Fertile ground for cost-cutting

$60 billion

That's how much the U.S. military may have lost in waste and fraud in wars over the past decade. The source of that number is a report to Congress by the Commission on Wartime Contracting in Iraq and Afghanistan. It put the loss at $31 billion to $60 billion. Either number is way too high, given the current emphasis on deficit reduction. The commission made recommendations for overhauling the contracting system, and the supercommittee in Congress now studying the deficit should take those ideas very seriously.