Congress passes sound budget
Today’s fiscally-sound budget is a compromise between the left-of-center Ryan roadmap and the right-of-center Rand proposal.
Congress passed the 2011 federal budget this morning, six months after the October 1 deadline. Compromising between the Paul Ryan (R-WI) and Rand Paul (R-KY) budget proposals, the 2011 budget brings spending down to levels not seen since 2008 and, if Congress can stick to the roadmap provided, will bring the budget into balance within 11 years.
Senator Ryan’s original roadmap would have taken 53 years to bring the budget into balance, whereas Senator Paul’s budget would have taken only 5 years to balance the budget. “We thought we could compromise between the left-of-center and right-of-center proposals, and bring it to 11,” said Ryan.
“This is why bipartisanship is so important,” added House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi (D-CA). “When Democrats held both Houses and the White House, we couldn’t pass a budget.”
“It’s odd,” explained House Minority Whip Steny Hoyer (D-MD). “But we needed someone to compromise with. Politicians can’t pass anything without compromise. If one party runs everything, as we did from 2008 through 2010, we can’t get anything done, because there’s no one to compromise but ourselves.”
“Compromise, ultimately, is the only way you balance the budget,” replied Senator Paul. Paul added that Democrats had to compromise to include military expenditures in the budget cuts.
Republicans gave in to Democrat demands to defund the Department of Education. “A national government education czar is too easily misused for a dictatorship,” warned Senator Charles Schumer (D-NY). “I’m not accusing the Republicans of wanting to take over local educational curriculums for partisan gain, I’m just saying that having a national Department of Education is too extreme for America.”
“I don’t see it as bipartisan,” said Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-NV). “It’s just common sense. We can’t leave a broken America to the next generation just to pay off political cronies today.”
President Obama (I-GWB) has promised to sign the budget once it arrives at his desk.
- Rand Paul budget plan: Rand Paul at Rand Paul—U.S. Senate
- “This will be the third year in a row in which the U.S. Government runs a budget deficit near- or greater-than $1 trillion. These deficits are far greater than what is economically sustainable, and economically responsible. The solution to the government’s fiscal crisis needs to begin by cutting spending at the heart of the problem—right here, on Capitol Hill. This proposal would be to cut the Legislative Branch by 23 percent or $1.283 billion in FY 2011. Consistent with many of the spending cuts included in this proposal, the Legislative Branch is taken back to FY2008 levels, and includes the elimination of an outdated agency, the Government Printing Office.”
- A Roadmap for America’s Future: Paul Ryan
- “The Federal Government’s current fiscal path is unsustainable: it leads to unprecedented levels of spending and debt that will overwhelm the budget, smother the economy, weaken America’s competitiveness in the global 21st century economy, and threaten the survival of the government’s major benefit programs.”
- Sen. Rand Paul Introduces Five-Year Balanced Budget Plan: Rand Paul at Rand Paul—U.S. Senate
- “How long can we afford spending money we don’t have?”
More balanced budget
- The Family Cow
- If you kill the cow for steak today, you won’t have any milk tomorrow. We are digging deep into our national cash cows—taxpayers—and we’re going to soon run out.
More deficit
- Blogs blowup bipartisan Boehner budget
- A hundred million here, a hundred million there, but the billions don’t happen until Tuesday.
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