Posted on 02/07/2005 7:56:15 AM PST by SmithL
WASHINGTON (AP) -- President Bush sent Congress a $2.57 trillion budget plan Monday that seeks deep spending cuts across a wide swath of government from reducing subsidies paid to the nation's farmers, cutting health care payments for poor people and veterans and trimming spending on the environment and education.
The budget - the most austere of Bush's presidency - would eliminate or vastly scale back 150 government programs. It will spark months of contentious debate in Congress, where lawmakers will fight to protect their favored programs.
The spending document projects that the deficit will hit a record $427 billion this year, the third straight year that the red ink in dollar terms has set a record. Bush projects that the deficit will fall to $390 billion in 2006 and gradually decline to $233 billion in 2009 and $207 billion in 2010.
Bush's 2006 spending plan, for the budget year that begins next Oct. 1, counts on a healthy economy to boost revenues by 6.1 percent to $2.18 trillion. Spending, meanwhile, would grow by 3.5 percent to $2.57 trillion.
However, outside defense, homeland security and the government's huge mandatory programs such as Social Security, Bush proposes cutting spending for the rest of government by 0.5 percent, the first such proposed cut since the Reagan administration battled with its own soaring deficits.
Of 23 major government agencies, 12 would see their budget authority reduced next year, including cuts of 9.6 percent at Agriculture and 5.6 percent at the Environmental Protection Agency.
In his budget message to Congress, Bush said, "In order to sustain our economic expansion, we must continue pro-growth policies and enforce even greater spending restraint across the federal government."
But Democrats complained that Bush was resorting to draconian cuts that would hurt the needy in order to protect his first term tax cuts that primarily benefited the wealthy.
"This budget is part of the Republican plan to cut Social Security benefits while handing out lavish tax breaks for multimillionaires," said Senate Democratic Leader Harry Reid, D-Nev. "Its cuts in veterans programs, health care and education reflect the wrong priorities and its huge deficits are fiscally irresponsible."
Bush's budget does not reflect the costs for his No. 1 domestic priority, overhauling Social Security by allowing younger workers to set up private investment accounts. It also does not include any new spending for military operations in Iraq and Afghanistan, The administration has said it will seek in coming weeks an additional $80 billion for the cost of operations in Iraq and Afghanistan for this year.
Critics also contend that the five-year deficit projections also mask the costs of some Bush initiatives such as making his first-term tax cuts permanent, the bulk of which do not show up until after 2010. The budget puts the 10-year cost of making the president's tax cut proposals permanent at $1.29 trillion.
Bush's budget proposed increasing military spending by 4.8 percent to $419.3 billion in 2006. However, even with the increase a number of major weapons programs, including Bush's missile defense system and the B-2 stealth bomber, would see cuts from this year's levels.
Aside from defense and homeland security, favored Bush programs included a new $1.5 billion high school performance program, expanded Pell Grants for low-income college students and more support for community health clinics.
One of the most politically sensitive targets on Bush's hit list is the government support program for farmers, which he wants to trim by $5.7 billion over the next decade, which would represent cuts to farmers growing a wide range of cuts from cotton and rice to corn, soybeans and wheat.
Overall, the administration projected saving $8.2 billion in agriculture programs over the next decade including trimming food stamp payments to the poor by $1.1 billion.
Other programs set for cuts include the Army Corps of Engineers, whose dam and other waterway projects are extremely popular in Congress; the Energy Department; several health programs under the Health and Human Services Department and federal subsidies for the Amtrak passenger railroad.
About one-third of the programs being targeted for elimination are in the Education Department, including federal grant programs for local schools in such areas as vocational education, anti-drug efforts and Even Start, a $225 million literacy program.
In all, the president proposed savings of $137 billion over 10 years in mandatory programs with much of that occurring in reductions in Medicaid, the big federal-state program that provides health care for the poor, and in payments the Veterans Administration makes for health care. The administration proposed no savings for Medicare, the giant health care program for the elderly.
Many of the spending cuts in the budget are repeats of efforts the administration has proposed and Congress has rejected previously.
Your response makes no sense. Try again. I'll repeat my remark since you neglected to cut and paste it when you referred to it.
International assistance in the defense of this country is Constitutional. Don't forget.
Except I forgot NPR and Amtrack that another poster pointed out. Those have to go too.
What does discretionary spending have anything to do with inflation? Does your or mine depend on inflation. No, ours depend on income, assuming we don't have wealth. BTW, we didn't see the government spending less during times of deflation, so why should they spend more during inflation?
With the exception of the DOE(unfortunately), since 2001 all discretionary increases above the level of inflation and population growth have been related to Homeland defense spending.
I am sorry that you didn't learn similes in high school. Inter-state commerce for the left is like national security for you. Get it?
Stabilizing a part of the word with foreign aid is what the liberals and you don't like.
To our troops, who have to fight terrorists who breed in unstable parts of the world, it's what might save their life.
You gets?
Many veterans are malingerers.
Get smart. Vote Libertarian.
Get smart. Vote Libertarian.
I didn't think bribing third world countries was the American way. Maybe things have changed. BTW, you must be blind. Look at the cumulative table again. I am leaving aside Defense or Homeland Security, although I am certain most of the spending goes to someone's pork. These days every local govt is trying to justify any federal aid on the grounds of homeland security. Anyways, education +39.8%, Commerce +84.5%, Energy +17.1%, HHS +27.5%, State and International Assistance +56.4%, White House Executive Office +25.5% (did they hire a new chef at the White House?), etc.
Thanks for selectively displaying and being hypocritical.
Money spent on others is not always a bribe. I spent money on my childs education. That's not a bribe.
Until you're capable and willing to debate this issue in a rational and logical manner, your arguments are convoluted at best. I've qualified the parameters of my argument based on the facts of the issue. We are debating the proposals of PresBush's 2006 budget. In that context, his proposals to reduce non-military discreationary spending are the issue. Mandatory spending on entitlement programs and social spending consume roughly 66% of the entire budget. Looking for 50% reductions in discreationary spending is irrational.
BTW. By taking exception to the increases in defense spending, you show a serious misunderstanding of the Constitutional requirements of the US government. Defending the US people is the #1 priority of the federal government. You may not have meant to come across that way, but nonetheless, thats the impression you gave.
The increases are lot bigger than the cuts, which are all under 5%. Why dont you show me a 39.8% cut or a 84.5% cut or even a 17.1% cut, which is on the bottom for big increases?
Touche!
BUMP
Although cutting the aircraft carrier is a bad idea.
You must be blind. Read your chart again. Non-DOD and nondiscretionary spending in Bush's 2002, 2003 and 2004 budgets averaged 5%. It's not what I like by any stretch, but it certainly isn't what you describe.
You're being selective in what you display. Objective people don't do that.
LOL!
I said I will not debate about defense because that is something we can all agree we need. The mandatory part of the discretionary spending is still small compared to the total budget for those agencies. Refer to my previous post where I list them. My biggest beef is with homeland security which has become a welfare program for states and cities. Why not look at the total picture from 2001? Wasn't Bush in power since 2001? I will claim he is a fiscal conservative when he returns spending to at least the Bill Clinton's level.
You're an idiot.
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