Congress, President Running Out of Time To Achieve Fiscal Priorities In our last issue, The Watcher detailed the status of several federal spending measures that have been delayed most of the fall. In this issue, we take a look at what these delays could mean to millions of American citizens.

Funding for the Food and Drug Administration is dangerously low, says a new report by three FDA advisors. Barbara J. McNeil, a professor of health care policy at Harvard Medical School and one of the report's authors, said she was stunned at the agency's sorry state.

In an attempt to have people pay attention to the issue of the national debt, a recent Associated Press article lead with the eye-catching headline of "National Debt Grows $1 Million a Minute." Wow! $1,000,000.00 a minute! That's quite a bit of cash. The article is well worth a read and should make you even more disappointed that the current Congress is considering waiving PAYGO rules for a patch to the Alternative Minimum Tax (AMT). Such a move would add $50 billion to the debt immediately and the issue will have to be revisited all over again next year because the legislation being considered is only for one year. If they pass the AMT patch without paying for it this year, I wonder if they will pay for it next year? argh...

Last week's Going, Going, PAYGONE?, below, is now apparently only a partial report on the state of play on PAYGO, according to Congress Daily.