Updating their budget estimates, House Republicans conceded Thursday that their best hope is to cut current appropriations by $32 billion for the remainder of this fiscal year, once new spending for defense and other security needs are added to the equation.
The impact on domestic spending and foreign aid programs would still be very severe, with the GOP seeking an immediate $58 billion cut from President Barack Obama’s once expansive 2011 budget. But with the Congressional Budget Office predicting a nearly $1.5 trillion deficit for the current year, the scaled-back estimates reflect the limits of a budget strategy so focused narrowly on one segment of appropriations.
As outlined by leadership and House Budget Committee staff, the new cap on appropriations will set a 2011 ceiling of $1.055 trillion—$32 billion less than the latest estimate by CBO of the full-year of the stop gap spending bill due to expire Mar. 4.
Most simply, domestic and foreign aid programs would be cut to $420 billion or about $40 billion below the levels now. But an additional $8 billion would be added for defense and security needs, even after making reductions from Obama’s Pentagon request.
This could accurately be summarized as “Yes, I had two double-bacon cheeseburgers with extra mayo and a large order of fries with gravy, but I would like to note my beverage was a diet coke.”
If you are not going to raise taxes and seriously cut defense spending, you aren’t serious.
ChrisS
November 1st: “If it weren’t for all those people on welfare and overpaid lazy government employees sucking at the teat of the government, we’d have this deficit problem licked!”
February 3rd: “You don’t say. Humph, well, I’ll be. Are you sure this is all we spend on welfare and education?”
I wonder if the Red State Trikeforce is going to send back their promise rings to the Nutjobs that they elected.
Hunter Gathers
Watching this thing die in the House (along with the TeaTard conniption fit that will follow) will be more entertaining than any movie that comes out this summer.
GOPers from swing districts are going to avoid this like the fucking plague.
cathyx
But cutting defense spending and raising taxes directly affects them. The cuts that they want don’t affect them at all. Get it?
Ivan Ivanovich Renko
They will never cut defense spending. There’s no better way to kill brown people than sending the biggest and best armed force in the history of humankind to their countries, donchaknow.
BGinCHI
@Hunter Gathers: Agreed. This is going to be really embarrassing when it doesn’t even pass a GOP controlled House. Unless they just gamble it’ll die further on and hedge their bets with the TP base.
cleek
mmmm gravy fries.
Villago Delenda Est
I’m sure many of you remember this, but there was a William “Refrigerator” Perry McDonald’s commercial back in the 80’s that pretty much ran exactly like this.
Punchy
They did cut da fence spending. Said that high-tech bullshit wouldn’t work in the desert.
piratedan
waits for the Next Big Republican idea…. increasing the taxes on the poor and call it a “National Incentive” for those folks to produce more to get out of that productiveless classification. It’s either that or a “school tax” for all those kids currently attending “Public” universities, as a way to share those costs.
Keith
And then there’s Option C: recategorizing expenses as not-expenses, thus magically making hundreds of billions of dollars of deficit spending go away.
trollhattan
We should let Morgan handle the books. They’ll set things right.
http://www.nytimes.com/2011/02/04/business/04madoff.html?pagewanted=1&hp
AB
@Villago:
I guess this has been done a few places, I thought of this:
http://thisishistorictimes.com/2011/01/warburger-the-infinitely-prolonged/
jl
“TeaTard conniption fit that will follow”
Actually, it will be interesting and important to record how many of those occur now, after their corporate funders have the House, and not much prospect of major legislation they don’t like getting close to being passed into law. Not much point in TeaTard intimidations, er, I mean, demonstrations, until next election cycle get going.
Zifnab
They aren’t even serious about their Ryan Roadmap. That plan was to gut agencies left and right. Even their commitment to destroying government has kinda tapered off.
I guess the GOP is just going to go into a holding pattern until the next election season.
redoubt
@Hunter Gathers:I’m a Fed. (sad sigh)
But incidentally: I’m so going to enjoy watching them explain to their constituents why the pork will be thin and stringy this year.
Dave
I wonder how many of these American Patriots were surprised to find out we spend 1/2 of 1% on foreign aid…
suzanne
I worked at McDonald’s when I was 16, and I still remember to this day the truly staggering number of people that used to do this. Double Quarter Pounder (we called them Double Heart Bypass) value meal, super sized, with a fucking Diet Coke.
And you’re so right about the GOP having the same attitude. I just have not yet figured out whether or not they genuinely think they’re being fiscally prudent, or if they are calculating and craven. Are they stupid, or are they evil? (Most of the Double Quarter Pounder people seemed truly oblivious.) I realize the end result is the same, but it would sure change how I feel about ’em.
azlib
Anybody with a functioning brain knows the Republicans are not serious about cutting the budget. The austerity rhetoric works fine in a campaign where $1B sounds like a lot of money, but is a rounding error in the Federal budget.
I really think their strategy is to expand the deficit by refusing to consider tax increases of any kind and refuse to cut spending significantly and watch the whole thing blow up within 10 years due to an enormous financial crisis. They will then, of course, blame the Dems for refusing to support spending cuts.
Barb (formerly Gex)
@suzanne: It’s a large group. My gut instinct is that the ones who buy in to the arguments are the oblivious. The ones who present the arguments are evil. Two shitty tastes all rolled into one shit-sandwich of a party.
Villago Delenda Est
@Keith:
That’s the George H.W. Bush “We’ll just put the shenanigans of my bank robbing son Neil and his buddies” “off-budget” so it won’t look bad.
Of course, his one of his other criminal children used the same technique to hide the cost of the “you tried to kill my daddy” war. When Obama said “the lie is over”, the deficit looked much worse, and the fucktards that are the teabaggers have been wailing about how Obama caused the deficit to increase so much.
Villago Delenda Est
@Keith:
That’s the George H.W. Bush “We’ll just put the shenanigans of my bank robbing son Neil and his buddies” “off-budget” so it won’t look bad.
Of course, his one of his other criminal children used the same technique to hide the cost of the “you tried to kill my daddy” war. When Obama said “the lie is over”, the deficit looked much worse, and the fucktards that are the teabaggers have been wailing about how Obama caused the deficit to increase so much.
Barb (formerly Gex)
@azlib: That will be when America is so desperate they will elect a gay atheist to fix up the problems left behind by the GOP. Who will, conveniently, be the source of all the problems once elected.
Ash Can
@Hunter Gathers: I would absolutely love to see the Tea Partiers completely flip their shit over this, and primary as many GOP legislators as possible with Caligula’s horse, Daffy Duck, and Orly Taitz. It would be doubly awesome if they could somehow get a Palin/Bachmann ticket nominated. If that all were to happen, the 2012 election could be the most spectacularly entertaining political event in this nation’s history.
Caz
The D’s don’t want to cut at all – in fact, they want to spend more. The R’s want to cut an itty bitty bit. Both parties have their heads up their asses on this.
And although the balloon juicetards don’t like the tea party, they are the only ones serious about cutting spending and getting fiscally responsible for a change.
So the score is:
Tea Party – 1
R’s – 0
D’s – 0
Juicetards – 0 (sorry, no points for how many times you call people “assholes”)
Just once, I would LOVE to see a post on this misguided blog about what the juicetards would cut. It’s easy to criticize – not so easy to come up with your own independent solutions, eh?
Ryan S
@piratedan:Haysuis!! dont give any ideas they couldnt have come up with on their own.
Barb (formerly Gex)
@Caz: Only one of the groups proposes to pay for the stuff that isn’t getting cut. That’s the point. The GOP is the party that wants to cut stuff to fix the deficit. They can’t cut enough. But nice job with your “look over there!” method of argument.
Mike in NC
@Punchy:
That can’t be good news for John “Just build the dang fence!” McCain.
jcricket
@azlib: This. Sadly.
It’s the California model. Just blame the Democrats for everything and obstruct any real efforts to make things better – while occasionally doing things that make the situation worse (i.e. spending increases without tax increases).
Although I do wonder, with places like Arizona and Texas seriously going down the austerity route, what would happen if Republicans actually got enough power to enact their Paul Ryan/Rand Paul roadmap.
Villago Delenda Est
@Caz:
Once again, Poe’s law in action.
It is fortunate for Caz that it is not a capital crime to be cretinously stupid in this country, or he’d be before a death panel faster than you can say Captain Jack Sparrow.
ChrisS
OP: “If you are not going to raise taxes and seriously cut defense spending, you aren’t serious.”
Apparently John was talking about the UK’s defense spending.
BGinCHI
@Caz: Maybe read more posts before you fire your weak sauce gun.
Cut defense, raise taxes on millionaires, for a start. And fix the tax code so that huge profits can’t be hidden or moved abroad.
Dave
@Caz: No…we have crazy, radical ideas like raising the top marginal rate back to where it was in the late 90s and not fighting wars of choice, of passing health care plans that actually save money and trimming a bloated defense budget. Yeah, we’re SO misguided out here. What would you cut, genius?
freelancer
Is that the score for the latest game of, “Score points with morons for looking at the wrong camera!”?
Barb (formerly Gex)
@Dave: Department of Education. I mean, look where Caz got without all that book lernin?
Dennis SGMM
The Republicans are just setting up for a game of chicken over the debt ceiling. They have a laundry list of concessions that they want from the Dems so this is their big opportunity. If they were really serious about lowering the deficit they wouldn’t have insisted on maintaining the tax cuts for the wealthiest among us.
It’s Kabuki, pure and simple. I just wonder what the Dems will give up to them.
redoubt
@Caz: Thanks for posting your boxscore:
CAZ PH AB R H E
1 0 0 0*
*Struck out for TeaParty in 9th
Ash Can
OK, I’m calling spoof on “Caz.” No one could possibly be that much of a cretin and operate a computer without electrocuting himself.
Having said that, though, “Caz” can be my guest with enumerating everything s/he’d cut to balance the budget. That would undoubtedly be good for some laughs.
Hunter Gathers
@Ash Can: The convention that formally nominates a Palin/Bachmann ticket would create such a large disturbance in the Dumb Side of the Force that Tampa itself would be sucked into the 8th dimension.
Kryptik
@Ash Can:
No, I’m pretty sure it’s possible. I mean, look how many GOP Congresscritters religiously tweet all the time.
(In other words, Caz’s idiocy is sadly par for the GOP course)
daveNYC
It’s only a game of chicken if both sides don’t want to crash. The Republicans just want the Democrats to lose, and seem to be perfectly willing to take the country down with them in order to make it happen.
FormerSwingVoter
@Caz:
Coal, oil, agriculture and lumber tax subsidies (in some cases we don’t just give them tax breaks, but actual cash). Medicare and Medicaid should slow their growth considerably with HCR, particularly after the first few years. Defense cuts will help, particularly as we get the rest of our troops out of Iraq and start winding down in Afghanistan. START should help as well, as fewer nukes = fewer costs, but you can’t do that without Russia reducing theirs as well.
After this, you get into lots of smaller cuts that should add up. It might hurt some, but we can probably reduce quite a bit in grants to arts/humanities and foreign aid. TSA could use quite a haircut, and airports that privatize their security have done pretty well, as skeptical as I usually am of that sorta thing. Government Printing Office is obsolete. Consolidate agencies where there’s overlap, like the various low-income housing groups. Cuts to Depts. of Commerce, Agriculture, State, and Homeland Security. Decriminalize marijuana and reduce now-unneeded funding to DEA and DOJ. Consolidate the 38 different Corps of Engineers. Cut the General Services Administration. Streamline the OPM.
But: Don’t touch EPA, Social Security, or the Depts. of Education, Transportation, Labor, Health, or Interior.
How’s that sound? Do I have your vote?
Karmakin
What to do? As a start.
Raise taxes on capital gains to above income rates, in order to deflate some of these bubbles.
Take steps to ensure a sustained period of full employment in order to redirect money from corporate profits to wages, and as such to greatly increase tax receipts.
Drastically cut back on defense technological spending.
There’s 3 solid ideas right there. Frankly, #2 is probably the most important one of all, and I think it’s the only thing that will truly work.
piratedan
yeah Caz, we know it’s hard to govern, in fact its REALLY hard since the last time your team was in charge they nearly drove Western Civilization off the freaking cliff and we’re still picking up the pieces and you guys are still more concerned about federal money for abortion than you are about fixing any of the problems you asshats put into motion like unregulated finncial industry, unregulated healthcare industry and two wars that 1) Iraq should have never been started and 2) Afghanistan, if it had been executed proerly would have allowed us to crush Al Quieda when we had the willing assistance of the world to use.
So the next time you wanna “keep score” maybe you should take off your shoes and look at them and be grateful that you still have them.
Ryan S
@Caz: I would cut the military in half at least. just chop…. all branches
That and do away with the bush tax cuts.
rikyrah
they have never been serious about governing – irresponsibly, let alone responsibly. why do you think they’ve been floating the meme that they can’t actually DO anything while controlling the House because they don’t have the Senate and White House? because they don’t want to be held RESPONSIBLE for making decisions. Because nobody elected them to REDEFINE RAPE – that wasn’t in their commercials. and the more of this shyt that they pull, they just prove they shouldn’t be there in the first place.
Stillwater
@ChrisS: Exactly right! The hilarious image of these clowns eagerly pushing their way into budget meetings and strong-arming committee members so that they could heroically and patriotically Balance America’s Budget, only to be seen now, with their dicks in their hands, looking sorta puzzled that … really? that’s it? … Huh.
Hoocoodanode?
singfoom
@Caz: Fail.
How do you write a comment when you can’t read? Those above me have some good ideas. I know from hanging around here for a while that people have suggested cuts.
You start with defense spending. Oh yeah, maybe stop The “War on Some Drugs”. Now you’ve gotten your just once.
El Cid
When talking about the deficit and the debt, you must bear in mind that there is no revenue side. Revenues are unimportant.
The only factor that determines the size of the deficit is federal spending on social programs which conservatives oppose.
Also, if revenues were important, then collecting more would mean that too much was being collected, and taxes would have to be cut anyway.
danimal
I predict that the GOP will flounder with this proposal for a while, then watched in stunned silence as the White House proposes a combination of closed corporate tax loopholes and defense cuts that dwarfs the size of these cuts. They won’t know what hit them or how to fight back.
Ryan S
@El Cid: Revenues are for Euro liberal weaklings.. at least thats what I’ve been told. Real Men cut out their own organs for cash.
burnspbesq
@Caz:
Snicker.
You actually believe that? Are you really that stupid?
Man, we REALLY need better trolls here.
Xecky Gilchrist
This is what happens when constituents – and more than a few elected officials – have no idea what “million”, “billion”, and “trillion” actually mean.
jrg
@Caz:
Good lord. Do you right-wing fucktards ever read a thread before you post to it?
Ryan S
@danimal: They will do what they ALWAYS DO..
Tilt head slowly to the side and whisper, “Why does Obama hate america so.” Then say, “Look, Over there ABORTIONS!”
Maude
@FormerSwingVoter:
The Government Printing Office isn’t obsolete. You can get a copy of the ACA at the library. I don’t want to look it up, but I think we need that Office.
And, Ronnie Reagan, may he live/die to be 150 or
whatever they’re celebrating this weekend, never spoke against the Office. Also, too.
What would Obama sign when legislation is passed? You can’t tweet that.
danimal
@Ryan S: Of course you’re right, but the few remaining actual independents pay attention to this stuff.
FormerSwingVoter
@Maude: I feel like most everything that they provide can be looked up online, though. I feel like we could cut their budget a bit, but YMMV.
Marmot
I think one of the big problems with the Tea Party folks is that they seriously have no idea what $58 billion represents as a fraction of $1.5 trillion.
I had a girlfriend like that once. It’s just big numbers, and they’re super-impressed with deficits in the -illions. Similarly, Repub cuts to the budget that amount to -illions are gonna be huge, and are totally a serious response to the problem at hand.
Some reporter somewhere is going to accidentally type out “the Republican cuts amount to only 3.87 percent of the $1.5 trillion deficit.” Right? At least once?
Ryan S
@danimal: Now if you can actually make them vote.
azlib
@Caz:
Read my lips: The medium term deficit problem is dominated by the rise of health care costs. HCR is an attempt to contain their growth. Funny the Reps want to repeal it. It is perhaps the one piece of (albeit imperfect) legislation which actually makes an attempt to reign in the medium term deficit. If we do not contain health care costs, all the token cuts the Reps talk about pale in comparison.
Stillwater
@Caz: And although the balloon juicetards don’t like the tea party, they are the only ones serious about cutting spending and getting fiscally responsible for a change.
Yeah. They want to cut spending by eliminating superfluous government type stuff, like the Department of Education. Ironic, no?
elmo
@suzanne:
Heh. That was my lunch yesterday. Srsly, why the hate?
Why would I add another 250 calories of liquid on top of the staggering 1800 or so of solid food? I don’t prefer the taste of the full-leaded, so why order it?
gex
@elmo: Indeed this argument says a lot about Americans and our savings and weight problem. “Why save a little at a time?” seems to be the thought process.
anon84
@piratedan:
My money’s on them killing the mortgage interest deduction as part of ‘tax reform’.
Comrade Dread
@Caz: I know you’re probably not even on this thread anymore, but:
Tax increases:
1. Raise marginal income tax rates on the upper 1% back to Reagan-era levels.
2. Remove all corporate tax loopholes, then reduce the overall corporate tax rate, so that it effectively increases revenue, while being more palpable.
3. Everyone’s income in subject to FICA
Spending cuts:
1. Withdraw from Iraq, Japan, Germany, and Europe.
2. Reduce defense spending by 25%, phase out equipment and troops gradually. After 5 years, reduce tax rates so that people finally start seeing that peace dividend.
3. Disband the DEA. Good agents can be reassigned to the FBI, ICE, or the NSA. Decriminalize drugs, and place a tax on the sale and production to fund anti-drug media campaigns and addiction treatment centers.
4. Phase out farm subsidies.
5. Phase out energy subsidies.
6. Phase out direct foreign aid.
7. Review Health Care reform and look for ways to further reduce costs.
New Programs (as budget permits):
1. National transportation infrastructure upgrade.
2. Urban transportation infrastructure grants
3. Increased port and border inspection points.
4. Increased alternative energy research grants and construction of plants (nuclear, solar, geothermal, wind).
5. Enhanced law enforcement with regards to white collar crime and financial sector oversight.
I could come up with more. I’m sure not everyone here agrees with me, but the general difference is that they, at least, would be willing to rationally debate this program.
agrippa
@Caz:
drivel
Stillwater
@Comrade Dread: Nice work! That’s a pretty impressive, well thought out list. I’d like to see it Front Paged so we could have a discussion about it. I mean, the only one that seems remotely political (or politicizeable) is the elimination of farm subsidies. Otherwise, I’m very curious what the savings on the cut side would be.
agrippa
@Comrade Dread:
Comrade Dread:
Caz just comes and perpetrates a drive by rant forom time to time. mainly for kicks.
agrippa
@jrg:
right wing fucktards the ilk of Caz seldom read before posting.
suzanne
@elmo:
Why the hell NOT? At that point, after all the saturated fat and salt you just ate, the sugar is the least of your concerns. If you’re gonna indulge, just do it.
That’s another issue altogether. But be assured, you’re in the minority. We sold about three times more Coke than all the other sodas combined. We had vats of syrup in the back of the restaurant that were taller than I am.
Tone in DC
@Hunter Gathers:
Oh, AYUH.
NobodySpecial
@piratedan: Foul! Assumes shoes not in evidence.
Jeffro
Where’s the link to the NYT budget-balancing calculator thingy again?
I had that sucker at a half-trillion dollar surplus or better every year…
mclaren
Raise taxes on the rich.
Many folks don’t realize that the bottom 48% of the U.S. population by income accounts for only 1/3 of 1% of the total net worth in America.
1/3 of 1%.
Let that sink in, and you realize why tax cuts on the rich are an absolute necessity.
mclaren
@Comrade Dread:
Good list. A few small caveats.
First, Reagan-era levels were nothing. Let’s raise taxes on the top 1% to at least 85% or 90%. Remember, we’re only taking about raising marginal rates. So only those last few dollars after somebody makes 10 million or whatever per year get taxed at 85% or 90%. Everyone in the top 1% can obviously afford that.
When you say “everyone’s income is subject to FICA,” it’s still a little tricky. The very rich typically get income from things like stock options that might or might not actually count as income in accounting terms. At the very least, we need to greatly broaden the accounting definition of “income.”
I agree with disbanding the DEA, but the NSA doesn’t have “agents.” That’s a movie myth. The NSA has analysts, AKA guys who sit around in the basement of the puzzle palace doing crypto geek stuff.
Phasing out farm subsidies would actually kill poor people in the third world. Our cheap food feeds many hundreds of millions in the world’s poorest countries, largely courtesy of U.S. farm subsidies. Maybe change the rules so that farmers can’t get subsidies for not planting crops, and if they get federal farm subsidies, they must seel X percent to the third world dirt cheap.
Phasing out direct foreign aid has some severe consequences. Poor people in the Sudan starving, Israel probably not being able to buy weapons. That could destabilize the middle east.
National and urban transpo infrastructure grants are a good idea, but the essential issue here is that we need to totally redesign our cities for mass transit. That’s non-trivial. So transpo infrastructure money is only the start. We need to begin doing things like getting rid of suburbs, knocking down parts of cities and building new stuff like urban farms and parkland with bike trails in it within the city, and so on.
Reducing military murder-of-third-world-children-and-women spending (let’s stop calling it “defense” spending, please) by 25% will hit the economy hard. Our murder-of-third-world-children-and-women spending currently comesto 1.45 trillion dollars per year. Cutting 25% slashes about 400 billion a year from the military budget, which means losing a lot of jobs. We’ll also need some transitional spending to retrain those people away from murder-of-third-world-children-and-women work into something productive.
Stillwater
@mclaren: We’ll also need some transitional spending to retrain those people away from murder-of-third-world-children-and-women work into something productive.
Lawd knows but that’s gonna be a lotta dollars!
I like you’re inclusions/suggestions, good stuff (and I don’t mean that condescendingly). Can’t we get an FPer to post a list like this, get some discussion going? It’s most def an area that I don’t know the first fucking thing about, and I assume others as well.
Jeanne ringland
@agrippa: He’s a seagull: swoops in, dumps a load of shit and swoops away.
Jebediah
@Caz:
In case you’re still in this thread – your “challenge” has been more than met, and it sparked some interesting and informative discussion. That makes you a really bad troll. Is there a word or phrase for trolling that backfires and makes the troll look like even more of a carbuncle on a mangy, drooling, hydrocephalic farm-animal-buggerer’s ass than before?
Perhaps you should go back to pointing your weak-sauce gun at pictures of Crazy Eyes, Snowgrifter, and Oily Taint. Don’t forget to wipe your hands before digging in to the Cheetos.
Michael
@cleek:
Nasty and wrong. The only things that go with fries (besides lots of salt) are either ketchup or malt vinegar.
Xenocrates
The GOP wants to balance the budget, but first they have to find someone who knows how to count to 10.
Comrade Dread
@mclaren:
As tempted as I would be to go that high, I do think at some point taxes become counter productive, so I think 50% would be fine for the top marginal rate.
Plus, I like the irony that would happen when we propose a return to Reagan level taxation rates and the opposition predictably responds with charges of soshalism and job killing.
I don’t think that would be necessary, but if there’s still a budgetary shortfall with regards to Social Security, then I’d be open to exploring the possibility.
That is tricky, because our farm subsidies are also what keeps the price of crops artificially low and keeps third world farmers poorer than they otherwise would be.
A gradual phase out over time should slow the pain and hopefully allow time for more economic actors to enter the market and drive the prices back down.
Note again that I said ‘phase out’ not ‘cut off’. This is a slow process designed to maintain stability, identify critical recipients as opposed to wasted money, and become more efficient. Unfortunately with the world we live in, I recognize that there will always be cases when it is in our nation’s interest to bribe other countries. I just don’t think all of the money we’re shipping out now qualifies.
As far as Israel, they can continue to buy our weapons. They just won’t be subsidized to do so. And I’m sure the fact that they are a nuclear power should provide enough of a deterrent against conventional military attacks, that the entire ME wouldn’t fall into chaos should we take a more hands off ‘work it out yourselves’ approach.
That’s a bit too much central planning for my taste. I’d be happy with light rail lines that cover most of the major cities, and yes, the greener, the better.
That’s why you don’t do it all at once, and why you have transition programs funneling some of the troops into the other expanded areas I discussed: FBI (and I’d love to turn regulation of businesses into more of a law enforcement issue and turn it over to them), NSA, CIA, ICE, city and interstate rail line construction projects, ETC.
I’m not saying it would be a magic pill or easy, but it would move us toward: a balanced budget, fiscal responsibility, and improved security and infrastructure. And once we get some of the national debt paid off, it offers us more freedom to act the next time the economy heads south.