The election season may nearly be upon us, but some members of Congress are already looking at a challenge they face right after the election: what to do about automatic cuts scheduled to take place Jan. 1 if action on the deficit remains stalled.
The Defense Department is staring at an automatic “sequester” of $55 billion — about 10 percent of its budget — while non-entitlement domestic programs face a $43 billion cut.
Both blows could be softened if Congress could agree to include entitlement reform in a comprehensive budget deal — and if Democrats and Republicans alike could concede that it’s finally time to rein in programs they’ve fiercely defended in the past.
That’s why we were pleased last week to see that Rep. Mike Coffman, the Aurora Republican, is sticking with a goal he outlined last year to push for withdrawal of all U.S. troops in Europe.
Republicans must show more flexibility on defense spending (and taxes) if Congress is ever going to reach a meaningful budget deal. Meanwhile, Democrats must demonstrate a greater seriousness in tackling entitlement reform and holding the line on discretionary domestic spending. Instead, many from both parties still circle the wagons against talk of even modest restraint in their favored spending arenas. (To their credit, Democratic Reps. Jared Polis and Ed Perlmutter recently voted for a compromise budget that did just that).
Coffman also appears to be an exception in this pack of dinosaurs — at least on defense spending.
It made sense to have U.S. troops based in Europe during the Cold War, when the Soviet Union and its Warsaw Pact posed a direct threat to Western Europe. Our troops served as reassurance to our allies that we wouldn’t leave them in the lurch in the event of hostilities, and as a warning to the Soviets to stay put.
But today, more than two decades after the Soviet Union collapsed, the U.S. still has 79,000 military personnel stationed in Europe in four brigade combat teams. As The Denver Post’s Allison Sherry explained recently, Defense Secretary Leon Panetta has said he’d like to withdraw two of them, which is progress, but Coffman would withdraw all four.
“The reality of this proposal is that I feel like I have the wind at my back. I think their time has come,” Coffman said. “I think if there weren’t budget pressures, it would be dismissed.”
We like Coffman’s optimism, although we’re not sure it’s justified. The Cold War may be long gone — and Europe may have more than enough economic strength to pay for its own defense — but defenders of the status quo can always find reasons we must keep tens of thousands of troops there.
They seem to think we live in a nation that isn’t hemorrhaging red ink and has no other pressing budgetary concerns. Once an imperative, troops in Europe are now a frill.
