[FesterUSMC]

Welcome to Free Republic! Free Republic is an online gathering place for independent, grass-roots conservatism on the web. We're working to roll back decades of governmental largesse, to root out political fraud and corruption, and to champion causes which further conservatism in America. And we always have fun doing it. Hoo-yah!

If the above statement applies to my grandfather who fought in the Philippines during World War II I want NO part of it, he is a good man, albeit a poor man.

[muleskinner]

If the above statement applies to my grandfather who fought in the Philippines during World War II I want NO part of it,...

Opus Alert?

[listenhillary]

He is family is he not? He is a veteran is he not? Did we discuss cutting benefits to veterans and I miss it?

I doubt there would be an abrupt cut off. Rather a transition back to a market based healthcare system.

[Ed Current]

$20,000 per Household: The Highest Level of Federal Spending Since ...

The 2003 fiscal year mercifully concluded on September 30. Reckless spending by Congress and the President made it a year in which:

• Government spending exceeded $20,000 per household for the first time since World War II,
• The federal budget expanded by $353 billion over its 1998 level,
• Defense and the attacks on September 11, 2001, accounted for less than half of all new spending since 2001,
• Mandatory spending reached its highest level in history, and
• Spending increased despite net interest costs plummeting by $110 billion.1

This paper examines the colossal expansion of the federal government since 1998. That year, a temporary tax revenue boom brought the first budget surplus in over a quarter-century. Abolishing the budget deficit also eliminated one of the most effective arguments for spending restraint, and the spending floodgates swung wide open. By 2001, the budget surplus was quickly evaporating because tax revenues, back to their historical levels, could no longer keep pace with runaway spending. The 9/11 terrorist attacks then necessitated new spending on national security. But by that point fiscal responsibility was a distant memory, and lawmakers steadfastly refused to balance these new high-priority security costs with savings elsewhere in the budget. As 2003 closes, the nation finds itself burdened by runaway federal spending and massive looming structural budget deficits.1