Bush closing the gap on LBJ regarding spending...

[hardheadjarhead]

Interesting study:

http://www.aei.org/publications/pubID.20675/pub_detail.asp


It explains why so many Republicans are turning on him. Democrats (to quote Bush's Dad) might be "tax and spend" people. Dubya is a "no tax" and spend sort.


Regards,


Steve

 

[michaeledward]

Seems to me that President Bush has been all about reversing every policy of President Clinton ... Including the most embarassing Clinton policy statement - "The era of big government is over."

Me thinks the President has somehow lost his VETO pen.

But, he is an excellent leader ... did you see how House Leader Delay, following the President's leadership, offered to give back all of that Pork Barrel Spending in the so-fat-its-busting highway bill? And the same thing from Representative Young from Alaska. It was moving to see him offer to give back all those millions of dollars for the reconstruction efforts in Louisiana and Mississippi. Those constituents on Gravina Island will have to tough out the loss of their 4.46 million dollars, each.

Gee - now that I think about it, couldn't we just buy each of those citizens a boat, and tell'em to keep the change?

 

[hardheadjarhead]

Apparently a number of Republicans are tearing their hair out on this. He's increased spending, increased the size of the government, and hasn't found a way to pay for any of it...and he hasn't tightened the belt of government one bit. Not even a teensy bit.

After Katrina he started promising to pay billions to replace the damaged infrastructure. Where's he getting the cash for this magic show?

To date he has yet to veto a spending bill. What ever happened to being fiscally conservative?


Regards,


Steve

 

[Jonathan Randall]

Interesting study:

http://www.aei.org/publications/pubID.20675/pub_detail.asp


It explains why so many Republicans are turning on him. Democrats (to quote Bush's Dad) might be "tax and spend" people. Dubya is a "no tax" and spend sort.


Regards,


Steve

The idea of the Republican party as the party of "Small Government" and "Fiscal Responsibility", is a scam. The greatest increases of Federal power and the deficit over the past thirty years have occurred under Republican administrations.

Democrats may, as President Reagan so eloquently stated, be "Tax and Spend", but I would add that Republicans are "Borrow and Spend" - with the bill for spending hoisted upon the backs of future generations. We are at the point now where nearly 1/5 of our Federal budget goes to service INTEREST payments (not principal!) on the National Debt. Tax cuts are GREAT, but they MUST be combined with cuts in spending. Not to do so is very poor stewardship and morally questionable.

Don't take this to mean that I consider Democrats without sin in this - to the contrary, not only have they done nothing in Congress to control spending but they've been busy increasing spending themselves.

 

[shesulsa]

The idea of the Republican party as the party of "Small Government" and "Fiscal Responsibility", is a scam. The greatest increases of Federal power and the deficit over the past thirty years have occurred under Republican administrations.

Democrats may, as President Reagan so eloquently stated, be "Tax and Spend", but I would add that Republicans are "Borrow and Spend" - with the bill for spending hoisted upon the backs of future generations. We are at the point now where nearly 1/5 of our Federal budget goes to service INTEREST payments (not principal!) on the National Debt. Tax cuts are GREAT, but they MUST be combined with cuts in spending. Not to do so is very poor stewardship and morally questionable.

Don't take this to mean that I consider Democrats without sin in this - to the contrary, not only have they done nothing in Congress to control spending but they've been busy increasing spending themselves.

One of the best posts on this topic in a long, long time. Have we all really forgotten Reaganomics?

I grew up in California while the actor was governor and I just LOOOOOVE to hear young Republicans recount that the last time the state of California had a surplus, Reagan was in office. What they fail to mention is that Jerry Brown (governor before Reagan) put it there before he lost his re-election campaign to popular, comfortable Reagan. So Reagan took office while there was a surplus ... it was gone in - what? - less than a year? So technically the statement is not false, however, it is extremely misinformative and deceiving.

 

[Xequat]

I think part of the problem is that the Democrats had control for so long that the Republicans had to come up with a marketing plan and they came up with calling the D's tax and spend liberals. The problem is that now that they have control, they feel like it's OK for them to spend money because they have a bit of a referendum, even though that's not exactly what people voted for, if that make sense. One of the reasons I voted against Kerry was that I was afraid of increasing the size of the government, but now it looks like that happened anyway. This is definitely not what I voted for.


I don't think that Bush has vetoed a single bill yet. Mike pointed out the Gravina island deal where we are paying hundreds of millions for a bridge that will serve 87 people. Pretty sad when a liberal Democrat from CA offers to cut 45 million from her spending if the President will do the same, and he still doesn't do it.

Isn't the root word of conservative "conserve?" What's being conserved here? I understand some of the recent, unexpected, and necessary costs (let's not get into which ones are necessary or not, ie the war, NASA, etc.) and that's OK, but the pork has to go, and we need to start conserving or at least investing.

I love tax cuts; I can't think of one I didn't like, but you defeat the purpose of cutting taxes if you just raise spending by an even greater margin. I'd really like to see a moderate party, because this is getting sad. Actually, I think I'm getting a little sad.

 

[hardheadjarhead]

I guess what burns me is how tax dollars go to corporate interests. To cut spending would be to cut corporate subsidies.

Halliburton, as I predicted, got the no-bid government contract to reconstruct the Gulf Coast...along with Bechtel and the other companies currently holding the monopoly on Iraqi reconstruction. Millions and millions of our tax dollars will be going to these companies.

The Fortune 500 companies earned a whopping $375 billion (with a 'b') in 1997, yet the government doled out $75 billion in subsidies to these corporations in the form of government grants, contracts, cut rate insurance, loans, and loan guarantees.

If we eliminated these subsidies, we'd each have ten percent taken off our personal income tax rates...or we could have our payroll tax reduced by 3%.

The next time you hear somebody gripe about our foreign aid, remind them that we spend three times the amount on subsidies to cotton farmers as we did in sending aid to the entire continent of Africa.

We don't hesitiate to hammer on the individual American for his application for bankruptcy, but then we bail out the auto industry and the airline industry. If the individual has to take responsibility, ought not the corporations?

If you want to cut spending to justify tax cuts...start it with subsidies.



Regards,


Steve

 

[MisterMike]

The idea of the Republican party as the party of "Small Government" and "Fiscal Responsibility", is a scam.

You're right. Small government is a trademark of the Libertarian Party. :ultracool

 

[michaeledward]

One of the reasons I voted against Kerry was that I was afraid of increasing the size of the government, but now it looks like that happened anyway. This is definitely not what I voted for.

The Perscription Drug Benefit in Medicaid was a huge increase in the size of government. It was passed in the first term of the current Bush Presidency. It was further revealed that the actual costs of this benefit were grossly distorted by the Bush White House during the congressional debate. After its passage, Americans learned that the actual debated costs, and size of government was approximately 60% of what the actual benefit would require.

Also during the first Bush Administration, the President increased the size of government by creating the Transportation Safety Administration. The creation of the Department of Homeland Security also created some government bloat. This article, found while doing some instant search on DHS, pointed out some potnential problems with DHS which seemed to marterialize in the last month or so.

http://slate.msn.com/id/2066774/


I point these things out so that the next time you are asked to cast a ballot, you carefully consider that past is often prologue. It seems you decieved yourself with your ballot.

(let's not get into which ones are necessary or not, ie the war, NASA, etc.)

I'm wondering how long the war in Iraq has to go on before it can actually be included in the budget? You see, currently there are over 145,000 American soldiers on the ground in a foreign country, ... as they have been for three years ... and the country is still paying for their presence with SUPPLEMENTAL APPROPRIATIONS; like it some god-****ed surprise that they are serving there.

Hurricane Spending a Surprise = YES
War In Iraq Spending a Surprise = Oh, Come On!

And ... NASA is one of the two government agencies that has not grown under the Bush Administration (I don't know how the current lunar landing plans have affected the size of NASA) - the other is the Department of Energy. Further ... NASA has some international obligations that must be met, visa-vie the ISS.

NASA's complete budget is less than 1% of the Federal Government budget, and half of NASA's budget actually comes from military spending.

 

[Xequat]

I point these things out so that the next time you are asked to cast a ballot, you carefully consider that past is often prologue. It seems you decieved yourself with your ballot.

Thanks for the enlightenment. If you actually think that I voted against Kerry without looking into HIS past, then I am really insulted. We can disagree all day long and be civil about it (although I think we actually agree on this thread topic), but I think you know me better than that. And next time you try to educate me, don't give me editorials. I can find just as many editorials to support my arguments, but the fact remains that we agree with them, not that they agree with us.

I was just making the point that I am disappointed in the spending increases, not trying to start another election debate. I deceived myself? Not only does that not make any sense, it's an awfully arrogant thing to say. Thank you, Dr. Freud, but when a candidate paints himself as a conservative spender, and I vote for him, then I may have been deceived, but certainly not by myself. That's exactly the point: I do feel like I was deceived because I voted for someone who turned out to be something else. It's possible that Kerry would have spent more, but at least it wouldn't have been a deception because we all would have known it going in.







Again, I say "(let's not get into which ones are necessary or not, ie the war, NASA, etc.)." Seriously, if we sit here and debate each spending item, then I'm done with this thread because it will go on forever and I don't have that kind of time. We can debate the war in other threads; the NASA thing I meant was going to the moon, so we can do that in another thread, too, but that's why I asked not to get into that here. You probably know where I stand on those issues, but this is not the place. I don't blame you, though...after rereading my post, it seems that I lumped NASA and the war into the unexpected spending category, when that's not what I meant. I just phrased it poorly because I was about to go to bed and didn't pay enough attention, so sorry about that.