Reality-Based Engineering: WaPo: GOP Congress Embraces Its Spending Ways

Thursday, August 04, 2005

WaPo: GOP Congress Embraces Its Spending Ways

And they are being told to hoist all this spending up as a symbol...my have the tables been turned. It really seems that all they do now is borrow and spend, borrow and spend. And cut all sorts of taxes for the sake of cutting them and then go and use their Peoples' Republic of China and Japan credit cards, push up the debt ceiling and charge away:

Having skirted budget restraints and approved nearly $300 billion in new spending and tax breaks before leaving town, Republican lawmakers are now determined to claim full credit for the congressional spending. Far from shying away from their accomplishments, lawmakers are embracing the pork, including graffiti eradication in the Bronx, $277 million in road projects for Speaker J. Dennis Hastert (R-Ill.), and a $200,000 deer-avoidance system in New York.
When the year started, President Bush made spending restraint a mantra, laying out an austere budget that would freeze non-security discretionary spending for five years and setting firm cost limits on transportation and energy bills. But now, as Congress fills in the details of the budget plan, there is little interest in making deep cuts and enormous pressure to spend...
..."If you look at fiscal conservatism these days, it's in a sorry state," said Rep. Jeff Flake (R-Ariz.), one of only eight House members to vote against the $286.5 billion transportation bill that was passed the day before the recess. "Republicans don't even pretend anymore."

Sorry, Mr. Flake - while my fiscal responsibility-side sympathizes with you, your national party decided to forego all restraints on spending to stay in power (sound like a familiar theme from the 80's?) and hitch its wagon to the Neo-Cons and Theo-Cons in order to get elected. Fiscal conservatives have to be beating their heads against a wall - guys like McCain and Dominici in the Senate especially.

To fiscal conservatives, it is not just the total cost of the bills but also their content. Covering 1,752 pages, the highway bill is the most expensive public works legislation in U.S. history, complete with 6,376 earmarked projects, according to the watchdog group Taxpayers for Common Sense. Kern County, Calif., home of powerful House Ways and Means Chairman Committee Chairman Bill Thomas (R), snagged $722 million in projects, or nearly $1,000 per person. Los Angeles County, with clogged highways and 10 million people, will receive barely $60 per resident.