This week, the United States Senate will vote on a spending package to fund the federal government for the remainder of this fiscal year. The Omnibus Appropriations Act of 2009 is a sprawling, $410 billion compilation of nine spending measures that lacks the slightest hint of austerity from the federal government or the recipients of its largess.<\/p>\n
The Senate should reject this bill. If we do not, President Barack Obama should veto it.<\/p>\n
The omnibus increases discretionary spending by 8% over last fiscal year’s levels, dwarfing the rate of inflation across a broad swath of issues including agriculture, financial services, foreign relations, energy and water programs, and legislative branch operations. Such increases might be appropriate for a nation flush with cash or unconcerned with fiscal prudence, but America is neither.<\/p>\n
Drafted last year, the bill did not pass due to Congress’s long-standing budgetary dysfunction and the frustrating delays it yields in our appropriations work. Since then, economic and fiscal circumstances have changed dramatically, which is why the Senate should go back to the drawing board. The economic downturn requires new policies, not more of the same.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n
Democrats rightly criticised Republicans for their out of control spending over much of the last 8 years… Unfortunately for us Democrats seem hell bent on making the Republicans look fiscally responible.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Some of you may have noticed this page has been rather quite for the last couple of days while I’ve been working on a few things behind the scenes. Anyway let’s get back to it shall we… Democratic Senator Evan Bayh had an interesting Op Ed in yesterday’s Wall Street Journal that I’d suggest reading […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_genesis_hide_title":false,"_genesis_hide_breadcrumbs":false,"_genesis_hide_singular_image":false,"_genesis_hide_footer_widgets":false,"_genesis_custom_body_class":"","_genesis_custom_post_class":"","_genesis_layout":"","advanced_seo_description":"","jetpack_seo_html_title":"","jetpack_seo_noindex":false,"jetpack_seo_schema_type":"","_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_feature_clip_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2},"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[26,7],"tags":[499,500,185],"class_list":["post-1605","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","category-economy","category-politics","tag-evan-bayh","tag-omnibus-appropriations-act-of-2009","tag-senate","entry"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/pfpI7-pT","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack-related-posts":[{"id":1677,"url":"https:\/\/www.jasetaro.com\/blog\/2009\/03\/13\/ironies-obama-signs-law-banning-federal-embryo-research-two-days-after-signing-executive-order-to-ok-it\/","url_meta":{"origin":1605,"position":0},"title":"Ironies: Obama Signs Law Banning Federal Embryo Research Two Days After Signing Executive Order to OK It","author":"Jeff","date":"March 13, 2009","format":false,"excerpt":"From CNSNews.com: On Wednesday, only two days after he lifted President Bush\u2019s executive order banning federal funding of stem cell research that requires the\u00a0destruction of human embryos, President Barack Obama signed a law that explicilty bans federal funding of any \"research in which a human\u00a0embryo or embryos are destroyed, discarded,\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Culture"","block_context":{"text":"Culture","link":"https:\/\/www.jasetaro.com\/blog\/category\/culture\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":568,"url":"https:\/\/www.jasetaro.com\/blog\/2008\/10\/01\/crap-sandwich-redux-senate-to-vote-on-bailout-bill\/","url_meta":{"origin":1605,"position":1},"title":"Crap Sandwich Redux: Senate to Vote on Bailout Bill","author":"Jeff","date":"October 1, 2008","format":false,"excerpt":"Michelle Malkin and Ed Morrissey have the details on this 451 page monstrosity... That's right 451 pages! The original Paulson Plan was roughly two pages, the house bill was just over 100 and the senate bill is 451 pages. Some of the additions in the Senate bill include: New Tax\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Economy"","block_context":{"text":"Economy","link":"https:\/\/www.jasetaro.com\/blog\/category\/economy\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":1478,"url":"https:\/\/www.jasetaro.com\/blog\/2009\/02\/12\/what-open-borders-has-wrought\/","url_meta":{"origin":1605,"position":2},"title":"What Open Borders Has Wrought","author":"Jeff","date":"February 12, 2009","format":false,"excerpt":"ABC News ran a story last night on the growing problem of kidnapping in Phoenix, Arizona. In what officials caution is now a dangerous and even deadly crime wave, Phoenix, Arizona has become the kidnapping capital of America, with more incidents than any other city in the world outside of\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Crime"","block_context":{"text":"Crime","link":"https:\/\/www.jasetaro.com\/blog\/category\/crime\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":474,"url":"https:\/\/www.jasetaro.com\/blog\/2008\/09\/25\/harry-reid-trying-to-sneak-oil-shale-ban-back-into-legislation\/","url_meta":{"origin":1605,"position":3},"title":"Harry Reid Trying To Sneak Oil Shale Ban Back Into Legislation","author":"Jeff","date":"September 25, 2008","format":false,"excerpt":"Senator Jim DeMint\u2019s office reports that Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid is trying to sneak an extension of the oil shale ban into legislation under cover of the bailout frenzy. Sec 1602 continues ban on oil shale. The language follows: SEC. 1602. Notwithstanding any other provision of law, including section\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Economy"","block_context":{"text":"Economy","link":"https:\/\/www.jasetaro.com\/blog\/category\/economy\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":4340,"url":"https:\/\/www.jasetaro.com\/blog\/2012\/01\/24\/video-1000-days-without-a-budget\/","url_meta":{"origin":1605,"position":4},"title":"Video: 1,000 Days Without a Budget","author":"Jeff","date":"January 24, 2012","format":false,"excerpt":"We've reached something of grim milestone... It has now been 1,000 days since federal government has had an actual budget: http:\/\/www.youtube.com\/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=QG0stsk3Ljs#! I can't say it any better than Tina Korbe: No matter what measure you use, government spending has increased since 1965. Total government spending has more than doubled. Federal\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Economy"","block_context":{"text":"Economy","link":"https:\/\/www.jasetaro.com\/blog\/category\/economy\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/img.youtube.com\/vi\/QG0stsk3Ljs\/0.jpg?resize=350%2C200","width":350,"height":200},"classes":[]},{"id":3912,"url":"https:\/\/www.jasetaro.com\/blog\/2011\/03\/10\/wisconsin-gop-ends-union-reforms-stalemate\/","url_meta":{"origin":1605,"position":5},"title":"Wisconsin GOP Ends Union Reforms Stalemate","author":"Jeff","date":"March 10, 2011","format":false,"excerpt":"Republican senators in Wisconsin broke the weeks long stalemate over Governor Scott Walker's collective bargaining reforms last night. In short, once it became clear that senate democrats, who had fled the state to delay action on the bill, were unwilling negotiate republicans amended the bill to remove appropriations and passed\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Politics"","block_context":{"text":"Politics","link":"https:\/\/www.jasetaro.com\/blog\/category\/politics\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]}],"jetpack_likes_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.jasetaro.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1605","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.jasetaro.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.jasetaro.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.jasetaro.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.jasetaro.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1605"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.jasetaro.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1605\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.jasetaro.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1605"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.jasetaro.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1605"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.jasetaro.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1605"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}