VP Biden argued at the debate last week and other Democrats keep making this point, that the GOP House voted to cut $250M from the State Department's security budget. This is used to excuse the flop of ignoring pleas to provide more security in Libya. Here is the size of the State Department budget: FY1993 $6.3 billion. FY2001 $7.4 billion. FY2008 $17 billion. FT2009 $21 billion. FY2010 $23.8 billion. FY2011 $24.3 billion. FY2012 $29.? billion (exact number is still not available). Let's say the GOP wanted to spend in the 2012 budget $250M less on State than in 2010. It isn't true. They perhaps offered to increase the budget by a smaller amount than Obama, but let's say they wanted an actual cut: The 2012 budget would still be billions larger than a mere two years earlier and would still be well above the levels had Bush-Obama followed Bill Clinton's approach to State. (In fact, if Bush-Obama followed Clinton's spending growth rates on Education, Health care, and on Social Programs,...(Read Full Post)