1) We're $18 trillion in debt.
The reason we're talking about a drastic cut is because medical costs are skyrocketing as are the populations of people who need those programs (Obama's plan would have nearly doubled Medicaid spending) so even that massive growth means millions will be pushed out of coverage.
But either way, the trend is that government spending for these social welfare programs has exploded - it's the blue part of the first graph here:
http://slatestarcodex.com/2017/06/2...-understand-the-extent-of-republican-failure/
It's not defense that's eating up the budget - it's this. "Entitlement" spending is what we call spending for programs for the elderly, disabled, unemployed, impoverished etc. and entitlements have been growing as a share of the federal budget at a terrifying rate.
The Republicans say that we're choosing between cruelty or more cruelty - that the current system of spending will eventually collapse the system like in Greece.
Costs HAVE to come down at some point - you can't just keep printing money. When are we going to make those choices?
They're saying we either make those cuts now, or else the system will collapse and then millions truly will die.