This week, the U.S. House of Representatives passed – over my objections – the so-called Ryan budget, a grim and pessimistic vision for America’s future authored by U.S. Rep. Paul Ryan.

If the plan of the budget resolution were made real in appropriations legislation, it would, according to estimates by the Economic Policy Institute, cost 2 million jobs next year.  It would eliminate the mandatory Pell Grant program, a cut of $98 billion, and let interest rates double on student loans.  It would cut key transportation investments by more than 20 percent.  It would slash Medicaid support by $810 billion, and it would end the Medicare guarantee on which seniors depend.

If that sounds familiar, it should.  This Ryan budget is a barely warmed over version of last year’s Ryan budget, which was so thoroughly debated during last year’s election – and so soundly rejected by voters.

It is important to remember that a House budget is only a roadmap and does not have the force of law.  However, budget sequestration, which already is in effect, and the Appropriations Legislation passed today are binding.  The resulting hardship is only beginning to be felt.

A Shameful Anniversary

As we now recognize that it has been 10 years since American troops were sent into Iraq, it is worth remembering that the Iraq war was a shameful example of the victory of ideology over evidence.  Indeed, some leaders were so tied to their ideology that they deluded themselves and the public at the cost of more than 100,000 American and Iraqi lives.

People often ask me whether my decision to vote against the Iraq war was a difficult one.  In advance of that vote, I worked hard and thought hard to examine the evidence about whether military action would improve America’s security.  But ultimately, it was an easy vote once it became clear that there was no justification to go to war.

On a Collision Course

Earlier this week, the House Committee on Science, Space, and Technology – spurred to action by the February meteor in Chelyabinsk, Russia that injured more than 1,500 people – held a hearing to examine methods of detecting asteroids and comets that might impact the Earth.

The Chelyabinsk meteor was, to be sure, an exceedingly unusual event; an impact of this magnitude occurs only once a century or so.  Even more rarely, far larger rocks fall from the sky:  Every 100 million years or so, the Earth is hit by a meteor large enough to cause mass extinctions, like the one at the end of the age of dinosaurs.

As I wrote in a Washington Post op-ed with my colleague Donna Edwards, while the threats posed by meteors are miniscule on a day-to-day basis, surely any existential threat to the human race must be taken seriously.  In particular, we should provide NASA with the support necessary to meet a 2005 Congressional mandate that it detect 90 percent of all near-Earth asteroids larger than about 500 feet in diameter.  Congress also should take seriously a possibility that has been raised by senior military officials:  that a meteor impact might be misinterpreted as a nuclear strike, leading to dangerous overreactions from nuclear-armed states.

Recently I discussed these concerns with the journalist Chuck Todd.  A video of our conversation is available online.

Sincerely,

Rush Holt
Member of Congress