Congresman Moran's News Commentary

The President’s fiscal year 2006 Budget was sent to Congress this week. It arrived with a distinct thud. Fiscally and morally irresponsible, this budget would add trillions to the deficit over the next 10 years while requiring the working class and poor to shoulder a disproportionate share of what was cut.

Veterans, local police and fire departments, health and education initiatives took significant hits in this year’s budget. Under the President’s blueprint for federal spending, veterans will have to pay more for prescription drugs. The COPS program, which has added 100,000 officers to our nation’s streets, was cut to zero, a loss of $480 million. The “No Child Left Behind” education law continues to be way under funded. Health care funding for children, the elderly, and people with disabilities gets cut by $60 billion. With 45 million uninsured Americans, this budget will add 350,000 people to the U.S. health insurance crisis.

Even with the misplaced priorities reflected by the programs the President chose to cut, the President’s budget remains fiscally irresponsible. It does nothing to address the record deficit of $427 billion and it does not even include funding for the two issues that dominated the President’s State of the Union Address - Social Security and Iraq.

The President’s budget also included no details on the Republican plan to privatize Social Security. In fact, his budget continues the raid on the Social Security Trust Fund, borrowing and spending all of the money from the Social Security Trust Fund over the next five years. His failure to provide a clear and honest accounting of the difficult trade-offs between increases in the debt, benefit cuts, and tax increases necessary to fund the White House’s privatization proposal is a failure of leadership. Democrats stand ready to address the challenges facing Social Security, but the President must put forward a proposal that is fiscally responsible, fair, and does not slash benefits.

The cost of military operations in Iraq and Afghanistan has cost $200 billion so far, but those costs continue to be unaccounted for in the President’s budget. The American people deserve an honest accounting of the cost of this war but the administration has repeatedly refused.

Pay-go budget rules, requiring that any increase in spending occur in tandem with an increase in revenue were once again, persona non grata. These tools of fiscal discipline were abandoned long ago by the President and the Majority Party in Congress. This despite their crucial role in creating the surplus enjoyed during the Clinton years, which has now become a record $4.5 trillion projected deficit.

President Bush’s budget is an unfortunate step in the wrong direction and a clear indication of the price we pay for having a rubber stamp Republican majority in the House of Representatives and Senate. Democrats insist upon fiscal discipline with budgets that pay as you go, and over the coming months, we will fight for a budget that reflects the values of America’s middle class: national security, prosperity, opportunity, fairness, community, and accountability. A responsible budget is the first step toward building a future worthy of the trust of the American people, the sacrifices of our men and women in uniform, and the aspirations of all of America’s children.