The fat lady hasn’t sung yet: The budget deal fine print is “still under negotiation.”
A government shutdown is averted as congressional leaders have reached an agreement on a budget deal. Here’s some analysis of the political ramifications.
A government shutdown would idle all but 500 NASA workers.
Leftwing civility: “Let’s dump trash at Boehner’s pad.”
NASA, crunched for money due to overages on James Webb Space Telescope, has cancelled its participation in the space gravitational wave mission LISA.
Two Americas: public vs. private. The graph illustrates our nation’s problems quite clearly.
After much fussing in the vote-counting process, the conservative judge has won in Wisconsin. This probably ends the debate over the union law passed last month, which will now become law.
More progress, if true: The Republican 2012 budget proposal includes nothing for Obamacare.
Looks like he has decided to shut the government down: Obama rejects latest Republican budget.
From the British science journal Nature: NASA human space-flight programme lost in transition.
Progress! The House Republicans propose $6.2 trillion in cuts over the next 10 years.
The House Republicans last night introduced a one-week stopgap continuing resolution with $12 billion in spending cuts.
My heart bleeds: Federal workers in shutdown limbo.
Considering government workers generally make twice the salary of workers in the private sector, I have little sympathy for them and consider this to be nothing more than a pig squealing.
The Republican response to the various Democratic claims that a budget deal is imminent: There is no deal, and $33 billion in cuts is “not enough.”
It’s a start, though it really isn’t enough: the Republican 2012 budget will call for $4 trillion-plus in cuts over the next decade.
Ryan said Obama’s call for freezing nondefense discretionary spending actually locks in spending at high levels. Under the forthcoming GOP plan, Ryan said spending would return to 2008 levels and thus cut an additional $400 billion over 10 years. [emphasis mine]
Note that no one was starving and children weren’t dying for lack of federal spending in 2008.
It’s a trend! Ohio and New Hampshire have followed Wisconsin, their legislatures passing laws limiting union power.
Note that in New Hampshire, the law still has to be approved by the state Senate.
This idiotic thing has got to be repealed: Nearly $2 billion already paid to unions, state public employee systems, and big corporations under Obamacare.
The program began making payouts on June 1, 2010. Between that date and the end of 2010, it paid out about $535 million dollars. But according to the new report, the rate of spending has since increased dramatically, to about $1.3 billion just for the first two and a half months of this year. At that rate, it could burn through the entire $5 billion appropriation as early as 2012. [emphasis mine]
The squealing is now getting idiotic: The administrator of the U.S. Agency for International Development claimed on Wednesday that GOP budget cuts for the 2011 budget “would lead to 70,000 kids dying.”
“These Aren’t Serious People.” Jim Hoft of Gateway Pundit today puts the whole budget mess in clear perspective. As usual, the charts are what make his point so clearly.
More proof it’s nothing but pork: Witnesses at House committee hearing express strong concerns about the heavy-lift rocket plan (the-program-formerly-called-Constellation) imposed on NASA by Congress.. Key quote:
“We simply do not know what is next,” said Maser, president of Pratt & Whitney Rocketdyne, which builds the space shuttle’s main engines. “We are in a crisis.”
A cautionary tale: Adventures in federal budget cutting.
The experience has been difficult and has caused me some personal problems. I am afraid this will be the case for anyone who tries to cut spending — in the face of an entrenched bureaucracy that thrives on ever-increasing budgets.
Now CNN reports a deal in Congress calling for $73 billion in cuts for this year.
Once again, though these amounts are minuscule, I like the political trend, which is blowing increasingly in the direction of cuts, and cuts only.
The reckoning is about to arrive: The federal treasury is down to $58.6 billion in cash with only $130.5 billion in borrowing authority.
Meanwhile former Democratic operative George Stephanopoulos reports that a tentative deal between the parties in Congress will finalize the cuts from last year’s budget at $33 billion.
As I said, the reckoning is about to arrive.
Are they blinking finally? Harry Reid (D-Nevada) suggested yesterday that the Democrats might be willing to compromise in budget talks.
The pigs rule! Congress to NASA: follow the authorization act.
In other words, Congress wants NASA to spend money (Pork!) on a rocket it can’t complete for the cash provided.
Senate Democrats and the White House offer $20B more in cuts.
This is further evidence that the political winds favor trimming the government. However, to find out how serious the Democrats are we’d need to find out some details about their specific proposed cuts.
More on the space war over NASA from Jeff Foust of The Space Review. Also read this Aviation Week article.
Overall, it is still a mess, with much of the money allocated to NASA a complete waste that will not get us into space.
He has a point: Fred Barnes argues that the Republican incremental approach to cutting the budget makes sense politically. Key quote:
The end zone is far away, however, and impatience won’t get Republicans there. Impatience is not a strategy. It may lead to a government shutdown with unknown results. To enact the sweeping cuts they desire, Republicans must hold the House and capture the Senate and White House in the 2012 election. Then they’ll control Washington. Now they don’t.
