Tag: policy

Science budget map

2:16 am

Want to know whose getting what? The journal Science has put together this nice interactive table showing the various proposed budgets for the various science agencies in the federal government.

Though the magazine is undeniably pro-spending for science, the information is useful, as it shows clearly that even if every Republican cut is approved, the amount of money for most of these agencies will not be, on average, much different than what was spent in 2008. And it seems to me that in 2008 there was plenty of money for science in the federal government. Probably too much.

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House votes to move money from NASA to local law enforcement

11:19 pm

The House votes to shift $298 million from NASA to local law enforcement.

What idiocy. I can accept the idea of cutting NASA considering the state of the deficit. However, for Congress to instead spend the money for local police work, something that is definitely not the responsibility of the federal government, is plain foolishness. The need now is to cut, cut, cut, until the budget is under control. Only then can we reasonably consider spending money on these programs.

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GOP bill zeroes out programs, puts curbs on Obama initiatives

9:23 pm

Another look at the GOP budget cuts: Republican proposal will zero out programs and puts serious limits on many Obama initiatives. Key quote:

“In the last two years, under President Obama, the federal government has added 200,000 new federal jobs,” said [House Speaker John A. Boehner (R-Ohio)]. “If some of those jobs are lost, so be it. We’re broke.”

Not surprisingly, Democrats are squealing.

Democrats challenged the 200,000 job number and said he showed a callous attitude toward those who would be out of work. “Maybe ‘so be it’ for him, but not ‘so be it’ for people who are losing their jobs,” said House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi, California Democrat. Senate Appropriations Committee Chairman Daniel K. Inouye, Hawaii Democrat, said Republicans’ cuts amounted to a “meat cleaver” approach.

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Science an Early Budget Winner … But Fight Has Just Begun

10:44 am

Await the squeals from scientists: The journal Science notes the differences between the budget proposals coming from the House Republicans (cutting funds to science) and Obama (increasing funds to science) and hopes for the best. (You can also get a good idea about the increases to science that Obama proposes by going to this ScienceInsider story and scanning down the various articles.) Key quote:

Both conservatives and liberals agree: the main pressure pushing the federal deficit is entitlements; the discretionary budget is dwarfed by mandatory Medicare, Medicaid, and Social Security spending. And yet neither the House of Representatives Republican appropriators’ proposal to tackle the deficit starting in 2011 nor Obama’s new budget for next year tackles the real challenge of entitlements. Instead, both pick and choose the discretionary cuts they want to start with.

From my mind, we should accept the cuts from both sides, then go after the entitlements.

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A clarification of the Obama NASA manned space budget

4:07 pm

To avoid confusion, I want to clarify why I consider Obama’s commercial space budget proposal today to be a decrease, not an increase, from past budget proposals. The history of this budget goes like this:

  • In February 2010 Obama proposed to spend $1 billion per year on new commercial space.
  • Congress responded by reducing that budget to $312 million for 2011 and $500 million per year thereafter.
  • The new Obama budget for 2012 proposes to spend $850 million per year for commercial space, more than presently authorized by Congress but less than proposed by Obama only last year.

It is almost certain that Congress will trim these numbers. Meanwhile, the amount of money to the program-formerly-called-Constellation goes up.

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A victory for aerospace pork

1:52 pm

Update: See my partial retraction here.

The NASA budget announced today by the White House proves how right I was when I stated back on July 8, 2010 that I had no faith in Obama’s new-found commitment to private commercial space. The new budget reduces the funds for private commercial space while putting the bulk of its support behind the unbuildable program-formerly-called Constellation. First read what I wrote in July:

The problem is that I simply do not believe the Obama administration. Everything I have learned about the current President, including the specifics (or lack thereof) of his proposal, tells me that none of his promises are going to be fulfilled. » Read more

Bernanke to Congress: We’re Much Closer to Total Destruction Than You Think

6:51 pm

Bernanke to Congress: We’re much closer to total destruction than you think. Key quote:

One way or the other, fiscal adjustments sufficient to stabilize the federal budget must occur at some point. The question is whether these adjustments will take place through a careful and deliberative process that weighs priorities and gives people adequate time to adjust to changes in government programs or tax policies, or whether the needed fiscal adjustments will come as a rapid and painful response to a looming or actual fiscal crisis.

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Cutting the Full $100 Billion

11:01 pm

Keep this momentum going! The House Republican leadership was forced this week to increase its proposed budget cuts to $100 billion because of tea party movement pressure, both in the House and back at home. Key quote from this New York Times report:

The reversal was the most concrete demonstration yet that the wave of fiscal conservatives who catapulted Republicans into the House majority is reshaping the political and policy calculations being made by the party leadership.

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Are Health-Care Waivers Unconstitutional?

11:19 am

Are the more than 700 waivers to Obamacare that the Obama administration has handed out unconstitutional? The final paragraph sums it up well:

Waivers can be used for good purposes. But since the time of Matthew Paris [around 1251], they have been recognized as a power above the law — a power used by government to co-opt powerful constituencies by freeing them from the law. Like old English kings, the current administration is claiming such a power to decide that some people do not have to follow the law. This is dangerous, above the law, and unauthorized by the Constitution.

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Bernanke headlines a day of grim warnings about the nation’s fiscal standing

12:24 pm

Fed chairman Bernanke issued a grim warning yesterday about the federal government’s overwhelming debt. Key quote:

The national debt is currently about 60 percent of the economy, or Gross Domestic Product, [Bernanke] said, adding that it is projected to reach 90 percent of GDP by 2020 and 150 percent of GDP by 2030. But Bernanke’s citation of $9.5 trillion in national debt didn’t include the $4.6 trillion owed by the government to trust funds for things such as Social Security and Medicare, which have paid out cash to the Treasury in exchange for promisory notes. The full national debt – when both forms of debt are included – is already just under 100 percent of GDP, which is currently around $14.6 trillion.

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Senate Rejects Full ObamaCare Repeal but Votes To Kill ‘1099’ Provision

7:16 pm

By a vote of 51-47, the Senate today rejected a full repeal of ObamaCare. A second vote, 81-17, did repeal the 1099 tax paperwork provision.

No surprises here. This just illustrates the need to throw more of these clowns out of office in 2012. For one thing, many of the 81 Senators who voted to repeal the 1099 tax provision had voted for it only 10 months ago. Have they finally learned to read?

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