THE BUDGET: Leaner and Tougher.

Randolph Bourne famously said that war is the health of the state. Democrats are discovering to their dismay that he did not say that war is the health of domestic spending. Mitch Daniels, President Bush's budget director, has recently reminded us that during World War II, non-war spending fell by 20 percent in two years. The Korean War saw such spending fall 28 percent in one year.

Bush's budget proposal does not, alas, cut back domestic spending, as FDR and Harry Truman did. But like their budgets, his reasserts the proper priorities of the federal government. He would increase defense spending by $48 billion, while holding domestic spending (excluding entitlements) to 2 percent growth. No conservative can cheer a $2.1 trillion budget, exactly. But the president has done an admirable job given the standards of Washington.

The defense increase is the largest in 20 years, and there are more increases to come. They can hardly come quickly enough. Almost half the increase will go to keeping up with inflation, covering military health-care costs, and a modest pay increase. Getting the armed forces more unmanned aircraft, newer fighters and ships, and new weapons systems is worth the additional money.

Bush is also to be commended for insisting that government programs should prove that they deliver results before getting more money -- although one wishes he had applied that principle to the bloated education bill he signed in January. Whether a government program works as intended is not the only question worth asking before deciding to fund it; the program may represent a responsibility better left to the states, charities, or businesses, or be an unconstitutional expansion of the federal role. But even insisting on results is a step forward in Washington.

House Republicans are nervous because Bush's proposal assumes a deficit. They are willing to accept a deficit in order to pass an economic stimulus bill. If that doesn't happen, many of them will push to cut $3 billion more from the budget to keep it in balance. We wish them good luck in cutting $3 billion from the domestic budget -- a worthy goal whatever the government's fiscal position. But their main job in this year's budget tussles will be to stand by the president, who has made a strong proposal.