Morning Bell: The Obama Spending Cut Farce Continues

Conn Carroll / May 07, 2009

On October 7, long after Lehman Brothers collapsed and the extent of our economic downturn was known, Teresa Finch of Nashville, Tennessee, asked both presidential candidates: “How can we trust either of you with our money when both parties got — got us into this global economic crisis?” Then-candidate Barack Obama replied: “What I’ve proposed, you’ll hear Sen. McCain say, well, he’s proposing a whole bunch of new spending, but actually I’m cutting more than I’m spending so that it will be a net spending cut.” A “net spending cut.” That is what the President of the United States promised the American people. And of all the promises that President Barack Obama has broken, his “net spending cut” broken promise is the most flagrant by far.

The Obama administration is clearly aware of the yawning gap between their rhetoric and reality. That is why on April 21, President Obama ordered his cabinet to identify $100 million in spending cuts in each of their agency budgets. Never mind that this cut amounted to just .006% of this year’s estimated $1.75 trillion budget deficit. But the Obama administration’s audacity did not end there. Today the White House will unveil $17 billion in proposed cuts for next year’s budget. While $17 billion is a 1,700,000% improvement on $100 million, it still comes out as a farce when put in the proper perspective: (more…)