Don't Hawk My Dog

by Eric Martin

Matt Yglesias on the interaction of budget hawks, defense hawks and Blue Dogs:

The Bush administration’s Fiscal Year 2009 budget for the Department of Defense came in at $513 billion. That does not include the ongoing costs of the wars in Iraq or Afghanistan. It’s by far the largest number in the world...Well, the Office of Management and Budget was preparing to tell the Pentagon to spend $527 billion—a $14 billion increase—in FY2010. But the Pentagon wanted to spend $584 billion. So they had this effort underway to protray Obama’s $14 billion hike as a $57 billion cut. And now Spencer Ackerman tells me that the administration is starting to cave and promising a $537 total budget.

I expect conservatives concerned about overspending and especially deficit-averse Blue Dogs to be leading the charge against these kind of wasteful outlays.

Matt's funny.  Remember kids, the defense budget is not part of the budget really.  Money spent on defense doesn't lead to deficits or difficult tradeoffs.  It's magic money.  Like tax cuts, only with a louder bang!  Social Security, on the other hand, well that system is bankrupt and in desperate need of reform.

Comments

[Uncle Kvetch]

Remember kids, the defense budget is not part of the budget really.

A gold star for Eric. And the military is not part of "the government." It's Civics 101, Dude!

[Brett Bellmore]

"So they had this effort underway to protray Obama’s $14 billion hike as a $57 billion cut."

Huh, so 'baseline budgeting' is a game both sides play. Too bad.

[Gary Farber]

Somewhat off-topic, but if folks haven't read Jane Mayer's latest about Ali Saleh Kahlah al-Marri.

[Gary Farber]

...they should, I meant to say.

[Gary Farber]

Also, this:

A federal appeals court this morning blocked the release into the United States of a small band of Chinese Muslims held at the U.S. military prison at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba.

But, hey, no matter that the U.S. government has for years said they're innocent of any wrongdoing, I'm sure they'll enjoy more orange chicken.

[Mike Schilling]

Money spent on defense leads to deficits or difficult tradeoffs.

Is there a "no" missing?

[Eric Martin]

Fixed Mike. Thanks.

I think my mind's still on vacation. Sigh.

[Nell]

Has the Obama defense budget been officially introduced? If so, can someone tell me if the wars/occupations in Iraq and Afghanistan are included in the budget, or is the Obama administration actually going to continue the abusive Bush practice of funding them entirely by "emergency" supplementals?

[OCSteve]

It’s by far the largest number in the world...

Well, maybe before the word stimulus became a household word…

A “B” as in billion? We don’t even sweat that anymore…

[Ugh]

And my contempt for the a$$holes at the Pentagon grows even further. And whoever at the Air Force came up with the "Save the F-22" campaign should be court martialed.

[Eric Martin]

Nell: It is my understanding that such funding will still be broken out in supplementals.

[Nell]

Nell: It is my understanding that such funding will still be broken out in supplementals.

And voted on separately? Fvcking **appalling**. I wonder if they'll engage in the same pretense that these hundreds of billions are not part of the defense budget, and state the number not including the war supplementals as "the defense budget."

[Eric Martin]

That all depends on how much Obama and Gates want to fight the Pentagon appropriations process.

[Nell]

Could you elaborate a bit on that last comment, Eric? I'm not understanding it.

[Eric Martin]

I mean to say that if Obama and Gates want to challenge the Pentagon budget/certain high ticket weapons programs, they might be more prone to use the real dollar amount, and not the supplemental sleight of hand.

[Turbulence]

Eric, is there any reason to fund the wars using the emergency supplemental appropriations as opposed to funding the war using the normal budgetary process? I mean, is the dollar figure in the supplemental really so unpredictable that it can't be included in the regular budgeting process?

[Eric Martin]

There might be some reason, but to me it always seemed to be about optics. Keeping the budget for the Pentagon seemingly lower, while also leaving out the costs from the wars when calculating the overall federal budget so as to lessen the appearance of annual deficits.

[Fraud Guy]

What would happen if the Iraq/Afghanistan costs were already included in the stated total budgets?

[Eric Martin]

They would increase dramatically. This would undermine arguments by people that are suggesting that we are spending too little on defense. People that want to peg defense spending to 4% of GDP (without the wars, we are under 4%, with the wars, we are above).

[Nell]

A commenter to the Matt Yglesias post answers my question differently, quoting Mullen in a Congressional Quarterly article:

“We’re going to have to figure out how to get off supplementals,” Mullen told a group of Washington reporters Thursday.

“My strategic approach is to start to implant those things that are in supplementals that we think we’ve got to have into the baseline budget. We need to start doing that. We’re working our way through the next budget now.”

The commenter elaborated:

Based on the both that story and what I’ve seen in the press on the current proposals, the $527B figure doesn’t account for all of afghanistan and iraq but starts to.

...The expenditures in afghanistan and iraq pay for ‘operational expenses’ Most easily separated are consumables like food, gasoline, and even salaries for local civilian employees - and of course all the contractors (which are generally not direct
payments to individuals but to whatever company is contracted for the service). The fuzzier aspects are repair parts and
what ... you call ‘capital expenditures’. It really depends on the specific system.

In the navy, at least, if there was a repair that the sailors were expected or required to make in the theater of operations, that would likely be paid for by the supplemental. However if the repair was deferred until the unit got back to the mainland base, (and/or done by a higher level repair facility) that would be paid for by the general navy repair budget. So I’m guessing that complete replacement of a
tank would be paid out of the main budget, but replacing only the treads in Iraq would be the supplemental.

The Mullen quote reassures me that this administration is not just going along in the abusive Bush/Rumsfeld way, but I still would dearly love a trustworthy source to follow the budget process and interpret what's actually changed and what hasn't.

[Nell]

On the other hand, maybe not. The CQ article is from October. So if anyone has clarifying links since Jan. 21, please feel free to supply them (ideally quoting the passage relevant to Iraq/Afg supplementals vs. in-budget expenditures; what I'm seeking to avoid here is reading a bunch of huge long defense-budget articles).

[Gary Farber]

One piece of info, Nell:

WASHINGTON, Jan. 26, 2009 – President Barack Obama’s 2010 defense budget request will be delayed, possibly until April, White House and Defense Department officials said.

The president's annual budget request usually is submitted to Congress the first Monday in February. However, with only a week in office, the new administration will need more time for a substantial review of the submission, officials said.

Office of Management and Budget officials projected the delay in April and sent a memorandum delaying the budget submission.

Civilian and military financial experts have prepared a draft budget for review by administration officials. They will issue budget guidance via the Office of Management and Budget, which will guide the department.

Officials said they expect this guidance to come to the Pentagon "shortly," and Defense Department finance officials are prepared to move quickly to apply the guidance to the submission.

It is possible that the total Defense Department request, known as the "topline" number, may be released earlier than April, but that must wait on the more detailed submission, officials said.

Also, Walter Pincus:

Defense Secretary Robert M. Gates has formally adopted the concept that national security planning and budgeting cannot be done by the Pentagon alone, according to the Defense Department's newly released Quadrennial Roles and Missions Review Report.

"The Department supports institutionalizing whole-of-government approaches to addressing national security challenges," the document says, adding, "The desired end state is for U.S. Government national security partners to develop plans and conduct operations from a shared perspective."
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This approach reflects recommendations made last year by the Project on National Security Reform, which had among its leadership President Obama's new national security adviser, James L. Jones, and Director of National Intelligence Dennis C. Blair.

Among the steps needed to be taken in this more holistic approach, according to the new Pentagon document, is publication of "an authoritative national-level strategic guidance document that addresses interagency roles and responsibilities, and resolves seam issues between agencies," meaning issues that overlap.

The document also recognizes the need for putting together an annual budget that shows a whole-of-government approach to national security programs along with the traditional department-by-department approach. Both ideas were also among the recommendations from the Project on National Security Reform.

The Pentagon document recognizes that there already are interagency groups that work when needed to plan unified actions on national security problems. But it calls for establishing a more permanent framework that includes "commonly understood strategic concepts, operational principles, relationships between agencies, and roles and responsibilities."

And a touch more. Fwiw.

Basically, though, we still have to wait and see. Obama has only been president for a month.

[Gary Farber]

Hey, Nell:

[...] Yet Mr. Obama will inflate his challenge by forsaking several gimmicks that President Bush used to make deficits look smaller. He will include war costs in the budget; Mr. Bush did not, and instead sought supplemental money from Congress each year.

So.

[Nell]

Much appreciated, Gary, thanks.

I found it hard to believe that the new administration would continue the abusive "supplemental" dodge.