Posted on 09/22/2008 7:01:41 PM PDT by markomalley
Democratic presidential nominee Barack Obama moved to claim the mantle of fiscal responsibility in a roiling economy, vowing on Monday to slash federal spending on contractors by 10 percent and saving $40 billion.
Urging members of his own party to be just as fiscally tough as the most conservative Republicans, Obama said the $700 billion economic bailout plan proposed by the Bush administration and congressional leaders is forcing a renewed look at federal spending.
As president, Obama said he would create a White House team headed by a chief performance officer to monitor the efficiency of government spending.
"I am not a Democrat who believes that we can or should defend every government program just because it's there," Obama said at a rally in Green Bay. "We will fire government managers who aren't getting results, we will cut funding for programs that are wasting your money and we will use technology and lessons from the private sector to improve efficiency across every level of government."
(SNIP)
"We are here because an ethic of irresponsibility has swept through our government, leaving politicians with the belief they can waste billions and billions of your money on no-bid contracts for friends and contributors, slip pork projects into bills during the dead of night and spend billions on corporate tax breaks we can't afford and old programs we don't need," said Obama.
(snip)
President Bush ran for office on a platform of efficiency in government, Obama said, noting that Bush instead has presided over a mushrooming federal budget and deficits. Under Bush, spending on contractors has more than doubled, from $203 billion in 2000 to $412 billion in 2006.
(Excerpt) Read more at ap.google.com ...
He’ll hire all his lefty friends who will soak the gov.
i feel safe with a white houe team keeping up with gov spending. sure i do.
OMG! He sounds like one of those dorky supervillians who surrounds himself with incompetents just so he can blame them when everything blows up.
Palin has done exactly this already in Alaska.
McCain is the leader on this issue.
Obama, please stop stealing ideas from others.
At some point you please show some ethical standards.
Yeah, Barak! Cut out those minority set-aside contracts, and save the taxpayers $500 Billion. Hey, where are all you black voters going? We didn't really mean it.
He means DEFENSE contractors.
Say goodbye to BlackWater.
I suggest he start with the schools. Federal money to the schools should be tied to results and vouchers should go to the parents of children in schools that fail to meet benchmarks. If the government schools can't do it, let the private sector schools teach them a lesson.
I work for a small defense contractor. Many of my colleagues are Obama supporters. Talk about your “cognitive dissonance.” Obama good; defense contractor bad. Oh, wait a second here.
Actually heard one of his lackey types insisting that all Obama’s promises will be kept because all his spending will be paid for.
Shameless lies surpassing the most famous lie of recent times.... I did not have sexual relations with that woman.
The only way they could do that would be to replace my position with a government employee. Which I'd be happy to do, but that's not going to save them money in the long term.
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