Desperate Rhetoric for Mundane Times

First of two articles (second one here)

By Winslow Wheeler
Time.com
Oct. 01, 2012
click here for original article

Imposing itself only infrequently on the consciousness of the noise-makers who dominate presidential campaign coverage on TV and in the newspapers, the defense budget has been a second-tier issue in the 2012 elections.

That may properly be so, but the inattention of the top of the line political pontificators, who can be excused for not understanding the issue except at the most superficial level, has not elevated the quality of the debate at the lower tier.

Leaving the discussion to people like the chairman and ranking members of the House and Senate Armed Services Committees, sitting and former secretaries of defense, and the retired chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff has—surprisingly only to some—left us with a debate on the Pentagon budget that is hysterical, misinformed, and, most of all, misinforming. Moreover, many of the critics of these histrionics from the other side, including myself, have been so wedded to myths that both parties should be seen as the source of the dismal babble, not just the one.