Spending

CT House GOP Candidate Wants Spending At 1998 Levels (VIDEO)

Brian Beutler | January 27, 2011, 11:13AM

Justin Bernier

The GOP's game of "no I want to cut spending more!" continues to swirl down toward zero.

Meet Justin Bernier, of Connecticut's fifth congressional district. He's outdoing John Boehner ('08 levels), the Republican Study Committee ('06 levels) and Rand Paul (who hasn't set a long-term mark but wants to slash spending by half a trillion dollars almost overnight) in these sweepstakes.

He wants to bring federal spending down to its 1998 levels, a drop that would constitute about a 57 percent reduction.

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Republican Study Committee

Controversial Conservative Spending Cut Plan Divides Republicans

Brian Beutler | January 26, 2011, 10:05AM

Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-KY)

Down to its smallest details, the Republican Study Committee's spending cut proposal exposes real rifts in the Republican party. While the GOP's basically fine with slashing arts funding, a lot of the items in that budget -- meant to imply liberal profligacy -- actually have significant Republican support.

For instance, the RSC plan would slash $150 million in spending on Essential Air Service -- a government program, which ensures small and rural communities continue to receive commercial airline service.

Flash back to 2007, and possible Republican presidential candidate, Sen. John Thune (R-SD) spearheaded an effort to restore such service to his constituents. "I am encouraged by the Senate's action to move this important legislation. Essential Air Service is just that, essential. It is essential to the people it serves and it is essential that the House of Representatives pass this legislation without modification so that we can restore commercial air service for Brookings," said Thune. "Ensuring access to communities like Brookings strengthens the local economy, provides consumers with choices, and makes the entire commercial airline network more valuable."

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Spending

Republicans Press Boehner Not To Get Squeamish On Spending Cuts

Brian Beutler | January 20, 2011, 5:12PM

Rep. Paul Ryan (R-WI) and John Boehner (R-OH).

Rank and file Republicans aren't happy with House Speaker John Boehner (R-OH) and Budget Committee Chairman Paul Ryan (R-WI). They think the GOP should take a hatchet to the federal budget now, to make good on their pledge to slash spending by $100 billion "this year." And their displeasure is spilling out into the open.

"Despite the added challenge of being four months into the current fiscal year, we still must keep our $100 billion pledge to the American people," reads a draft of a letter to Boehner, obtained by TPM, being circulated by the Republican Study Committee. "These $100 billion in cuts to non-security discretionary spending not only ensure that we keep our word to the American people; they represent a credible down payment on the fiscally responsible measures that will be needed to get the nation's finances back on track."

The problem, as Boehner and Ryan have explained, is that they won't even get a whack at the budget until March, when the government's current spending authority expires. By then it will only be six months until the end of the fiscal year in September, and they're having a hard time squeezing a year's worth of promised cuts through a half-year window.

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House Republicans

Conservative Republican Study Committee Outlines $2.5 Trillion In Spending Cuts

Brian Beutler | January 20, 2011, 1:00PM

Rep. Jim Jordan (R-OH)

Conservative House members on the Republican Study Committee, chaired by Rep. Jim Jordan (R-OH), have outlined a program they claim can cut $2.5 trillion in spending over the course of a decade. Like most major spending cut proposals, this one's not entirely rigorous. It relies principally on an aspirational spending cap -- specifically, limiting non-defense appropriations totals to their 2006 levels without adjusting for inflation. In other words, it punts the question of what to cut to future Congresses, which could just as easily bust the cap.

That accounts for nearly $2.3 trillion of the projected cuts. But the plan also calls for a host of specific cuts to make up the remaining few hundred billion dollars.

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