Two hundred and fifty years later, time and reason strongly suggest that the U.S. “defense” budget is out of control, unsustainable and absent of accountability. The massive Pentagon budget provides the Pentagon with a premier position within both the government and society. Now, they are requesting a 50 percent increase in the defense budget to S1.5 trillion. What Paine recognized as “common sense” was that wars are not won by budgets alone. The $1.5 trillion Pentagon budget request represents more than S9,000 per individual taxpayer.