Blog: The Fine Print / Open, Accountable Government

Robert Samuelson Is An Elitist

Feb 14, 2007 by Matt Lewis

To follow up on Craig's post, I wanted to comment on Robert Samuelson's contempt for the American public. From his column: We could consider all of federal spending and not just small bits of it. But most Americans don't want to admit that they are current or prospective welfare recipients. They prefer to think that they automatically deserve whatever they've been promised simply because the promises were made. Americans do not want to pose the basic questions, and their political leaders mirror that reluctance. This makes the welfare state immovable and the budget situation intractable.

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Samuelson Misremembers Recent Deficit History

Feb 14, 2007 by Craig Jennings

Robert Samuelson's column in the Washington Post this morning is a broadside against entitlement spending. You see, Samuelson believes that Congress will never balance the budget because so many Americans receive welfare (read: Social Security, Medicare, Medicade) that cutting such programs is politically impossible. And because raising taxes is also politically impossible, eliminating the federal budget deficit is impossible.

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Baucus Says No to SS Privitization Nominee

Feb 14, 2007 by Adam Hughes*

Senate Finance Committee Chairman Max Baucus (D-MT) announced today he will not take up the nomination of Andrew Biggs to be Deputy Commissioner of the Social Security Administration. Biggs was nominated last year but was not confirmed and was re-nominated this year by President Bush. In making his announcement, Baucus said: Andrew Biggs

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New Fact Sheet on President's Budget and Tax Policy

Feb 13, 2007 by Matt Lewis

The President's supporters have been contradicting the findings of a 2006 Department of the Treasury study while defending the Bush tax cuts. Check out this new OMB Watch fact sheet for the story.

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President Proposes Unrealistic Cuts to Veteran's Health

Feb 13, 2007 by Matt Lewis

The Bush budget plays games with funding for veteran's health care. The Washington Post reports: WASHINGTON -- The Bush administration's budget assumes cuts to funding for veterans' health care two years from now _ even as badly wounded troops returning from Iraq could overwhelm the system. Bush is using the cuts, critics say, to help fulfill his pledge to balance the budget by 2012. But even administration allies say the numbers are not real and are being used to make the overall budget picture look better.

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NYT Editorial on Deficit Reduction Lacking

Feb 12, 2007 by Matt Lewis

An interesting editorial in the NYT today outlines a plan that, if implemented, would seem to have a good chance of eliminating the deficit. Three quick complaints:
  • The authors are silent on the Bush tax cuts, so I assume they want them extended.
  • They are pretty much silent on the estate tax, although the make an oblique reference to only taxing estates bigger than $7 million- a huge cut compared to recent levels.

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Dionne on President's Budget

Feb 9, 2007 by Matt Lewis

EJ Dionne's column on budget trade-offs and priorities is a good read. This president will defend tax cuts by any means necessary. It was one of those moments when a public official gives away a larger truth by offering what seems to be a throwaway line. Testifying this week on President Bush's budget, Treasury Secretary Henry M. Paulson Jr. suggested he would not mind a bit if the Democratic Congress added money to prevent cutbacks in coverage under the federal government's children's health insurance program.

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Entitlement Enlightenment: Into the Bipartisian, Interbranch Breach

Feb 8, 2007 by Dana Chasin

Senate Budget Committee chair Kent Conrad (D-ND) and OMB Direct Robert Portman outdid each other at yesterday's Committee hearing. They lavishly praised each other's sincerity and good-faith bipartisan commitment to restoring the nation's fiscal imbalances by guaranteeing long-term entitlement program solvency, taking pains and risks to be sure to leave everything on the table, sharing a good-natured chuckle at the off-message public comments of a naughty Vice President who tried take some minor taxware of the table in broad daylight. The lyrics to their Kumbaya cooing were as follows:

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Health Care Wrongness

Feb 8, 2007 by Matt Lewis

A note on a budget meme that needs to be done in. The Washington Post: Some of its approaches, particularly the effort to restrain the growth of Medicare through additional means-testing and cutting payments to providers, are commendable; they merit more serious consideration by Congress than they appear destined to receive. The New York Times:

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CBO-Based Iraq War Cost Projections Swallow Surplus

Feb 8, 2007 by Dana Chasin

Amid growing controversy about budget war costs in Iraq, Defense Secretary Robert Gates has reneged on the commitment he made to Buduget Committee chair Kent Conrad (D-ND) and ranking member Judd Gregg (R-NH) during his confirmation process that he would present the FY08 Defense budget to the Senate Budget Committee next week (something Donald Rumsfeld never did). As we noted in FY2008 -- Mixed Budget Signals, the administration, presumably seeking to keep the enemy, as well as Congress guessing about it

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