The Wall Street Journal parrots Administration talking points about the President’s $3.73 trillion budget, which is described as “balanc[ing] two competing and conflicting agendas: dramatic cuts to federal spending while also investing in programs to improve U.S. competitiveness,” and which contains “in fiscal 2012 alone…reducing or closing 200 federal programs at a savings of $33 billion.”
This is not impressive. Take a look at the historic tables in the budget to put these cuts in context. When you look at the budget in numbers that control for inflation, the budget for 2011 is still 25 percent higher than it was in 2008. It’s 60 percent higher than it was a decade ago.
Do Americans really think that our government should be spending twice as much as it did when the first Republican “Revolution” occurred in 1994? Of course not, which is why Congress needs to ignore this budget and start fresh with one that uses 2008 (or earlier) as a baseline. Yes, this will require make tough choices on entitlement programs. Far from political posion, I think Americans will welcome hearing a serious conversation about reforming programs that we all know are a coming train wreck.
The media needs to dig a little deeper than top-line bragging about eliminating a couple million dollar programs. This isn’t anything close to the kind of fiscal discipline that Americans are demanding.