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It just gets your goat, doesn't it? Politicians promising "fiscal discipline" but, once elected, reverting quickly to "earmarks-as-usual"? The WSJ (A16) calls them on it excellently: "Return to Spender." Some quotes:
If they're wondering why the bottom's fallen out of their approval ratings, here it is...
Ostensibly the $606 billion "minibus" -- combining funding for the Departments of Labor, Health and Human Services, and Education -- is "only" $12.2 billion beyond the President's budget request for discretionary spending. But that's more than half of the $22 billion that Democrats want to spend for 2008 above the Administration's top line. (That $22 billion, by the way, swells to at least $205 billion in additional outlays over five years.)...
The Members also reverted to habit by using a House-Senate conference to "airdrop" $155 million in earmarks that were not included in earlier editions -- in violation of the 2006 ethics "reform." The conference also clandestinely removed a provision barring federal funding for the "hippies museum" near Woodstock...
Since there aren't enough votes to override Mr. Bush, it's back to the drawing board. Maybe next time Democrats should try something new -- say, spending less money.
Now check your blood pressure/pulse again.
1 comment:
That's so bizarre. Our two opposing heads going against each other in the election next week are doing exactly the same thing. Conspicuously so. The spending is spiraling into madness. I wish elections could just be the less insane affairs they were in the last century.
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