we were on the sidelines...we were just trying to figure out how to get other people to go on the field and deal with this problem and look where we are today. We’re really nowhere.”

Clinton also discussed the Obama administration’s missile defense strategy, which was retooled to focus on defending the United States and its allies in Europe from short and mid-range missile attacks. The strategy rejects the Bush administration's plan to station interceptors in the Czech Republic and Poland that were intended to stop long-range missiles that the current administration believes Iran does not have. Since Poland and the Czech Republic will no longer have land-based interceptors, the new plan eases pressure on Russia, displeasing some Republican members of Congress upon Obama’s announcement of the strategy on Thursday.

“This decision was not about Russia,” she said. “It was about Iran and the threat its ballistic missile program poses. Because of this position, we believe we will be in a far stronger position to deal with that threat and to do so with technology that works and a higher degree of confidence that what we pledge to do we can actually deliver.”

She later discussed Iran and the repercussions the country must face for not revealing its intentions to the international community for nuclear technology.

“Our concern is not Iran’s right to develop peaceful nuclear energy, but its responsibility to demonstrate that it’s program is intended exclusively for peaceful purposes,” she said. “This is not hard to do. The Iranian government seeks a sense of justice in the world, but stands in the way of the justice it seeks.”

In response to a question from Brookings Institute President Strobe Talbott, Clinton also discussed the U.S. government’s strategy for restructuring the country’s health care policy.

“It’s interesting that what we are proposing is fundamentally so conservative compared with so many of our friends and allies around the world, who do a much better job then we do in covering everybody and keeping costs down,” Clinton said. “And yet some of the political opposition is so overheated. We have to calm down here, take two aspirin, go to bed, think about it in the morning. But I’m optimistic.”

Economist Disappointed With Stimulus Plan

By Justin Duckham-Talk Radio News Service

The recession may be coming to a close, but according to Barry Bosworth, the Senior Fellow in the Brooking Institution's Economic Studies Program, the stimulus plan may not be responsible. In Bosworth's judgement, the $787 billion measure to jumpstart the U.S. economy has been a disappointment.

"The problem with the stimulus program has been that it has taken too long to get it going. The crisis hit in mid September [of 2008], Congress never acted until the Spring, and then it takes a couple of months for the government agencies to get it set up," said Bosworth during a panel discussion at the Brookings Institute Thursday.

However, Bosworth added, the stimulus plan can still prove useful.

"Most of the money is going to be spent in the future. It is going to be a big plus in driving us out of the recession," Bosworth said. "Don't give up on it, but what's really disappointing is that recession after recession the same thing happens: we can not get the political process to act fast enough."

Bosworth criticized provisions of the stimulus that were not intended for immediate economic relief, claiming that individual interest groups had capitalized on the crisis to push unrelated agendas.

Arlington County (Va.) Board member Christopher Zimmerman, who joined Bosworth on the panel, disagreed with Bosworth's assertion. Zimmerman responded that while not all of the aspects of the stimulus plan provided an instant boost to the economy, many will provide long term benefits.

"All that stuff that's being done that may not be great for stimulus are things that we actually need in this country to generate the economy that will take care of things like deficits and other expenditures we need to make in the future," Zimmerman said.

Oil a political tool for Russia

On Monday the American Foreign Policy Council held a conference on the United States’ foreign policy towards Russia. Steven Pifer of the Brookings Institute said that Russia is engaging in a policy which is meant to keep the West out of the former soviet states, while reasserting its own power and expanding its sphere of influence.

Oil is the principle tool Russia has for accomplishing these goals, according to US Army War College Professor Stephen Blank. Blank called oil a “Swiss army knife” for advancing Russia’s interests, and said that Russia’s protected and subsidized energy market has risen to power because of pipeline control. He continued by saying that Russia’s move to own pipelines and distribution centers is a plan to dominate Europe through “forced dependence” on Russian gas and oil. Dr. Blank recommended that the U.S. and the E.U. reduce their respective dependence on Russian oil, and that the E.U. strive for internal political unity.

By Michael Ruhl, University of New Mexico - Talk Radio News Service