Appropriations

Feb 8, 2016

Top 400 Taxpayers See Tax Rates Rise, But There’s More to the Story

As Americans were gathering party supplies to greet the New Year, the Internal Revenue Service released their annual report of cumulative tax data reported on the 400 tax r...

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Feb 4, 2016

Chlorine Bleach Plants Needlessly Endanger 63 Million Americans

Chlorine bleach plants across the U.S. put millions of Americans in danger of a chlorine gas release, a substance so toxic it has been used as a chemical weapon. Greenpeace’s new repo...

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Jan 25, 2016

U.S. Industrial Facilities Reported Fewer Toxic Releases in 2014

The Toxics Release Inventory (TRI) data for 2014 is now available. The good news: total toxic releases by reporting facilities decreased by nearly six percent from 2013 levels. Howe...

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Jan 22, 2016

Methane Causes Climate Change. Here's How the President Plans to Cut Emissions by 40-45 Percent.

UPDATE (Jan. 22, 2016): Today, the Bureau of Land Management (BLM) released its proposed rule to reduce methane emissions...

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more news

Renewing Fiscal Responsibility

Sep 25, 2007 by Matt Lewis

The Brookings Institution will be hosting an event to get the presidential candidates focused on the deficit. But only six years post-Clinton, they may be tilting at windmills.

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FY 2008 War Funding Could Top $200 Billion

In May, Congress passed a $99.5 billion supplemental war spending bill that expires on Sept. 30. The next supplemental bill for FY 2008 war spending is expected to total close to $200 billion. That total, however, is an estimate based on speculation in Washington and continuously changing conditions in the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan.

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Congress to Vote on Compromise SCHIP Package

House and Senate negotiators have agreed to an expansion of the State Children's Health Insurance Program (SCHIP) that closely mirrors the earlier Senate version. The House is scheduled to vote on the package today, Sept. 25, with the Senate voting later in the week. President Bush has promised to veto the bill.

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More on Funding Priorities

Sep 25, 2007 by Matt Lewis

From the AFL-CIO blog: Let's also use these numbers for the appropriations conflict. That'd make 82 more days in Iraq as costly as the difference between the President's budget requests and the Congressional proposal. The President's cuts would take away:

nearly 370,000 veterans' health care
9,223 teaching jobs
12,000 cops

See this breakdown by state for more of the impact of the President's cuts. And check the headlines for the impact of the President's decision to keep funding this war.

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Truly Wasteful Spending

Sep 24, 2007 by Matt Lewis

President Bush wants (at least) $200 billion for another year of war in Iraq and Afghanistan. But he won't pay for health care for kids or veterans, or more cancer research, all things that would be funded under proposals Congress is considering but the President has threatened to veto. Dean Baker on the President's perverse priorities:

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Pear: Overview of Budget Showdown

Sep 24, 2007 by Matt Lewis

The reliably informative Robert Pear has a good article on the budget debate in today's New York Times. I didn't know this: Mr. Bush's public comments suggest he is determined to veto one or more appropriations bills, to highlight what he describes as excessive spending. But neither side has a postveto strategy. Democratic leaders in Congress say they have yet to resolve the most basic strategic question: Should they negotiate with the president or just send him bills reflecting their priorities and wait to see what happens?

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FedSpending.org Adds New Data, Features

Sep 20, 2007 by Adam Hughes*

FedSpending.org has launched a new version today, with updated data from parts of FY 2006 and FY 2007, new features and search functionality, greater accessibility for people with disabilities, and a few bug fixes in the site. The site now contains contracting data through the second quarter of FY 2007 and federal assistance data through the first three quarters of FY 2006.

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SCHIP Update: House to Vote on Senate Bill

Sep 18, 2007 by Craig Jennings

CongressDaily($) is reporting that House Speaker Nancy Pelosi will send to the floor the Senate-passed version of SCHIP renewal. Unless the House changes the bill, it can then proceed directly to the president's desk. If he carries out his threats, it will be vetoed. If the House does amend the bill, it will have to return to the Senate before it sees the president's desk, possibly delaying passage beyond SCHIP's September 30 expiration date.

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Take the BudgetBlog Reader Survey

Sep 18, 2007 by Craig Jennings

We here at the BudgetBlog would like to know what you think of our blog. Please take a moment to fill this short reader survey and give us your thoughts.

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White House Enlists Cabinet in Budget Fight

Sep 18, 2007 by Matt Lewis

The White House continues to push for budget cuts. Today's Washington Post: The White House in recent days told nearly a dozen Cabinet secretaries to send letters to Capitol Hill rejecting Democrats' proposed new funds for their agencies, escalating a confrontation between lawmakers and President Bush over domestic spending priorities.

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