GOP Proposes Brave Budget
Wall St. Journal,
Jul 17 -
By Stephen Moore
In one of the most fiscally inept stunts in many years on Capitol Hill, Congressional Democrats have taken a pass on enacting a budget this year. Legislators will just wing it and let the $3.6 trillion fall where it may and hope the public doesn't notice a $1.5 trillion dollar deficit. But the minority Republicans have just presented their own budget plan and it's a remarkably bold and honest document that involves big cuts in government spending over the next decade and a balanced budget by 2019. The GOP budget would be a Tea Partier's dream come true if it ever were enacted.
The plan, fashioned by Tom Price of Georgia, head of the conservative Republican Study Committee, reduces federal borrowing from the Obama baseline by a gargantuan $6.4 trillion over the next decade. Not bad considering that it also lowers taxes by $1.7 trillion more than the Obama budget by making the Bush tax cuts permanent. Spending reductions start with what Mr. Price calls a "reset" on spending for discretionary programs back to 2008 levels. That insures that "temporary" stimulus funding doesn't get continued year after year. The plan also instructs the President and Congress to dedicate every penny of bailout money repaid to the federal government by the banks to debt retirement.
"We think it's essential to show the American people we can cut spending enough to balance the budget even with the big hole Barack Obama has put us in," Mr. Price tells me. His budget is a Reaganite budget, calling for tax cuts, asset sales, repeal of hundreds of wasteful programs, and across-the-board cuts in virtually every program except Social Security. "Even some Republicans will flinch from the spending cuts required to get to a balanced budget," Mr. Price concedes.
Mr. Price and his RSC colleagues show that you can get from here ($1.5 trillion annual deficits) to there (a balanced budget) through spending discipline and economic growth. Can it be done the Democratic way, with higher taxes and lower growth? Not likely.
Online: Wall St. Journal
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