The issue: Congress does whatever it can to protect spending at home

Through sheer repetition, Washington lobbyists, reporters and political junkies have come to keep a straight face when a member of the House or Senate takes to the floor to announce, with feigned shock and horror, that federal spending is out of control.

(The aggrieved member never mentions that, thanks to the U.S. Constitution, spending is entirely Congress’ business. It’s much easier to blame faceless federal bureaucrats, whose every move cash-wise is dictated by Congress.)

IN THE NAME OF frugality, the lawmaker insists tough choices have to be made. The fat has to be cut out of the budget. Sure, there will be some pain, but the suffering is necessary if we are ever to right the fiscal ship.

Until it comes to military bases. Not only are the lawmakers unwilling to make tough choices, they are unwilling to make any choices at all.

With no prospect of having to fight World War II again, even Congress was embarrassed by the vast military infrastructure we were supporting in the 1980s. This brought about BRAC, the base realignment and closure commission.

After close consultation with the military brass, local officials and businesses, the commission came up with a list of bases to close, consolidate or substantially cut back. Congress had its say but had to vote yea or nay on the list as a whole: It was all or nothing.

And it worked. Global Security.org reports the first four rounds of closings saved the taxpayers $16 billion through 2001.

The law requires the military to go through this exercise every few years, and it has asked Congress for $2.4 billion in its fiscal 2014 budget to cover the upfront cost of base closings.

The public relations drawback is that BRAC costs money to save money, a fact that lawmakers, trusting in voters’ short memory span, enthusiastically seize on when a base in their area is threatened.

DEFENSE SECRETARY Chuck Hagel early this year began planning to dispose of excess capacity for the 2015 BRAC round. Congress’ response has been quick and blunt: None of the military’s funding “may be used to propose, plan for or execute an additional BRAC round,” according to a House Armed Service Readiness subcommittee’s markup of a Department of Defense spending bill.

To put this spending in perspective, the Peter G. Peterson Foundation calculation that in 2012, the U.S. spent more on defense — $682 billion — than did the countries with the next 10 highest defense budgets combined. (Peterson is a former Commerce secretary, chairman of the Council on Foreign Relations and all-around Wall Street billionaire.)

Still, any member of Congress will tell you frugality can be carried only so far.

Comments

comments