I've got to give Fox's Neil Cavuto some credit on this one—he asked Rep. Thaddeus McCotter, a Michigan Republican and head of the GOP House Policy Conference, to get specific after McCotter claimed he supported military spending cuts. What ensued was a textbook example of political evasion:
Cavuto started out by asking McCotter to name a specific level of military spending cuts that he supports, citing Kentucky Senator Rand Paul's proposal to cut at least $60 billion from the defense budget. McCotter began his response by saying "I don't do figures," but he immediately proceeded to cite a very specific figure, claiming that House Republicans had already included a $14 billion military spending cut in their spending bill passed last month.
But McCotter's claim that the GOP cut $14 billion in military spending is not true: their spending bill actually increases military spending by 1.6% over FY2010 levels. McCotter's claim of $14 billion is relative to President Obama's spending request for FY11, but as far as dollars go, the GOP budget would spend more of them than last year.
Moreover, McCotter, along with a majority of Republicans, voted against cutting a $450 million military spending earmark for a jet fighter to be built in John Boehner's home district. So despite McCotter's claim to support military spending cuts, if he'd had his way, the House's proposed increase in military spending would be even bigger than it currently is.
McCotter was saving his best for last, though. When Cavuto asked him to say when Republicans will get serious about military spending cuts, McCotter's answer amounted to 'not now.' His rationale? We shouldn't be talking about spending cuts now because we need to "send a message to our enemy that we aren't screwing around." Perhaps not, but when it comes to actually dealing with the budget deficit, screwing around is pretty much the only thing House Republicans are doing.