There's nothing really difficult these days about missile technology; it's very well dispersed. For example, North Korea and South Korea have both launched satellites, that proves they have ICBM capability. So has Japan. Indonesia as well. Pakistan and India have both IRBMs and are developing ICBMs. India is developing an SLBM. China has ICBMs SLBMs and IRBMs
If NK has true ICBM capability, then why is the US
disputing that claim? South Korea I am less worried about, given their close working relationship with the US. Japan has no nukes.
Indonesia has sworn off nuclear testing. Pakistan and India developing ICBMs doesn't really surprise me, but at least both currently have relatively close strategic ties with the US AFAIK. China was on my list.
Let's see, Japan in 1941, North Korea in 1950, the USSR in 1956, China in 1958, China in 1963, North Korea in the late 1960s and 1970s (several times), the USSR in 1968, USSR in 1973
I sholud have qualified "recently." WWII took place at a time when the US was not the dominant superpower of the planet, and only relatively astute political and military theorists had grasped what a strong position it was in back when our army was trailing Portugal's. During the Cold Wars we were perceived as relatively equal partners in antagonism with the USSR.
Iraq 1991, China 1996, North Korea (several more times).
Iraq lost their (non-nuclear) bet. China's nuclear threat in 1996 I was unfamiliar with. I promptly Googled it, and aside from editorials all I managed to come up with was
At the height of the confrontation, General Xiong made headlines in America when he told a US academic: "Americans care more about Los Angeles than Taiwan." The remarks were widely interpreted as a veiled threat of nuclear strikes on America's West Coast So yes, this is extremely bad, but not an official ultimatum...it was a remark from a high-ranking Chinese official to a former defense official, who then reported it to the White House. In 2002, the same Chinese official was scolded by Condoleeza Rice, and nuclear devastation failed to ensue.
Was this a well-nigh inexcusable remark? Yes. Should this guy have been fired instead of promoted? Yes. But it wasn't exactly state-to-state nuclear blackmail, and it's hard to say if China "won" this "round" considering that Taiwan continues to conduct its own affairs, and the US naval intervention at the time seems to have had a rather intimidating effect.
(Bizarrely, I did a fair amount of research for a report on the China-Taiwan conflict and the danger of the US commitment to Taiwan around 2003-2004, and while I concluded that the region was dangerous and the Taiwanese were in a troubling position, I turned up none of this "China threatened LA" story at all.)
Finally, the damage that will result from even a limited attack on the mainland is so horifying that they subconsciously don't want to think about it. If they don't, it won;t happen. You're doing exactly the same thing by the way. Don't be embarrassed about it, that's what most people do.
Ok, I'll try not to be embarrassed by your rhetorical strategy. It's ok to just call me an idiot on this board you know, it would probably go over better than patronizing me.
You've made a good point, but is it not true that the horror of nuclear devastation affects politicians all around the world, not just the US? What leaders are sufficiently motivated to cause such devastation in the US, and then undoubtedly face similar destruction in their own country?
You've made your point that investing in ABM and trying to obsolete ICBMs is a good idea, but is it a good idea at this particular moment in time? Starting another arms race is pretty much the last thing anyone wants, and this fear may also be affecting politicians. As I observed, it would probably take a great deal of political capital to convince the legislators and their constituents of this, barring some foreign policy disaster (like an actual, blatant threat from China to use their ICBMs to try to score a political victory).
Straw man. Nobody has ever said we should drop everything else. And if you haven't heard Pentagon people sceraming that ABM is needed, you haven't been listening
Assuming that we maintain the current proportion of military funds, then its a strawman. However, I support spending a lot less money on the military period. I'm most interested in maintaining air supremacy and readiness of the weapons systems we currently have. Once again, perhaps my ignorance has asserted itself, but dropping a bunch of money into R&D during the current crisis struck me as a bit odd, especially since the fiscal conservatives are currently screaming about the massive deficit (some of whom even cares about the deficit when it was Bush's) and everyone is currently occupied with the Herculean tasks of the economy and healthcare.
As for the Pentagon, my Google-fu is weak again. Who is doing the screaming?
Ask Pakistan.
Pakistan doesn't have infrastructure and population?
The argument about "there are other things we should buy first" is seductive but its fundamentally fallacious. There are always other things we need.
How is it fallacious? Yes, there ARE always other things we need, and like everything else, we need to make judgment calls. I'll confess that your arguments have led me to bump ABM a few places up my mental list, but conversely you have failed to convince me that we are under some sort of imminent nuclear threat. ABM is something to be developed and constructed with the support of other nations (i.e. don't just go to Russia and wave a list of changes you want in the ABM treaty at them) as protection for everyone in the world.
At least if Russia's the threat, then Germany has Poland as a speed bump (sell more Leopards to them!). 
