Democrats Attack GOP Budget for Deficit Projections (Hypocrisy alert)

AP Breaking ^ | > Feb 4, 2003 | Crutsinger

[Lance Romance]

Democrats Attack GOP Budget for Deficit Projections
By Martin Crutsinger The Associated Press
Published: Feb 4, 2003

WASHINGTON (AP) - Democrats accused President Bush on Tuesday of proposing a $2.23 trillion budget for 2004 forcing record deficits but doing nothing about them as the White House began defending its new spending blueprint on Capital Hill.

White House budget chief Mitchell Daniels used an appearance before the House Budget Committee to champion the plan's $1.3 trillion in 10-year tax cuts, which the White House says should spur the economy. The plan also projects deficits of $307 billion this year and $304 billion next year - surpassing the record $290 billion deficit of 1992 under the first President Bush.

The White House blames the weak economy and the fight against terrorism for the shortfalls and says the red ink can be managed.

"In fact, given a sputtering economy, it reflects appropriate economic policy, as the president decided in advocating a bold economic plan," Daniels said.

Rep. John Spratt of South Carolina, top Democrat on the budget panel, said by driving up deficits, Bush was passing on huge federal debts to future generations.

"I don't see any effort here to develop a plan that will get us out of the hole that's being dug," Spratt told Daniels, adding, "Where's the solution?"

The White House has said only economic growth and spending restraint can balance the budget again, a stance Republicans on the committee rallied behind.

"What matters is that we don't lose control of spending," said budget panel Chairman Jim Nussle, R-Iowa. "We must not commit to strategies that win popular support today, only to balloon in costs that will be imposed on our own children."

Newly sworn in Treasury Secretary John Snow was to testify later Tuesday before the House Ways and Means Committee.

Some Republicans in the Senate, where the GOP has a thin two-vote majority, were more guarded.

Sen. Charles Grassley, chairman of the Senate Finance Committee, said he was focused on finding "tax policies that can deliver the most immediate bang for the buck." Grassley has openly questioned whether he can round up enough votes for the centerpiece of Bush's economic stimulus proposal, eliminating individual taxes on stock dividends.

Bush's budget included the $670 billion in tax cuts over 10 years he first unveiled in January as an economic stimulus program, but the proposal has now grown to $695 billion. Treasury added $25 billion to the original $360 billion price tag for the dividend measure, after re-estimating of the program's cost over a decade.

Bush's budget also includes $588 billion in other tax relief, including making permanent the 2001 tax cuts, due to expire after 2010.

Bush blamed the deficits on the 2001 recession and the war on terrorism and insisted in his budget message to Congress that the best way to get back to a balanced budget was to boost economic growth through further tax cuts.

One item certain to get extra scrutiny after Saturday's loss of the space shuttle Columbia was Bush's proposal to provide NASA with a modest 3 percent increase - to $15.5 billion for the fiscal year that begins next Oct. 1, including a 4.7 percent increase for the shuttle program.

Less than two years after Bush projected $5.6 trillion in surpluses for the next decade, on Monday he estimated $1.08 trillion in cumulative deficits for the coming five years alone.

The budget mostly projected five years ahead instead of the customary 10 years. Administration officials said longer forecasts are guesswork, while Democrats said Bush did not want to reveal the full, bleak impact of his budget policies.

The president called for setting aside $400 billion over the next decade for revamping Medicare, the health insurance program for 41 million elderly and disabled people, including adding prescription drug coverage.

Bush proposed to give states more latitude in spending federal funds for Medicaid, which provides health coverage for the poor, and for Head Start preschools in low-income neighborhoods.

Marian Wright Edelman, president of the Children's Defense Fund, accused the administration of "waging a budget war against poor children."

The president would spend $782 billion next year for the operations of all federal agencies, excluding the two-thirds of the budget that covers automatic benefits like Social Security. That is $30 billion, or 4 percent, more than Bush has so far sought in the bills for this year that lawmakers are still writing.

Of that, half would be for the Pentagon, giving it a 4.2 percent increase over this year, to $380 billion. The new Department of Homeland Security would grow to $26.7 billion, $1.3 billion more than its component agencies are on course to get this year.

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[Lance Romance]

Marian Wright Edelman, president of the Children's Defense Fund, accused the administration of "waging a budget war against poor children."

AP had to resort to this old bitch just to get a jab in at Bush?

Not to mention, the Democrats were the ones that fought against the Balanced Budget amendment and created the massive debt we have now during the Reagan years. The crocodile tears and calls for fiscal responsibility fall falt.

[A Vast RightWing Conspirator]

I guess everyone should feel good and absolutely unworried if the nation's wealth is mortgaged at a rate of $1,000,000,000 per day for as long as the man in the White House is aligned with the GOP.

[Lance Romance]

Two fine Democratic defender today. Senator's Schumer and Clinton thank you.

[RJCogburn]

Democrats were the ones that fought against the Balanced Budget amendment

Right you are...and the repubs were in favor of it.

Now that the repubs are in charge, it doesn't seem like such a big deal to the Bush apologists.

Yes, there's sufficient hypocrisy to go around.