The 19 percent solution.

• Author: Colvin, Melinda
• Position: Letter to the editor

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Nick Gillespie and Veronique de Rugy's "The 19 Percent Solution" (March) contains so much common sense I'm sure the politicians won't pay attention to it. To balance the budget we have to get a handle on entitlement spending--specifically, we need to means-test benefits. Social Security and Medicare should be treated as insurance, not entitlements.

As for general budget cuts, most U.S. departments could be eliminated: education, energy, agriculture, and commerce, just to name a few. They are redundant, as the states already regulate these...