The Congressional Budget Office studied the “stimulus” package, and found only about half the money lawmakers want to spend will be used this year or next. In other words, it’s not a jolt to the economy, it’s pointless as stimulus, and the lawmakers who voted for it must know that.
Their real goal seems to be to expand the government. This bill includes some $140 billion for education -- almost twice what the Education Department spent all of last year. It also aims to pump $35 billion extra into the Department of Energy, a stunning sum since DOE’s current annual budget is $23.8 billion.
Once these bureaucracies expand, good luck trimming them back. They’re apt to be as temporary as the New Deal “Rural Development Utilities Programs.” Its mission to electrify rural America was completed decades ago, yet it still exists.
Politicians think they can palm most anything off as “stimulus.” An early version of the bill, for example, included hundreds of millions for contraceptives. “The family planning services reduce cost,” House Speaker Nancy Pelosi explained while defending the plan on ABC, “to the states and to the federal government.” That’s arguable at best.
Still, even if that were true, reducing the birthrate would be a pretty slow-motion way of reducing federal costs. It would be faster and more efficient to axe a department or two instead.
Luckily, the contraception spending was axed once people became aware of it. That proves that, when the public pays attention -- and complains -- lawmakers will do the right thing.
Hopefully it’s the beginning of a trend.
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