There's some spending cuts coming up in this next budget, and it's about damn time. Bush really dropped the ball on cutting back spending in his first term, and both parties in the Congress pigged out.

When the new budget comes out, let's see what the newly-fledged deficit hawks in the Democratic Party, along with all those supposed small-government Republicans, have to say about it. And let's hope that veto pen is out there.

I'm not holding my breath. If deficits go down in the next few years, it's probably going to be due to economic growth more than government frugality. I'm pretty sure this was the main reason we had surpluses in the late 90s.

Since 1970, government spending, in constant dollars, has decreased from one year to the next in only two years: 1987 and 1993.

In constant dollars, adjusted for inflation, our current budget is twice what it was in 1977, three times what it was in 1966, and four times what it was in 1961. Since 1961, our population has gone up by a factor of about 1.6.

Somehow, I can't quite believe this spending has been all absolutely essential to human survival.