Name your cuts to the federal government's budget

There are a lot of big numbers swimming around out there that are hard for most people to understand. So to help provide a sense of proportion, here's a visual interactive representation of where the federal government's money is going, and how so much money is being spent. 
 
http://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2010/02/01/us/budget.html?ref=federal_budget_us  
  
It is important to click on "hide/show" mandatory spending to see which items are funded through legislation instead of the budgetary process, as these are the items which will make for headline battles before they can be increased or decreased. 

The biggest fish in the pond are: 
1) Defense spending 
2) Medicare and Medicaid 
3) Social security  
 
These items already comprise the majority of the budget with 68% of the total spent. It's political suicide to advocate cuts to defense, medicare/medicaid, and social security. Personally, I'd like all 3 to be cut, but let's look at things that are at least theoretically possible.
 
To decrease the deficit, you have to either cut spending or increase taxes. Where would YOU begin to make changes? Starting with a 1,400 billion deficit.
 
For example:
1) ~30 billion cut: Cut all foreign aid. Those people need help, but American money should be spent on Americans.  
2) 20 billion cut: Cutting majority of agricultural subsidies, we're already a huge agricultural exporter, we don't need to continue subsidizing this. 
3) $68 billion: Let the Bush tax cuts expire, this would bring in $68 billion a year in additional tax revenue so that we can keep the things we still want to have. 
4) $25 billion: Renew the estate tax which has been around since 1916 but lapsed last year. $25 billion a year in revenue on taxes to inheritances over of over $3.5million dollars.
5) 30 billion increase: Increase direct-loan financial aid to promote job retraining. As technology replaces people, those people can't get back to work until they're trained to use the new technology. This is a critical leg for a balanced economy.  Unemployed produce no tax revenue, but if you get someone back to work, he contributes to the economy and can pay taxes. 
6) Hard cap on budget growth for all programs, normally ~2% a year.  This is actually the biggest cut even though it's gradual. It is also the most painful because budgets naturally grow as they serve a /growing/ population, and providing cost of living salary increases to it's employees. With a hard cap, each year will require annual layoffs(during a recession too!) and reductions in service, and increases in wait times for the people at large. Hopefully they'll lay off the best employees last if they haven't left for a job that pays better. 

113 billion deficit reduction per year, closing the deficit in 14 years.

I sound like an asshole cutting these things, but that's because I'm suggesting actual things to cut instead of vaguely saying "Spend less money". It doesn't sound as simple when you have to give up someone's tangible benefits. There's my terrible budget proposal, post yours!

Fuck that I'll name state cuts...I'll cut out the budget to build new sports stadiums in every american state...since thats the only thing americans don't mind be raped with taxes over...a new sports stadium they will likely never visit.

" Fuck that I'll name state cuts...I'll cut out the budget to build new sports stadiums in every american state...since thats the only thing americans don't mind be raped with taxes over...a new sports stadium they will likely never visit. "

I'd like to see the money used for the DEA to raid medical Marijuana dispensaries be put to better use.

Well obviously extending the Bush tax cuts would be idiotic.  Estate tax should be active too.
 
I think defense spending should be intelligently redesigned in coordination with the military.  Some of those projects are just idiotic and are expensive and aim to attain goals that serve no practical purpose.  We need a larger standing army.

Did you know that if you took 1/3 of the USA's defence budget you could feed, clothe, and provide fresh water and shelter for every poor person on the planet for a year.
 
Maybe you don't buy a bunch of stealth bombers this year...

You know, if any of you were working there and making the cuts, at every turn you would have a million advisors telling you the cons of cutting funding from this or that. And what tells you that in the 14 years between now and a debt-free US there wont be some other shit that happens that requires money. ie war, natural or artificial catastrophe, etc.

" Did you know that if you took 1/3 of the USA's defence budget you could feed, clothe, and provide fresh water and shelter for every poor person on the planet for a year.  Maybe you don't buy a bunch of stealth bombers this year... "

I don't think we need a way to obliterate an enemy with nuclear weapons, let alone 3 ways. Seems like such a horrible way to see things. 

" If the government was run like a successful business, their cuts would look a lot like yours.  Unfortunately, the gov't is run like the gov't.  "

Cut half the military's budget. We can still win against China spending 3 times as much as they are instead of 6.

1. Cutting Foriegn aid would piss off the countries that we are currently supporting as well as half of the UN.. America doesnt need to be hated more than they already are.
2. While some states in the US are a huge producer of agriculture, most states arent, who is going to substidize those states that arent? 
3. Goes without saying, i doubt that the government is going to renew the tax cuts when we are in a deficit. 
4. The realestate market is still struggling, renewing taxes that were removed will only hurt it more. 
 
 You cant cut things in our government without a huge consequence following it. Our government is structured in a way that we can either have excess or depression, not something in between.
 @Ragdrazi said:

" Cut half the military's budget. We can still win against China spending 3 times as much as they are instead of 6. "

 @Ragdrazi said:

" Cut half the military's budget. We can still win against China spending 3 times as much as they are instead of 6. "

Chinas military spending is so low because they have almost no navy to speak of and their airforce is insignificant. The only thing they have to spend money on is manpower and half their population is requires to take up some form of martial arts which cuts down in training costs. Our advantage against china is our superior technology which is quite expensive to maintain. "

I am not American so dont take my opinion seriously on this but why don't you cut your military spending which is ridiculously high? 
 
Edit: oh wait other people have already said that but I would not want to live in a country that spent that much money on its military.

" @Gunner said:

 @Ragdrazi said:

" Cut half the military's budget. We can still win against China spending 3 times as much as they are instead of 6. "

Chinas military spending is so low because they have almost no navy to speak of and their airforce is insignificant. The only thing they have to spend money on is manpower and half their population is requires to take up some form of martial arts which cuts down in training costs. Our advantage against china is our superior technology which is quite expensive to maintain. "

But six times as much? That's ridiculous. We don't need all this. "

" I'd like to see the money used for the DEA to raid medical Marijuana dispensaries be put to better use. "

" @Ragdrazi said:

" @Gunner said:

 @Ragdrazi said:

" Cut half the military's budget. We can still win against China spending 3 times as much as they are instead of 6. "

Chinas military spending is so low because they have almost no navy to speak of and their airforce is insignificant. The only thing they have to spend money on is manpower and half their population is requires to take up some form of martial arts which cuts down in training costs. Our advantage against china is our superior technology which is quite expensive to maintain. "

But six times as much? That's ridiculous. We don't need all this. "

Our military is spread out all over the world and the majority of our forces are currently active because of this, active military units are more expensive than reserve military units which is what most of the chinese military consists of. The removal of military presence would ruin our relations with our allies and piss off the UN. The U.S dug itself into a pretty deep hole when they adopted the "lets police the world and make everyone like us" doctrine. "

" @Everyones_A_Critic said:

" I'd like to see the money used for the DEA to raid medical Marijuana dispensaries be put to better use. "

Yes! One of my first thoughts was the wasted money on marijuana prohibition. All of the cuts mentioned here would be smart and the war on drugs is a failure that everyone can see. Everyone except politicians that is... "

I like what you did, it seems like the most effective solution to the budget problems without cutting important things like Social Security and whatnot.

That is pretty complicated. I'll leave that to the government.

Cut medicare and medicaid.  There I said it.  They're inefficient, corrupt programs, that turn down way more people than insurance companies anyway.

Anything I'm not directly befitting from is coincidentally what we can cut in the budget to fix America.

" @Xeiphyer said:

" Did you know that if you took 1/3 of the USA's defence budget you could feed, clothe, and provide fresh water and shelter for every poor person on the planet for a year.  Maybe you don't buy a bunch of stealth bombers this year... "

But I like my Stealth Bomber's, and the new one has a camera. "

Get rid of subsidies. Legalize marijuana. Bring our troops home from around the world. Stop all foreign aid. Get rid of NASA.  etc.... 
 
Or, just stop all federal spending and have states (who have balanced budget amendments) take care of their own budgets.