$17 Billion sounds like a big number... ICE got cubed...

President Barack Obama's detailed 2010 budget plan, due out Thursday, will propose to eliminate or consolidate 121 domestic and defense programs to save $17 billion, administration officials said Wednesday.
The trims, though modest, are likely to spark opposition from lawmakers and interest groups seeking to shift to someone else cuts aimed at narrowing next year's projected $1.2 trillion deficit.
"There are very few programs that don't have a constituency and someone who is willing to stand up for them in Congress. We understand that," a senior administration official said. But he added, "A lot of programs are implemented with the best of intentions. Not all of them are effective."
Compared with the total $3.6 trillion spending plan for 2010, the proposed trims amount to one-half of 1%. Half the cuts would come from defense, especially Pentagon weapons programs already spelled out by Defense Secretary Robert Gates, such as trimming back the fleet of advanced F-22 fighter planes. The other half would come from programs that have strong support among progressive activists who cheered Mr. Obama's election. Programs targeted for elimination or consolidation include education and housing programs that Democratic aides said will have fierce advocates among traditionally Democratic constituencies.
An administration official said that over 10 years, the total saved by the proposed program cuts would exceed $200 billion.
One of the biggest targets, the early childhood education program Even Start, had been on George W. Bush's target list since 2004.
Even Start was designed to target not just poor children but also their illiterate or uneducated parents in community education centers. A White House aide cited the same study that Bush administration officials had used to justify their threats to the program. Of 41 educational or developmental milestones examined in the study, a control group not enrolled in the program had the same or better outcomes on 38. Mr. Bush was able to whittle the program down from $247 million in 2004 to $66 million this year; Mr. Obama proposes killing it outright.
Other programs slated for elimination are the Education Department's Jacob K. Javitz fellowship program and Christopher Columbus grants, the latter of which has a $1 million-a-year budget, 80% of which is overhead. Also gone would be an option to have the Earned Income Credit included in weekly or monthly paychecks, and the Immigration and Customs Enforcement Agency's Criminal Alien Program, which identified jailed criminal foreigners to ensure they are not released into the community. A White House aide also cited the Long Range Radio Navigation System, a $35 million Coast Guard system made obsolete by global positioning systems.
"Some of these have been on the books north of 40 years," said White House Chief of Staff Rahm Emanuel. "Inertia set in."
The defense of many targeted programs has already begun. AIDS activists are fuming that an expansion of developing-world health programs will favor other health needs over HIV/AIDS.
Liberal think tanks are worried about a proposed partnership with state governments to root out fraud in joint state-federal programs such as Medicaid and children's health insurance.
"There is a kind of 'Nixon going to China' aspect to this," said Isabel Sawhill, co-director of the Center of Children and the Family at the liberal-leaning Brookings Institution. Just as only Republican President Richard Nixon could go to communist China in 1972 without being destroyed politically, only a popular Democrat could challenge liberal groups on sacrosanct programs that may have outlived their usefulness, she said.
"There's a different perspective that exists and a different sense of commitment," Mr. Emanuel said. "We bring a certain credibility."
White House officials acknowledged the similarity between Mr. Obama's 121 program cuts and consolidations and $17 billion savings and Mr. Bush's 151 programs and $18 billion savings proposed for 2009. About 40% of the programs Mr. Obama has targeted for elimination or consolidation come directly off a similar list proposed by Mr. Bush over the past two budget seasons on Capitol Hill. Congress largely ignored those proposed cuts.
Administration aides have been working to sell their plans in advance of their formal release. When Deputy Secretary of State Jacob Lew unveiled the president's six-year, $63 billion request to expand Mr. Bush's efforts to combat AIDS, malaria and tuberculosis in developing countries, he emphasized the funding increases sought for maternal and children's health, family planning and tropical diseases.
It took the activist group Health Global Access Project to note that the Obama figure represents a $6.6 billion cut from earlier projected increases in the core AIDS, malaria and tuberculosis programs to fund the new health initiatives.
An administration official said the White House expected the criticism but noted that the core AIDS programs are already due for a tough, congressional mandated review by Sept. 30. And questions are mounting on the cost of treatment, the longevity of the program and the effect on developing-world mortality rates of AIDS efforts versus simpler efforts to combat illnesses like childhood diarrhea.