military spending

Too late to slip into this morning’s story on the tax cuts being floated as part of President-elect Barack Obama’s stimulus plan, Harvard economist Martin Feldstein emails to add his name to the growing list of skeptics. Workers given a $500 payroll-tax credit, Feldstein writes, will likely use it the same way they did their [...]

The $488-billion for defense was just tacked on to a larger spending bill at the last minute, with no separate vetting by appropriations committees. The lack of oversight leads to increased funding for programs repeatedly criticized by Defense Sec. Robert Gates.