So here I am watching Hardball, and John Fund disputes a fact and urges his opponent to 'look it up'--the fact in question, whether or not we have kept our troop levels constant in Saudi Arabia after 9/11; according to John Fund, we have, and we still have "about 16,000" troops there. So what are the odds that John Fund pulled this number out of his ass, and was just grandstanding to make a point, and force his opponent to back down?
Well, let's follow John Fund's advice: let's look it up.
In deference to John Fund, let's look it up at
The Heritage Foundation's website, where they say this about debate over global troop levels:
Much of the debate is carried on in a fact-free vacuum, lacking the context of American troops’ traditional footprint around the globe for the past half-century.
Troop Levels in Saudi Arabia
1998: 4,873
1999: 5,552
2000: 7,053
2001: 4,805
2002: 776
2003: 953
2004: 235
2005: 258
John Fund, pathological liar. Call him out!