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July 19, 2003 BALANCING THE BUDGET....Could we balance the budget if we just reined in all that wasteful spending so beloved of congressmen through the ages? Dwight Meredith says no. He's right. I'm all for cutting back on pork and frivolous spending, but that doesn't even come close to balancing the budget. As Dwight points out, if you really want to balance the budget you can either raise taxes or you can make serious cuts to Social Security and Medicare. Everything else is just picking nits. Posted by Kevin Drum at July 19, 2003 09:58 AM | TrackBackComments
Or you can hope the economy takes off again absent government action. It worked wonders in the 1990s--creating balanced budgets as far as the eye could see. Which, granted, wasn't very far. Posted by: James Joyner at July 19, 2003 10:11 AM | PERMALINKSocial Security, Medicare, Medicaid are mandatory? This is the entire reason some of us never wanted to get started with such inane nonsense. Politically popular? No doubt you are right, but isn't that really the point? Cocaine is popular with lab rats also. That doesn't make government provision of it, at the expense and coercion of the more capable among us, sound policy. Mandatory? Unfortunately, I think you are right. Remember though, while free lunches aren't available for O'Rielly, likewise, neither are they available for you, there is always a cost. That cost is individual freedom. Something that used to be cherished as liberty. No, not freedom from want, but rather freedom from innefective, unnatural coercion. Posted by: John Alexander at July 19, 2003 10:23 AM | PERMALINKI'll forego the latest tax cut if the liberals will means test, and I mean the only people who get SS and Medicare are those who have very limited other resources. Poverty prevention only. We can phase it in over 20-25 years. Anybody in? Posted by: spc67 at July 19, 2003 10:30 AM | PERMALINKis the 'net interest' line the amount we pay to service the debt? i've tried to find the definitive answer to that but i've ended up with contradictory answers from different reports. Posted by: danelectro at July 19, 2003 10:37 AM | PERMALINKthe line i'm refering to is the omb report referenced in dwight's posting: Posted by: danelectro at July 19, 2003 10:51 AM | PERMALINKKevin, Isn't defense spending another huge chunk of the budget -- roughly 25%, if memory serves me right? Cutting defense spending may be no more politically possible than Medicare and Social Security, but one could argue that cuts in defense are another option for reducing the defecit -- certainly more effective than trimming the "waste, fraud and abuse" conservatives like to pretend will make the defecit go away. (Really, all you need to know that Bush isn't to be taken seriously is that he wants to pay for a war with a tax cut.) Posted by: Gregory at July 19, 2003 11:06 AM | PERMALINKGregory, believe it or not, I think defense is about 5% or less. $368B passed this week in a $1T budget, IIRC. Posted by: Linkmeister at July 19, 2003 11:12 AM | PERMALINKhttp://www.fcnl.org/issues/mil/sup/mil_taxsuprt.htm The above should provide some insights into military budget figures.... Posted by: peter jung at July 19, 2003 11:21 AM | PERMALINKDefense is (roughly) $400 billion out of $2 trillion budget. In other words, 20%. So, yes, defense could also be cut to balance the budget. Of course, this is no more likely from a political point of view than cutting SS or Medicare. spc67: There are problems. Although means testing sounds good in theory, it provides very strong incentives for people not to bother saving for their retirement. This is a well understood problem with all welfare programs, but it would be especially nasty in this case. I'm not sure what the answer is. Posted by: Kevin Drum at July 19, 2003 11:29 AM | PERMALINKGregory, believe it or not, I think defense is about 5% or less. $368B passed this week in a $1T budget, IIRC. uuhh, math? 368B is 36.8% of 1T..... Posted by: taktile at July 19, 2003 11:31 AM | PERMALINKOr you can hope the economy takes off again absent government action. It worked wonders in the 1990s--creating balanced budgets as far as the eye could see. Which, granted, wasn't very far. The Deficit Reduction Act of 1993 which raised taxes and which every
Republican and their dog assured us would lead to economic ruin, had a
lot to do with reducing the deficit in the 1990s. Social Security, Medicare, Medicaid are mandatory? I just wanted to clarify what mandatory spending means in terms of the budget. It's "Spending (budget authority and outlays) controlled by laws other than annual appropriations acts." (See http://www.senate.gov/reference/glossary_term/mandatory_spending.htm) It doesn't mean mandatory in the usual sense. Gregory, believe it or not, I think defense is about 5% or less. $368B passed this week in a $1T budget, IIRC. Social Security, Medicare, Medicaid are mandatory? This is the entire reason some of us never wanted to get started with such inane nonsense. Politically popular? No doubt you are right, but isn't that really the point? Cocaine is popular with lab rats also. That doesn't make government provision of it, at the expense and coercion of the more capable among us, sound policy.
The frantic insistence that the "natural state of man" is some kind of complete freedom to do whatever the hell one pleases, with no "interference" from anyone for any reason, isn't just adolescent, it's almost pathological. Maybe this political philosophy (such as it is) was developed by
rebellious little boys who haven't gotten over being "controlled" by
Mommy. This is all going according to Grover Norquist's plan. The trouble for the GOP is that what they are basically trying to do is destroy government, at all levels, without taking a vote on it. By taking tax increases off the table, they are trying to set up a choice between bankrupting the country or eliminating all government functions except defense. So eventually the American people will face a choice: 1) Keep the GOP in office and don't raise taxes. To avoid government bankruptcy, this will require drastically curtailing SS, Medicare, Medicaid, and almost all "social programs," those pesky things like fire houses, police officers, and school teachers. This would be Grover Norquist Utopia, but it would result in misery for millions. 2) Throw the GOP out of office and raise taxes on the rich to fund SS, Medicare, Medicaid, fire, police, and school teachers. The GOP is banking that the American people, properly brainwashed and propagandized, will pick 1. I wouldn't bet on it. Posted by: FDRLincoln at July 19, 2003 12:08 PM | PERMALINKJ has me right. I was thinking of GDP. Thanks for the correction, sorry for the confusion. Posted by: Linkmeister at July 19, 2003 12:39 PM | PERMALINKJohn Alexander seems to either believe that "freedom" means freedom not to pay taxes or the freedom to watch the less fortunate starve. And people wonder why Libertarians can't elect dogcatchers. (As for the "state of nature", I'm with Hobbes: Solitary, nasty, brutish and short. Screw "natural".) Posted by: Demosthenes at July 19, 2003 01:28 PM | PERMALINKScrew "natural". Am I the only one who hears a thundering horde of Totally Inappropriate and Utterly Off-Topic responses galloping through her head? I'm so ashamed.... Posted by: Julia Grey at July 19, 2003 01:40 PM | PERMALINKThere's a third possibility, FDRLincoln. A Democratic president is elected and subsequently raises taxes because he or she has little choice. Norquist and those of his ilk use this as political campaign fodder for the next 20 years: "Damn those tax & spend Democrats!" In any case, Bush is leaving his successor(s) one hell of a dilemma. Posted by: PaulB at July 19, 2003 02:22 PM | PERMALINKYou mean that I shouldn't pit nits? I really like nits. They taste good. I also understand that they are good for you, nutritious, lots of vitamines, etc., etc. If this is incorrect, could someone please educate me properly about nits. I'd hate to do something bad to myself. Posted by: Rook at July 19, 2003 02:36 PM | PERMALINKOk, Ok, I meant "pick" nits. Man, I suck at typing. Posted by: Rook at July 19, 2003 02:37 PM | PERMALINKAh, thought so; thanks for the correct info on defense spending. (And if memory serves me right, interest on the debt is another big non-negotiable chunk too.) I certainly agree that curtailing defense spending isn't an easy option politically. I completely agree with Kevin's overall point that even if you cut all discretionary government programs -- not just "waste, fraud and abuse" -- you don't come close to a balanced budget without touching the Big Four: Defense, Social Security, Medicare, and interest on the debt. The GOP budget claims of at least the last decade or so have never added up in this regard; implying that you can balance the budget by getting rid of pork (definition: tax money going to Democratic states, including funding for firefighters and first responders), waste, fraud, and abuse is wishful thinking at best and more likely simple disingenuousness. Posted by: Gregory at July 19, 2003 02:45 PM | PERMALINKHell, I would agree to a tax increase if it was combined with means testing Social Security and Medicare. I don't see the slightest reason why the government needs to be paying retirement benefits to rich people. Posted by: Sebastian Holsclaw at July 19, 2003 02:49 PM | PERMALINKQuick question, Sebastian, Would you favor a tax increase to pay for the war on/occupation of Iraq? Posted by: Gregory at July 19, 2003 03:07 PM | PERMALINKYes, if every penny of the tax increase went to that purpose. Posted by: Sebastian Holsclaw at July 19, 2003 04:38 PM | PERMALINKHow about this folks. We all get to VOTE how are taxes are used directly. We taxpayers complete our returns. When we are finished, we apply a percentage of our taxes paid to some combination of 7-10 broad categories of government spending: Defense, SS, Medicare, welfare, Homeland Security, Education, Ag.& corporate subsidies, Debt paydown, environmental cleanup etc. (categories to be negotiated). Some percentage off the top of everybody's taxes goes into interest on the Federal Debt and a general fund to run the government itself (White house, Congress etc) and as a catch all fund for the government to vote to use at it's discretion. So if I pay 10,000 in taxes for example, say 2500 goes to general fund and interest, then I can start to vote my dollars. 7500 to defense, nothing to anything else, or 2500 to education, 2500 to environmental cleanup 2500 to SS. Whatever you wish. Then the legislature votes on specific projects within those broad perameters. Any body want to guess what areas would get funded to a higher level and what would get declining funding? If people want more transparent government that is more responsive to the people, how about this as an idea? Various gov't agencies would have to compete for OUR votes, and the lobbyists would have to appeal to the people for funding of pet projects, not merely the congresscritters. Posted by: spc67 at July 19, 2003 04:41 PM | PERMALINKOne more thing to take notice of: interest rates are at a 50 year low recently. That isn't likely to last forever. The US gov't is now financing a debt of about $6,000,000,000,000, going up by $1.5B a day, so even a modest increase, say 0.5% in rates that are at unprecedented low levels will add $30B or more to the deficit. Posted by: Alex at July 19, 2003 04:53 PM | PERMALINKJulia, Your comments would be amusing for their shear predictability if it weren't for your utter misunderstanding (or is it deliberate mischaracterization?) of what I wrote. Nowhere in my post did I call for "complete freedom" do do whatever I please. Nor do most serious libertarians call for such a thing. Such an ideology is more properly thought of as anarchy, which if my memory serves right, has been advocated much more often on the part of leftists than rightists. The most unfortunate part of your post is the dripping vitriol. I purposely chose to use the word "capable" simply to see how long it would take before a post similar to yours popped up. Didn't take long. Wouldn't it be rather more productive to explain to me the naivete of my beliefs? Or the impracticability of them, or how I have been blinded or brainwashed by the powers that be? Really, even such as this is rather non-responsive, but demonstrates a bit more critical thought than mere name calling. Finally, as to your comments Demosthenes your comments about watching people starve are yet another complete mischaracterization of libertarianism. Many of us with Libertarian tendencies are concerned, to the point of being consumed, by the plight of man. This includes the less fortunate among us. We simply read history and understand human nature to preclude wide scale collectivist solutions to these problems. What does it behoove a society to give up its liberty and get nothing, or even less than we had before, in return? Many of the commenters on this blog and other lefty blogs that I read understand this very well as it relates to the Patriot act and other civil liberties issues. Why can you not even dane to discuss such concepts as they relate to economic rights? Instead you resort to portraying Libertarian thought as heartless and cold, when its motives are the literal 180 degree opposite. Now, again, no doubt many of you think Libertarian thought is idiotic regardless of the my "misplaced" confidence in it. Just as I see as naive and illiterate many of your ideas as to government and collectivism as idiotic. But isn't it more productive to discuss the philosophies on the merits, with both empirical evidence and rational thought, as opposed to spewing simple invective? I really think this is the reason for the gulf in understanding that Kevin speaks of a couple posts above. We can't relate to one another because we aren't talking to one another. Rather, we talk past one another. I suppose this is simpler, but it does nothing to solve, or at least come to consensus, on the basic issues that divide us today. Posted by: John Alexander at July 19, 2003 05:40 PM | PERMALINKspc67, I think that what gets funded the least in your plan is Social Security and Medicare. I think defense would get the most funding, but almost every category would see a gain (including welfare, education, and other social programs) with the substantial losses of the big two. Posted by: Double B at July 19, 2003 05:45 PM | PERMALINKspc67, Then again, that might be precisely what you intended. P.S. Williestyle, Do you try to intentionally misread my stuff? *Mandatory Williestyle-related snarkiness over* Bill Gates' vote would be the same as any other taxpayer, increased control over the spending of his tax obligation. No one is being denied enfranchisement. People still get to vote for Prez, Congress etc. Elected reps still determine the overall taxation level etc. Posted by: spc67 at July 19, 2003 06:08 PM | PERMALINKDo you try to intentionally misread my stuff? *Mandatory Williestyle-related snarkiness over* I blame it on my remedial education. Bill Gates' vote would be the same as any other taxpayer, increased control over the spending of his tax obligation. But since his tax obligation is greater than that of the entire state of Alabama, his effective control is concurrently greater. No one is being denied enfranchisement. People still get to vote for Prez, Congress etc. Elected reps still determine the overall taxation level etc. But since everything the government actualy does costs money,
electing Presidents and Congressmen would be mostly for show. The real
power would be held by those who control the purse strings. Another major flaw with spc67's proposal is that taxpayers wouldn't know what everyone else is voting on, and therefore would have no way to judge how the budget stands. In our current budgetary process, flawed as it may be, there's one bill and one pie chart; Congress can amend it and then give it an up-or-down. I can easily see how someone might devote more to defense than they otherwise might "just in case," or that some might slight social security and medicare out of the belief that someone else is taking care of it for them. And then, would the people who've never devoted a penny to Social Security and Medicare be able to benefit from the programs? Interesting proposal, but I'll pass. After all, we currently vote for representatives to do all that work for us, and hopefully we already know *their* priorities in allocating funds to broad categories. Posted by: Gregory at July 19, 2003 06:55 PM | PERMALINKExactly, the people ultimately control the purse strings How 'bout that? Especially with right wingers like Gates, Buffet, Sandy Weil etc. you should love this! Posted by: spc67 at July 19, 2003 06:56 PM | PERMALINKGregory, True, except the premise of ther thread is that it's broken. So how would you fix it? Posted by: spc67 at July 19, 2003 06:59 PM | PERMALINKok, i know i'm a bit snarky, but i asked my above question in good faith. i know there are people on either side of the political spectrum that can answer it. look, i went to public school ok, and i can't seem to determine exactly what percentage our interest payments on the debt amount to in relation to the total tax burden. help, please? Posted by: danelectro at July 19, 2003 07:03 PM | PERMALINKExactly, the people ultimately control the purse strings How 'bout that? Especially with right wingers like Gates, Buffet, Sandy Weil etc. you should love this! I wasn't making a value judgement. Nah, The Alabamians are fine. It's you I'm gonna sic the dogs on! :) Posted by: spc67 at July 19, 2003 07:34 PM | PERMALINKThe Alabamians are fine. It's you I'm gonna sic the dogs on! :) Fine with me, I'm a dog person. On the other hand, history suggests that the Alabamanoise won't be fine for long once your modest proposal is implemented. Posted by: WillieStyle at July 19, 2003 07:51 PM | PERMALINKDanelectro, Those numbers seem a bit low to me, but I've been able to find nothing to contradict them. I do suspect that the Gross Interest Number, that is the one we must make so as not to default, is higher, and hence the use of the word "net." If I run across something I'll keep you in mind. Posted by: spc67 at July 19, 2003 07:53 PM | PERMALINKdanelectro, I'm not sure, but I think that the "servicing the debt" portion of
the budget goes to paying back all bonds that have come to due this
year. My gues is that since deficits over the last 20 years have been significantly larger than they were in the past, the amount we pay in servicing the debt today is significantly less than the total interest due on the debt. Ofcourse, I went to public school too so I could be horribly, horribly wrong. Posted by: WillieStyle at July 19, 2003 07:58 PM | PERMALINKDanelectro, This sounds more like it. Page 87 of the Treasury Dept. Management report for 2002 shows interest on the Federal Debt of $335 billion. That would imply an average borrowing cost on $6 trillion of debt of about 5.5%. Sounds a little high, but much closer to accurate. That would make gross interest, that is the payments necessary to avoid default about 15% of the budget, which passes my smell test. Hope this helps. Posted by: spc67 at July 19, 2003 08:12 PM | PERMALINKWilliestyle, I'm not sure I have any idea what you're talking about. But Gov't securities pay no call premium upon maturity, they simply pay off at par. You are right though, there is other stuff going on in the "Net" calculation, I just can't pin down what it is. The budget #'s are cash flow oriented, hence the "net" approach, we'd need an income statement to break out "gross." That Treasury management report is as close as I can come. Posted by: spc67 at July 19, 2003 08:24 PM | PERMALINKthanks, spc76 and willie. ~15 percent was one of the figures i arrived when i attempted to determine this several months ago, but i saw figures up to 30+ percent. i'm going to accept the fifteen as a good approximation. a related but not my real point question...don't you find it curious that this information isn't on this tip of *somebody's* tongue? balanced budget was the gop's issue in the 80/90's, and now it seems to be the dem's. but an actual thumbnail estimate of what money goes where seems to be beyond even those of us bloggers/commenters. and spc67: i don't agree with giving up the next round of tax cuts in exchange for means testing. but if you want to talk about long term tax policy, and how means testing fits in, then there's plenty of room to negotiate. Posted by: danelectro at July 19, 2003 09:02 PM | PERMALINKBut Gov't securities pay no call premium upon maturity, they simply pay off at par. If you buy a $100 30 year t-bill for $95 today, then when the govt.
pays you $100 30 years from now, it is paying you the $95 premium and $5
in interest. "As Dwight points out, if you really want to balance the budget you can either raise taxes or you can make serious cuts to Social Security and Medicare. " One could also make serious cuts to the Offense budget. The projected US$50 Billion a year for the occupation expenses Iraq sounds like a good place to start. Particularly since that isn't included in the current deficit estimate. Posted by: raj at July 20, 2003 01:13 AM | PERMALINKDanelectro, I looked back in the historical tables, and it looks like the "net interest" approach is always the way it is done. Very bad accounting IMHO. But we are talking about the gov't. Williestyle, I still have no idea where you are getting your finance vocabulary. If you buy a gov't security at 95, and you get paid back at par, the premium would be five points, not 95 and you'd still have been paid your interest over and above that for the life of the security. The "savings bonds" sold to individual investors are essentially zero coupon securities that are sold at say 25 cents on the dollar and mature at par. In that case the entire difference is interest accruing, not premium. But these securities make up a tiny fraction of the Fed's issuance. Posted by: spc67 at July 20, 2003 03:00 AM | PERMALINKWilliestyle, I just reread our exchange. I think our entire disagreement may be that you are mixing up "premium" with "principle." Or, maybe not. BTW, have the dogs arrived yet? Posted by: spc67 at July 20, 2003 04:37 AM | PERMALINKspc67, Good morning! True, except the premise of ther thread is that it's broken. So how would you fix it? I don't accept that the premise that our budgetary process is broken. It seems to me that the premise of this thread is that GOP promises to balance the budget by cutting "waste, fraud, and abuse" -- even if you assume that category includes, as Grover Norquist probably believes, all discretionary spending -- simply won't do the job. It's ignoring the several elephants in the room, which have been identified clearly enough. No, spc67, what's "broken" about the budgetary process is Bush, with a GOP congress, cutting taxes without cutting spending, and launching a war or two to boot. (Kudos, by the way, for being willing to accept a tax cut to pay for the war. IMNSHO, that stance is a litmus test for being taken seriously in the debate, and you'll note that Bush doesn't pass.) Balancing the budget is really quite simple, but -- again, this is the point of this thread -- requires tough political choices Bush doesn't seem to want to make, but rather defer to his successor(s). Cut Medicaid, Social Security, and/or defense spending (I presume that defaulting on interst on the debt is not an option), and/or raise taxes (or at the very least, let Bush's tax cuts sunset, which does not amount to the same thing. And as I've commented in other threads, I am tired of bad policy proposals being defended with "well, what would you do? It's a high school debater's trick -- when losing the affirmative case, get your opponent to suggest an alternative, attack it, and pretend that means your failing case has been vindicated. I ain't biting. Saying "no" is sufficient. You seem to have conceded the flaw in your case. I don't need to propose an alternative in order to reject it. Besides, I think I've refuted your claim that the process is broken. As I've said, we already have a similar system in place -- you vote for a representative whose priorities on those categories matches your own. It may not be a perfect process, but it beats your alternative. My apologies if this seems harsh -- it's early, I didn't get enough sleep, and I'm insufficiently caffeinated. You came up with an interesting idea that, upon examination, had what I consider to be fatal flaws, but kudos to you for thinking of it. If my reply lacks the courtesy a good faith proposal deserves, you have my apologies. Posted by: Gregory at July 20, 2003 06:04 AM | PERMALINKI just reread our exchange. I think our entire disagreement may be that you are mixing up "premium" with "principle." That might very well be. Gregory, Harshness aside, I was asking what you would do for a simple,
straightforward reason. To see if you had a better idea I could get
behind, not to dismiss your response. BTW as for the "fatal flaw" it is easily remedied. The first time we do this, it's a dry run and we publish the results so people have some idea how their fellow citizens will vote. Williestyle, Just for your general font of knowledge (and so you can run me into the ground more properly later). Principle is the "face amount" owed, premium is any amount that must be contractually paid over and above the principle due when principle is repaid. Usually such premiums are built into corporate securities to prevent early prepayment. BTW, what's with the inferiority complex all of a sudden? Posted by: spc67 at July 20, 2003 06:34 AM | PERMALINKspc67, Thanks for accepting my comments in the spirit in which they were intended. I certainly did not mean to accuse you of obfuscatory tactics by your request for alternatives; but I think you'll recognize at times that request has been made in less good faith than you made it. As I've said, though, I don't accept that the current situation needs to be changed. Too, your suggested solutions still don't do it. First off, if the firt time is a trial run, that still has the potential to wildly skew Federal spending priorities. A rough example, and please excuse the math. If, say, the Social Security budget needs a 10% increase, but taxpayers -- rightly concerned -- allocate a 20% increase, the program is overfunded, and at the expense of something else. If, the next year, taxpayers learn that they've allocated too much and decide to change their minds, the program could be shorted, and basically the whole thing chases its tail. No, I maintain that the way to do this process is by have repretsentatives who at least theoretically have access to current information about what the government is spending, and where changes need to be made. You'd also have to implement it by a Constitutional amendment, so it won't fly anyway. If you think the election of a Democratic president (from among the existing slate)will lead to a balanced budget, my view is you are incorrect. You may suspect that a Democratic president won't balance the budget -- and hey, you may even be right -- but we *know* the GOP has no such intention. Our current Republican president and Congress who have demonstrated not only no intention of balancing the budget, but also pursue deliberate policies that have resulted in massive structural defecits. Once again, the alternative does not have to be perfect for an "at least not that" approach to be valid. Posted by: Gregory at July 20, 2003 08:55 AM | PERMALINKHell, I would agree to a tax increase if it was combined with means testing Social Security and Medicare. I don't see the slightest reason why the government needs to be paying retirement benefits to rich people. Except that they paid into the Social Security system just like everyone else. What was that murmur I heard somewhere around here about confiscatory taxation? Posted by: Julia Grey at July 20, 2003 01:34 PM | PERMALINKI'm just passing through from Australia, but I'll pause long enough to say how surprised I am that you Yanks don't seem to think you have much in common with each other. All this debate about libertarianism, confiscatory taxation, being "lefty" and so on. I suspect that if the people of the USA don't think there is some fundamental sense in which you are all in this business of life together, and must sink or swim together, and should therefore take some care of each other, you will one day find yourselves in pretty deep trouble. I do not confuse the recent behaviour of the US Federal Govt. with the essential beliefs and humanity of all US citizens, but if you guys don't actually have any essential shared beliefs - particularly about what I might briefly call civilised behaviour - I don't see how you are ever going to regain control of your country and start to run it like a civilised place internally and a reasonably good neighbour externally. Posted by: gordon at July 20, 2003 08:00 PM | PERMALINKJulia, there is no 'Social Security System' that anyone has ever paid into. Ever since the very beginning the Social Security taxes have been used as general funds. If you want to argue that it ought not be that way, fine. But to argue that it has ever actually been other than that is incorrect. Posted by: Sebastian Holsclaw at July 21, 2003 01:30 AM | PERMALINK"1) Keep the GOP in office and don't raise taxes. To avoid government bankruptcy, this will require drastically curtailing SS, Medicare, Medicaid, and almost all "social programs," those pesky things like fire houses, police officers, and school teachers. This would be Grover Norquist Utopia, but it would result in misery for millions." Why should we assume that we can't have pesky things like firehouses and police officers without Social Security and Medicare? Surely we can cut one without cutting the other. "No, spc67, what's "broken" about the budgetary process is Bush, with a GOP congress, cutting taxes without cutting spending, and launching a war or two to boot. " And jacking up domestic spending (and not just Homeland Security, either), and adding a brand-new benefit to Medicare. Anyone who worries about the red ink that's once again infesting our budget ought to be screaming to high heaven about that, even more than the tax cuts. "spc67: There are problems. 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