President Bush said an important piece of American defense was the missile defense system.
Let’s hope he’s not putting all of our defense eggs in that basket. The missile defense system has cost $130 billion so far and is scheduled to tally $50 billion more over the next five years. And it still doesn’t work. Indeed, President Bush’s recently released budget includes a request for $8.8 billion in funds for missile defense, despite his pledge to cut programs that weren’t “achieving results.” (President Bush’s 2005 budget included nearly twice as much funding for the ineffective missile defense system as it alloted for the Department of Homeland Security to spend on customs and border patrol.)
In related news, Business Week quotes a defense expert who reports that “Russia has tested a ballistic missile that would render the United States Star Wars scheme useless.”