Republicans aim to cut expired programs

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Republican Study Committee Recommends Cutting Welfare Program That Already Expired

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2010/11/09/republican-study-committe_n_781122.html

Before y'all go getting your panties up in a bunch about the link to the Huffington Post, here is the direct link from the committee, led by Rep. Tom Price (Ga.)

http://republicanwhip.house.gov/YouCut/week1.htm

The republicans are off to a great start - go get 'em!

So? The co-chairmen of President Barack Obama’s debt-reduction commission will propose cuts to Social Security and Medicare, as well as reductions in income tax rate. Obama's not doing much better.

http://noir.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=newsarchive&sid=ajXqHH3ZYLvo

I think you missed it. EXPIRED programs. Meaning that they're not actually cutting anything.

Perhaps you should read your own article before inaccurately paraphrasing it. Obama's commision is indeed looking at some of the cuts you mentioned, but you left out the part about doing so "in exchange for curbing tax breaks." The article you posted goes on to say "Most economists say any effort to reduce the deficit will require some combination of spending cuts and tax increases."

Besides, how is this any defense against making imaginary tax cuts? At least Obama's working with current and factual data.

You really don't understand the U.S. Government do you. Just because a program is "Expired" doesn't mean it isn't still getting federal tax dollars. The Republicans are saying they want to defund the "Expired" Programs meaning they want to finish the job and cut their funding, so it is a spending cut.

And you miss the point that when a program expires, it is excluded from future budgets, meaning the budget for this program has already been cut. This is the usual way that programs become defunded by the government, in fact - that way, if it was popular, nobody has to take the hit for "cutting" it, but if it was unpopular, everybody can claim credit for "cutting the budget" by the simple act of not doing anything (something at which Congress excels...).

That, for instance, is how NASA removed expenditures for the Apollo program from their budget, without ever actually having to admit that they had no intention of returning to the Moon anytime soon - they simply stopped requesting allocations, and permitted it to quietly expire. As I understand it, something similar happened to the Ares program in the last budget cycle. It's also how the Civilian Conservation Corps vanished quietly into the night back in the Fifties - it was simply permitted to expire.

No, this is a clear example of how the Republican Party, once serious deficit hawks, have been reduced to "playing to the back rows", putting on the appearance of doing their jobs for the folks back home rather than doing anything substantive for the country. But then, what can you expect of a party with a stated (although publicly backpedaled-from) position that their major goal for the next two years, above and beyond taking care of the country's business, is to ensure that the sitting President isn't re-elected?

Funding expired doesn't mean the program is dead. That has happened numerous times at agencies only to get reauthorized later and employees also getting paid back pay. There is how things are supposed to work and what actually goes on.



No, President Obama cut Ares and essentially we don't have a manned space program. He ordered NASA not to request money for it.



"Expired" Program doesn't mean it is dead. Heck the Hubble Space telescope was "Expired" before. It eventually ended up getting completed anyways.

If expired doesn't mean dead, then why are the republicans freaking out over the possibility of letting the Bush tax cuts expire? Although technically they were never funded to begin with, so apparently there is a huge disconnect by the republicans about what the terms "funded" and "expired" really mean.

i get the distinct impression that your news sources are broken.

you should read what phil plait had to say about that.

or you could consult the scientific american, or physorg....

or do you think that only the government should be allowed into space? are you opposed to private companies launching manned missions?

oh wait, don't tell me. it's because canceling the program was something obama did and that makes it a bad thing.

politicians have a hell of a time defining simple words.

bill clinton didn't know what "is" meant. now we can't figure out what "was" means.

it just makes me want to sing the teamamerica song.

Never heard the saying “there's nothing more permanent than a temporary government program"?

Of course they are. He's a hyperpartisan right-winger; they don't trust real news sources because reality has a liberal bias.

<.<

because god is liberal?

oh man sometimes i forget how bad my jokes can be.

I watched some of the House and Senate debate concerning the funding on C-Span. I have an extremely good memory in some respects. I'm beginning to think you consider Al Franken to be the center on the political spectrum...

Want me to get started talking about his new mission for NASA to make Muslims feel good about themselves and how that went over with people?

F*ck Yeah

If you go by all the stuff his commie son said...