When will enough be enough?

Chipping away at our government

There's a lot of waste in government - just like there's a lot of waste in any corporation, large or small. It's all on scale with the size of the organization. I guess it seems worse when it's government because it's our tax dollars and we see it - but when it's from a company that makes something you use - your iPhone, for example - the cost of waste is built into the cost of the product, but you don't see it. Companies are not transparent the way government has to be.

So, when government cuts funding for the programs it offers, it would be nice to think that it is waste that is being cut. But, that's not the way it's going to work - you've still got a mammoth operation and waste is still taking place. The point is, services are being cut - not just wasteful spending - and useful programs are being cut and people are losing jobs and benefits. Think about that as you examine the chart below.

Wasteful spending

Cutting spending where it is important...

Reddit headline...


This year, we cut $75 million in homeless veteran benefits, but promised $27.4 million for NASCAR sponsorships

Tea Party nitwits

Conservatives clamoring to cut spending are often of the mind that it's easy - when in fact, most citizens want their share of government spending. The Republicans are just more willing to screw everyone else to get their cut.

Budget Pork

The most immediate budget problem in Congress involves the Bush budget for 2009. It never got passed last year in anticipation of a new President. And the 2009 budget I'm referring to here isloaded with pork-barrel spending projects. About 58% of that pork is Democratic in nature and 42% is Republican. But now the Republicans are ranting about the pork-laden budget - at least the 58% that's not theirs.

BTW, some crazy-ass spending projects might not be so bad right now as most of that money would help create or maintain jobs.

From Acerbic Politics

Keep Spending - Poster

Barney Frank - Right On

Barney Frank has lots of issues that piss off a lot of people. But in my mind, he is VERY bright and his remarks in this video are right on target and make fools of the Republicans.

Bush is a Liar and a Hypocrite (Day 2121)

George Bush has been speaking out against the Democratically controlled Congress, bashing them for overspending on everything except his war. The truth is, he is just about the biggest government spender of any President in modern times.

From McClatchy News Bureau - click the link for charts, additional information and sources.

WASHINGTON — George W. Bush, despite all his recent bravado about being an apostle of small government and budget-slashing, is the biggest spending president since Lyndon B. Johnson. In fact, he's arguably an even bigger spender than LBJ.

More on Bush and the National Budget

Bush, having declined to veto a single spending measure when Republicans controlled Congress, says he wants to veto just about all of them now. It is perhaps too near the twilight of his presidency to call Bush on this latest hypocrisy-and anyway, the repetition is tiresome. Better to illuminate the picayune nature of the fight Bush picks.

The dispute is over a total-spread among all the spending bills-of $22 billion that Bush himself did not call for. That amounts to about 2 percent of federal spending that is subject to annual appropriations by Congress. How else to put it in perspective?

Military operations in Iraq and Afghanistan are costing nearly $10 billion every month. The president's point isn't to force negotiations over a piddling sum. It's to fake out the public so that it believes Democrats can't perform basic governmental tasks.

Via J-Walk Blog