<p>Dstark, the federal budget is too big, and too complex for me to claim to be able to figure out where or how spending could have been less than it was - and certainly how to cut it without actually hurting anyone. (Appearances to the contrary notwithstanding, I do have a day job!) But consider this: if the third largest item in the budget wasn’t paying the interest on the debt run up by Reagan and BushI, how much easier would it be to balance the budget? I think even BushII might have done it, particularly if the “starve the beast” pro-deficit policy hadn’t already taken over the Republican ideology.</p>