A day late and about $3 trillion short
After spending trillions of dollars on failed bailouts, TARP and economic stimulus that hasn't stimulated anything, Obama has been watching the polls. These polls show that while his personal approval numbers are at around 67%, the support for his POLICIES is at about 30%. Eventually, he realizes, if this trend continues, his policy numbers (a lack of approval for his policies) will end up pulling down his personal approval numbers.
So he is acting as quickly as possible.
His action: to propose "paygo". That is, to propose a balanced budget amendment that requires "pay as you go", wherein the government cannot spend a dollar that it doesn't have. It cannot spend without either earning that money in some way, or else cutting it from another part of the budget.
In concept, I like the idea of "paygo". It is a concept that a whole bunch of conservatives have supported for a long time.
However, there are several items that bother me.
The first is that "paygo" could be used as an excuse to raise taxes, ei: "We NEED this 'tunnel to nowhere' in order to create make-work programs, and since we have "We NEED this 'tunnel to nowhere' in order to create make-work programs, and since we have " we will need to raise taxes in order to pay for it." Every little item that the Obama admin decides "" we will need to raise taxes in order to pay for it." to be done will result in an increase in taxes to pay for it, rather than resulting in a decrease in spending elsewhere.
Another thing that bothers me is that this is being proposed by the man who just created the single largest spending program in US history, resulting in the quadrupling of the budget deficit, trillions in new debt for our children, and massive inflation that we haven't even BEGUN to see yet. And he's proposing it as a way to do spin control, rather than as a way to actually balance the budget. Talk about a day late and a dollar (or three trillion dollars) short.
And finally, what bothers me most is that he is specifically EXCLUDING healthcare reform from his "needs" proposal. That is, he's saying that anything that the government spends in order to nationalize healthcare will not be subject to "paygo", which means he can spend us into increased poverty for his healthcare reform agenda. Which essentially means that this "paygo" proposal is nothing but a farce.
What say you?
Elliot