SADLY, SEC. GATES ISN'T QUITE THERE YET

I was glad to read that he wants to cut some needless spending but I don't think he's going anywhere near far enough:

In a conversation with reporters Friday, Gates sought to temper any claims that he was aiming to reduce the nation’s fleet of 11 aircraft carriers.

“I might want to change things, but I’m not crazy. I’m not going to cut a carrier, OK,” Gates said.

In reality, we greatly exceed the rest of the world (and that includes allies like Britain) in carrier strength:

America has about twice as many aircraft carriers as the rest of humanity combined, and America's aircraft carriers are substantially larger than almost all the other's aircraft carriers. The Navy likes to call the big Nimitz class carriers "4.5 acres of sovereign and mobile American territory" -- all two dozen American carriers of all classes add up to about 70 acres of deck space. Deckspace is probably a good measure of combat power. The rest of the world's carriers have about 15 acres of deck space, one fifth that of America's.