Spending

Amazon CEO Jeff Bezos, aka the richest guy alive, recently announced plans to donate $2 billion to create a network of preschools. “The child will be the customer,” says Bezos. Maybe we’re old-fashioned, but the idea of pupils as “customers” doesn’t lead us to believe that Bezos has a firm…

Republicans are pushing a budget-cutting process Democrats say punishes the vulnerable. The real problem is that it's pointless.

The problem is entitlement spending, not appropriations

After threatening to veto a $1.3 trillion omnibus spending bill before a midnight government shutdown deadline Friday morning, President Donald Trump ultimately signed the measure, citing national security concerns.

President Trump threw a potential wrench into congressional budget discussions Friday morning, threatening to veto the omnibus package that Republican leaders pushed to his desk just hours before to avoid a government shutdown.

An omnibus funding bill is facing delays in Congress ahead of a Friday government shutdown deadline, with lawmakers scrambling to answer a number of open questions in the $1.3 trillion package related to border security, infrastructure projects, and gun violence prevention measures.

Lawmakers in the Senate are expected to pass a bipartisan two-year budget deal ahead of a midnight government shutdown deadline when it comes to a vote Thursday evening, leaving the ball in the House’s court.

Senate leaders announced Wednesday afternoon that they reached a massive two-year budget deal after weeks of negotiations in hopes of averting a government shutdown when funding runs out Thursday at midnight.

“What would you do if you were stuck in one place and every day was exactly the same, and nothing that you did mattered?” Bill Murray asks in Groundhog Day. “That about sums it up for me,” a drinking buddy answers.

Update, 9:54 p.m. ET: The Senate voted overwhelmingly 97-2 to proceed on the House CR late Thursday night. Majority Leader Mitch McConnell objected to Minority Leader Chuck Schumer’s attempt to force a cloture vote Thursday night, pushing the final vote closer to the government shutdown deadline…

President Donald Trump split with Republicans in Congress on a key aspect of the party’s short-term government funding measure Thursday morning.

The deadly derailment of an Amtrak train near Tacoma, Wash., last week prompted a tweet from Donald Trump. The accident, the president wrote, “shows more than ever why our soon to be submitted infrastructure plan must be approved quickly. Seven trillion dollars spent in the Middle East while our…

As they devise a strategy to place a tax bill on President Trump’s desk, Republicans in Congress are grappling with thorny issues: What can pass the Senate? How much should they add to the deficit? How will tax changes play with voters in 2018?

Eight months into its current session, Congress has passed no major legislation.

President Donald Trump has fiscally conservative Republicans in a serious bind.

Wouldn't it be nice if voters punished politicians who increase budget deficits? Well, according to one research paper, they do.

Lawmakers may be coming to an agreement to fund defense through September after a frenetic week of debate and negotiations, but any deal will only bring them out of the budgetary woods and into the political fire.

Over the weekend, a personnel dispute within the National Security Council between the national security advisor, H.R. McMaster, and senior White House aides Jared Kushner and Steve Bannon was eventually brought to President Trump himself. As Politico reported Tuesday evening, Trump overruled…

Near the end of World War I, there was an alleged (almost surely apocryphal) exchange of telegrams between German and Austrian officers whose units were fighting side by side, in difficult circumstances, against the Allies. The German cabled: “Our situation is serious, but not critical." The…

Some heretofore-skeptical commentators are declaring that February 28 is the date Donald Trump truly became president of the United States. That might signal some good news, but it was closely followed by bad: March 1 could go down as the date of death of the Tea Party movement in America.

For starters, he wants to cut taxes—"big league." The Tax Foundation estimates that the Trump plan would reduce federal revenues by $4.4 to $5.9 trillion over the course of a decade. Under dynamic scoring, whereby the growth of the economy is factored into the analysis, that number drops to…

As a candidate for president, Donald Trump did not offer much in the way of specific policies. Still, based on the handful of details he did present, it is pretty clear he wants to spend money, a lot of money.

Senate majority leader Mitch McConnell chided the opposition for holding up last-minute spending legislation to keep the government funded beyond midnight Saturday, as a small group of Democratic senators pledged to fight the bill until they could secure a longer extension of health benefits for…

Donald Trump said unequivocally Thursday morning that "this is the time" for government to borrow money for multiple spending priorities, an unusual position for the standard bearer of a GOP that made fiscal restraint one its signature positions during the tea party wave just six years ago.

Donald Trump's speech on the economy Monday puts him in a strong position on the issue on which Hillary Clinton is weakest and politically vulnerable.

Ohio in 2014 launched a searchable database of the state's expenditures, allowing residents to browse how their money was being spent by both the state and participating local governments. Government watchdogs view it as a model for something that could be applied across the nation.

It's been the night of the living debt in Washington for decades now. Government programs that Congress hasn't expressly approved to receive money keep operating on the taxpayer's dime, and the cost is no pocket change. These "unauthorized" programs, zombies of the federal budget, total more than…

Congress spent $310 billion last year on some 250 agencies and programs that were no longer — as required under the law and Congress's own rules — authorized to receive and spend funds. This problem of "expired authorizations" has grown with the ever-expanding size of government; and it contributes…

It's been half a decade since the Deepwater Horizon oil rig, which had been drilling the BP-owned Macondo Prospect, suffered a catastrophic blowout. Over 87 days between April and July 2010, 4.9 million barrels of oil gushed into the Gulf of Mexico.

Something has gotten into Ted Cruz. The Republican senator is known as a conservative firebrand willing to take on his own party, but in a Thursday meeting with reporters in his Capitol Hill office, Cruz was sounding almost ecumenical. Maybe it was the presence of Pope Francis.

President Obama spent two days in Ethiopia on his recent four-day trip to Africa. To house the president and his entourage during their stay, the government required four hotels costing over $1.3 million. 

Last week, THE WEEKLY STANDARD reported on a $412,000 contract for 1,280 sleeping room nights at the Hilton Hotel in Addis Ababa, the Ethiopian capital. However, at least two other hotels were booked for the visit, and a fourth hotel was also used, although no contract has yet been posted. The new…

In the midst of revelations about a massive data breach at the Office of Personnel Management (OPM), the agency awarded a $4.3 million two-month contract extension to Northrop Grumman for the OPM's Data Warehouse Program (DWP). According to the award documents, the follow-on contract includes…

The system of federal and state "exchanges" or "marketplaces" that offer health insurance through the Affordable Care Act lean heavily on "navigators" to guide consumers in their choices. Organizations such as community health centers, legal aid societies, social service groups, church groups and…

Federal agencies set a new record for improper payments last year, shelling out $125 billion in questionable benefits after years of declines. The Feds, as the AP reports, blew the billions on (among other things):

When President Obama attended the G-20 summit in Brisbane, Australia last November, the entire delegation required over 5,000 room nights at five different hotels over the course of the summit, costing $2.1 million. Transporting all those people around Brisbane was not cheap: the State Department…

Lost in much of the reporting about CPAC is that almost all of the likely presidential candidates—really, all of them, with the exception of Rand Paul—seemed to place themselves at the Reaganite hawkish-internationalist end of the foreign policy spectrum. The much-heralded return of Republican…

A bipartisan group of mmore than eighty influential national security experts, from former Defense Secretary Robert Gates to Michèle Flournoy to Bill Kristol, have written a letter to congressional leadership to urge increased defense spending. 

On its much maligned Twitter feed, Think AgainTurn Away, the State Department is denouncing higher taxes -- and even asserting they're evidence a utopian society is a pipe dream.

Vice President Biden spent about a day and a half in Belgium in early February to meet with various European leaders, but his entourage, security team and other delegation members required up to 209 rooms for up to three weeks surrounding the visit. While the estimated tab was $690,507, this cost…

In January, the State Department signed contracts for an estimated $1,690,000 million for hotels for President Obama's trip to India. Two of the contracts were for the New Delhi stay, and another two were for Agra, the location of the Taj Mahal. That latter leg of the trip was cancelled when…

In his weekly newsletter, the boss, just back from the Munich Security Conference, shares his big takeaways:

The National Institutes of Health (NIH) is working on a solution to a problem faced by a growing number of Americans as the population ages and relies more on prescription drugs: "What is this pill?" Much in the way a Google image search looks for similar images in Google's vast caches, the…

This Washington Post headline pretty much explains that government is our business—and business is very good:

Under President Obama, $7.5 trillion has been added to the national debt. The number is being highlighted by the Republican National Committee ahead of President Obama's State of the Union address, which will be delivered tonight from Washington. 

When President Obama visited Brisbane, Australia in November for the G-20 summit, the large U.S. delegation required multiple hotels and thousands of "room nights" for the length of the stay, though the president himself spent only one night in his hotel. Initially, as first reported by THE WEEKLY…

In one final ignominious act of parliamentary genius, outgoing Senate majority leader Harry Reid rolled Republican troublemaker Ted Cruz of Texas over the weekend, robbing the GOP of a chance to stop Democrats in the lame-duck session. That’s the consensus in most Washington political circles, and…

The House of Representatives passed a long-term spending bill Thursday night, just hours before the current continuing budget resolution is set to run out. The vote of 219 to 206, including nearly 60 Democrats, took longer than the alotted 15 minutes as House members from both parties witheld their…

House minority leader Nancy Pelosi of California has announced her opposition to the 2015 omnibus spending bill. Congress is attempting to pass the bill to continue funding for the federal government, which runs out at 12 midnight Friday morning. Without passing this bill or a short-term continuing…

In an open letter to Democrats, Nancy Pelosi urges her colleagues to continue fighting the House spending bill. 

Conservatives on Capitol Hill are passing around a document titled, "Omnibus Contains $2.5 Billion to Accommodate Illegal Immigrants and Refugees," which claims to new spending bill has dedicated a lot of money to helping people in the U.S. illegally.

In the last five years, the Department of Defense (DOD) has spent over $130 million to store unused satellites from eight different satellite programs, and plans to spend another $206 million on storage over the next five years. Storage costs for individual pieces of equipment range from $40,000 up…

Congress is closing in on a final spending deal in the last week of the lame duck session, Politico reports. Negotiations between the Republican House and the Democratic Senate on appropriations are nearly complete, and the impending deal would be, according to senior congressional reporter David…

Anti-Obamacare ads are dominating the airwaves in the election’s stretch run.  According to Kantar Media’s Campaign Media Analysis Group, Republicans ran nearly 13,000 anti-Obamacare ads in Senate races during the week of October 20-26.  That’s after they ran nearly 12,000 anti-Obamacare ads during…

The boss tells Politico what Washington can get done in President Obama's last two years in office:

The American public has resisted the metric system for decades, but that has not discouraged the Commerce Department's National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) from sinking $37,950 into two more episodes of a "motion-comic" video series called "The League of SI Superheroes." (SI stands…

A headline in the Wall Street Journal reads, “U.S. Deficit Shrinks to Level Last Seen in ’07.”  The problem with this headline isn’t its accuracy (although it should say ’08 unless it’s speaking as a percentage of GDP).  The problem is that readers are likely to come away with the false perception…

Yesterday’s presentation by the U.S. Treasury was a comical spectacle—at least for those of us with sardonic senses of humor. The good news? The deficit for FY2014 (which ended September 30) was 29 percent lower than the deficit was in FY2013. Increased corporate tax receipts drove much of the…

The headline on an item in Time reads:

Analysis of Congressional Budget Office projections by the Senate Budget Committee finds that Obamacare will increase the deficit by more than $100 billion over the next decade.

These days, mentioning birth control and the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) in the same sentence will likely draw some strong reactions. But a recent contractor inquiry by HHS for its National Institutes of Health (NIH) campus in Bethesda, Maryland adds a new wrinkle. This time, the…

The "busiest land port of entry in the Western Hemisphere" is getting an upgrade, and according to the U.S. General Services Administration (GSA), about a half a million dollars worth of new artwork will be part of the package. The San Ysidro Land Port of Entry, the border crossing facility for the…

An eye-opening report from KMOV about an Obamacare contractor using taxpayer dollars to pay their employees to spend all day doing nothing:

The government was spending too much money.  And wasting a lot of it.  The need to cut back was obvious and pressing.  So Congress passed something called the “sequester,” that would force frugality upon the government and oblige Washington, Inc. to endure the kind of downsizing that had been…

Earlier this week, I reported on the absurdity of the open GOP Senate primary in Nebraska. Currently, outside groups affiliated with prominent Republican leaders are flooding the state with dishonest attack ads on the leading Republican candidate in the race, apparently motivated by petty…

After shelling out $677 million to build the federal health care website, the government will spend an additional $121 million in 2014 to repair it—$30 million more than previously estimated—the Washington Times reported last night. This comes just as the Obama administration is starting the hunt…

The Hill reports:

In late March, President Obama took a week-long trip through Europe which included a stop of less than 24 hours in Brussels, Belgium for meetings with the European Union and NATO. The president stayed at The Hotel, a twenty-seven story hotel in the center of the city. The estimated cost for the…

The Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS) released details of the latest contract with Terremark Federal Group covering "open market items" required for the ongoing operation of Healthcare.gov. The documents include an itemized list of computing and network services, fees, licenses and…

The Republican side of the Senate Budget Committee has put together this chart showing that payments on the interest of federal debt will "dwarf virtually every federal expense" in 2024:

“I think that cutting the defense budget in significant ways right now is a serious mistake. When we’ve cut the budget before at the end of the Cold War, at the end of Vietnam and other times, it’s been because we thought the world was going to be safer place. No one can make that case right now."…

President Obama unveils his budget today. And the numbers aren't likely to satisfy fiscal conservatives and budget hawks, who might have been hoping for a budget that decreases spending and lowers the debt. 

President Obama's budget marks the end of "austerity," reports the Washington Post. 

In Washington, folks are celebrating a new bipartisan budget deal that saves us from another full round of reductions in federal spending mandated by the “sequester.” Far fewer are lamenting the dwindling of the sequester itself. As usual, Washington has things upside down.

Tough times in the lobbying industry and the news is sure to be greeted with an outpouring of sympathy from across the land.  As Kevin Bogardus and Megan R. Wilson of the Hill report:

House Armed Services Committee chairman Rep. Howard “Buck” McKeon doesn’t look like an insurgent.  The quintessential Californian – a man of Reaganesque optimism whose congressional district now includes the Gipper’s presidential library – McKeon has been a steadfast supporter of House speaker John…

New research from the Republicans on the Senate Budget Committee shows that over the last 5 years, the U.S. has spent about $3.7 trillion on welfare. Here's a chart, showing that spending versus transportation, education, and NASA spending:

Our upcoming WEEKLY STANDARD cruise had me thinking (only a bit!) about blackjack, since the ship's casino is occasionally (rarely!) frequented after dinner by TWS editors and guests. I remember being told on a previous cruise by a real gambler that the characteristic error of occasional blackjack…

The Washington Times reports:

The government will be tapped out on Oct 17, according to Treasury Secretary Jack Lew.  Unless, that is, Congress takes:

Another bad year and deeper in debt.  This is the story of the United States Postal Service, which, as Billy House of the National Journal, reports:

Nancy Pelosi says that when it comes to the budget, there is no fat left.  Every dime of spending is essential. 

In 2009, the Obama administration made news with an $18 million, five year contract to redesign Recovery.gov, the website the government set up to allow taxpayers to track the stimulus spending enacted by the president and Congress soon after President Obama took office.  On Wednesday, notice of…

If the public is to understand the full awfulness of the sequester, it seems that it must first suffer. So, as Eric Katz reports at Government Executive, the FBI will be furloughing agents and cutting costs in a way that, according to its departing director will:

All is quiet on the Washington front. But don’t let the lull in partisan warfare fool you. In two weeks Congress returns from its summer recess, after hearing from constituents who hold the institution in lower esteem than used car salesmen, and view eating Brussels sprouts, enduring traffic jams,…

The U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) released a report on Thursday regarding illegal trafficking in the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP), more commonly known as food stamps. The report showed that the rate of trafficking rose from 1 percent of total benefits in the last study…

It is becoming increasingly clear that President Obama does not approve of the American Founders’ notion that Congress’s role is to pass laws, and the president’s role is to execute them. On the heels of his unilateral decision not to start Obamacare’s employer mandate on the date that the…

The effects of the sequester would be dire.  Or so we were told.  The massive furloughing of bureaucrats across all agencies and departments would result in cutbacks, or even elimination, of essential services.  The bonds on civilization would be strained.

Mackenzie Eaglen, writing about the weakening of the military:

While furloughs of civilian employees of the Defense Department have not lived up to the pre-sequester billing, the Pentagon is doing what it can to ease the pain for those who will be taking involuntary time off.  The American Forces Press Service is reporting that the director of the Pentagon's…

Marco Rubio, speaking earlier today at an in event in Washington sponsored by Concerned Veterans for America and THE WEEKLY STANDARD:

A live event this morning with Senator Marco Rubio, Senator Ted Cruz, and Governor Ed Rendell called, "The Need for Spending Reform: The $17 Trillion Debt Threat & America’s Spending Addiction." Panelists include Veronique De Rugy, Representative Adam Kinzinger, and Pete Hegseth.

Remember how the sequester was supposed to ravage the landscape?  The automatic spending cuts would, we were told, cause all manner of pain and suffering – inconvenience, even – as David A. Fahrenthold & Lisa Rein of the Washington Post report, we were warned:

Budget may be strained and deficits may be insupportable but there is money, $70 million worth, for IRS bonuses.

Democratic congressman Jose Serrano made the case that the IRS needs more to prevent the federal agency from more scandals:

The Republican side of the Senate Budget Committee is breaking down President Obama's budget with this preliminary analysis:

At a Democratic National Committee fund raising event in Atherton, California Thursday morning, President Obama declared that the United States government still needs to get its fiscal house in order:

As the sequester bore down on Washington, the dire warnings from the Obama administration gave the impression that wild horses couldn't drag another dime out of the treasury for a whole host of vital government services. Aircraft carrier refueling, the Head Start program, and White House tours were…

THE WEEKLY STANDARD podcast with senior writer Stephen F. Hayes on President Obama's bad sequester calculus. Hosted by Michael Graham.

On March 6, Barack Obama invited a dozen Republican senators to dine with him at the Jefferson Hotel in Washington. The group spent virtually all of their time discussing debt, deficits, and spending. Obama picked up the tab. The next day, he hosted House Budget chairman Paul Ryan, along with his…

The Democratic budget, released yesterday by Senate Budget Committee chair Patty Murray, passed out of committee this evening on a party line vote, 12-10. In response, the top Republican on the Senate Budget Committee, Jeff Sessions, released this blistering statement:

There will be no grand bargain.

In an interview that was released this morning with former Clinton aide George Stephanopoulos on ABC, President Obama talked a little about his view of the debt.

In an interview with ABC News, President Obama says his budget won't be balanced:

When it comes to deficit reduction, President Obama and the mainstream press seem to have a fascination with the figure of $4 trillion.  During last year’s first presidential debate, Obama falsely claimed, “I've put forward a specific $4 trillion deficit reduction plan,” even though he’d done…

ABC reports that most folks support spending cuts, as long as defense budgets aren't slashed:

THE WEEKLY STANDARD podcast, hosted by Michael Graham, with Bill Kristol:

Since President Barack Obama took office in January 2009, more than $6 trillion dollars has been added to the national debt.

The president has returned from Florida and is back in form, warning against the imposition of the drastic spending cuts called for by what is known as the "sequester."  

Democratic senator Tom Harkin insisted this morning that America does not have a spending problem and that we're not broke:

The White House has released limited excerpts of President Obama's State of the Union Address: 

After dodging the question just a week ago, White House spokesman Jay Carney's hand was forced today by a statement Nancy Pelosi made yesterday on Fox News Sunday:

In an interview this morning, House minority leader Nancy Pelosi made the case that we don't have a spending problem. Indeed, Pelosi says, it is wrong to say we have a "spending problem":

The woman who still could be the next defense secretary, Michele Flournoy, has an intelligent op-ed, well worth reading, in today’s Wall Street Journal, on "The Right Way to Cut Pentagon Spending." If we're to have a defense secretary who acquiesces in cutting defense (and we will while Barack…

Paul Ryan, chairman of the House Budget Committee, blasts President Barack Obama in a statement for breaking the law by refusing to submit an annual budget. "President Obama is required by law to submit his budget request for Fiscal Year 2014. For the fourth time in five years, however, he will…

The Senate Republican Conference released this video, accusing President Obama of "Empty Talk" on tackling spending:

Democratic senator Mary Landrieu said on the Senate floor that Washington's spending problem exists only on Fox News:

Wisconsin congressman Paul Ryan knocked President Barack Obama for "shadowbox[ing] a straw man" in his inaugural address. Speaking Tuesday morning on the Laura Ingraham Radio Show to guest host Raymond Arroyo, Ryan responded to Obama's statement that Medicare, Medicaid, and Social Security "do not…

President Barack Obama used his second inaugural address Monday to offer an aggressive, unapologetic defense of activist government and to call for a new spirit of unity even as he seeks to move the country even further left.

President Obama and Vice President Biden revealed their proposed reforms intended to reduce firearms related violence.

Federal welfare spending will skyrocket 80 percent over the next decade, according to new analysis by the minority side of the Senate Budget Committee. Here's a chart, provided by the committee, detailing the growth in spending:

At his press conference today, President Obama showed that he either thinks he can pull the wool over Americans’ eyes through the sheer force of his own outrageous rhetoric, or else he really believes his own rhetoric and is living in a fantasyland.  The guess here is that it’s a roughly even mix…

White House spokesman Jay Carney said yesterday that "deficit reduction is not a worthy goal unto itself":

Having avoided the "fiscal cliff," we will now be in jeopardy of breaking our necks when we collide with the "debt ceiling." The responsible thing to do, we are already being told by the New York Times is ... to raise the ceiling:

Metro stops in Washington, D.C. will now feature advertisements that warn of overspending. "Talk Is Cheap," the tagline on a series of ads reads. "Overspending Is Not."

After Congress agreed temporarily to avert the "fiscal cliff" last night, President Barack Obama hailed the deal in brief remarks delivered from the White House, and then headed to Air Force One to take a midnight flight to Hawaii. Obama had left his family days earlier to return to Washington to…

A Democratic member of Congress is moving to block President Barack Obama's congressional pay increase. The move, led by John Barrow of Georgia, is to prevent the pay increase that Obama issued through an executive order from going into effect.

Spending will increase 55 percent over the next decade, if President Barack Obama's budget plan goes into effect. The finding comes from the Republican-side of the Senate Budget Committee, which notes that Obama's "Proposal Would Spend $880 Billion Over Already Projected Increases."

It has become increasingly clear that the Obama-era Democrats view every major societal event as a new invitation to spend money, centralize power, or both.  The horrendous shootings in Connecticut have the Democrats lobbying not only for new legislation, but new federal legislation — and hence…

Since Washington and the mainstream press corps are pretending that our deficit woes are the result of a roughly equal blend of excessive federal spending and insufficient federal taxation, let’s review the evidence.  According to official government figures published by the Congressional Budget…

Senator Mark Begich, a Democrat from Alaska, is "pleased" to include more than $200 million in pork spending in the Sandy legislation, a bill meant to help those affected by Hurricane Sandy.

The fiscal cliff is a diversion, designed by politicians to conceal their inability to come to grips with the fact that they continue to spend too much, and refuse to reform a tax structure that reduces the competitiveness of American companies in world markets. No matter what deal is cut, whether…

The federal government is now spending $110 billion on "all food assistance" per year, according to new analysis by the minority side of the Senate Budget Committee. The federal dollars spent on these programs has risen by nearly $70 billion in just ten years. 

"President Obama's 'Plan' Adds $8.6 Trillion to the Debt," the minority side of the Senate Budget Committee contends. Here's a chart put together by the Republicans on the committee to explain how Obama's plan adds to the debt:

Minority Leader Mitch McConnell, the top Republican in the Senate, blasted President Barack Obama for not leaving anything on the "fiscal cliff" negotiating table this morning in remarks on the Senate floor.

Senator Jeff Sessions continues to argue against the secrecy of the ongoing "fiscal cliff" negotiations with an op-ed this morning in today's Wall Street Journal. Sessions argues that the secrecy is inherently anti-Democratic, and similar to the "Russian Duma, where officials meet behind closed…

Speaker John Boehner took to the House floor to address the "fiscal cliff" talks.

Watch the live conference here:

Senate minority leader Mitch McConnell blasted President Barack Obama from the Senate floor this morning for not offering any specifics on spending cuts.

Seventy-five percent of the new revenue pulled in by President Barack Obama's "fiscal cliff" plan would go toward new spending, not toward deficit reduction, the Republican side of the Senate Budget Committee contends. Here's a chart, detailing how money from the new tax hikes would be distributed:

One problem with the unearned income Medicare contribution tax is the name Congress chose for it, which is a triple misnomer. The income that will be subject to the tax isn’t unearned -- it is earned by savers who receive market rewards for delaying consumption and providing funds to finance…

A new poll conducted by Politico/GWU/Battleground finds that 76 percent of Americans favor "Cutting government spending across the board."

The amount of money spent on welfare programs equals, when converted to cash payments, about "$168 per day for every household in poverty," the minority side of the Senate Budget Committee finds. Here's a chart detailing the committee's findings:

Mitch McConnell, the Senate Republican leader, says he “burst into laughter” Thursday when Treasury Secretary Tim Geithner outlined the administration proposal for averting the fiscal cliff.  He wasn’t trying to embarrass Geithner, McConnell says, only responding candidly to his one-sided plan,…

According to my sources here in Vermont (that would be the Burlington Free Press and Vermont Public Radio) 2/3s of the state's congressional delegation believes the country is likely to go over the fiscal cliff.  The remaining 1/3 is "hopeful" that this bullet can somehow be dodged.

John Boehner laid out the House Republican position in the upcoming legislative debate on the fiscal cliff in remarks Wednesday afternoon. "Mr. President, the Republican majority here in the House stands ready to work with you to do what's best for our country," Boehner said, calling the massive…

A chart from the Republican side of the Senate Budget Committee shows that "U.S. Per Person Debt [Is] Now 35 Percent Higher than that of Greece."

The Foreign Policy Initiative provides this fact-sheet to debunk President Obama's false defense spending claims:

From December 1941 to August 1945, the United States of America joined the other Allied powers and fought against the Axis powers in Europe and the Pacific, during the greatest and most destructive war in all of human history.  Victory required the complete dedication of the American citizenry, as…

In a decade, federal spending to pay for the interest on America's debt will exceed total spending on the defense budget by $125 billion, or 20 percent, according to projections from the Congressional Budget Office and the Office of Budget Management. The projections are based on President Barack…

The $831,000,000,000 economic “stimulus” that President Obama spearheaded and signed into law requires his administration to release quarterly reports on its effects.  But “the most transparent administration in the history of our country” is now four reports behind schedule and has so far not…

A report from the Congressional Research Service released today finds that welfare spending is now the largest federal budget item. Presently, the federal government spends $745.84 billion to support 83 of these welfare programs.

A new report by the non-partisan Congressional Research Service finds that the largest federal budget item is spending on welfare programs. To support the 83 programs that CRS identified as welfare programs, the federal government spends $745.84 billion. 

In the wake of the Treasury Department’s newly released summary of federal spending for 2012, it’s now possible to detail just how profligate the Obama years have been.  Here’s the upshot:  Under Obama, for every $7 we’ve had, we’ve spent nearly $11 (or, to be more exact, $10.95).  That’s like a…

In 2008, Barack Obama promised to cut federal spending, cut wasteful programs, reform Medicare and Social Security, and create "5 million new jobs" in a "new energy economy." At Buzzfeed, Andrew Kaczynski has four videos of Obama making those promises at the town hall debate in 2008. Here, for…

Former presidential candidate Ross Perot has endorsed Mitt Romney, according to the Republican nominee's campaign.

In May 2009, President Obama released his updated budget estimates, which projected that the federal deficit for fiscal year 2012 would be $557 billion (see table S-1).  The Congressional Budget Office now says that the deficit for fiscal year 2012 (which ended on September 30) was about $1.1…

President Barack Obama asserted at Wednesday’s presidential debate that Governor Mitt Romney wants to spend “$2 trillion in additional spending that the military is not asking for.” Obama’s assertion echoes his earlier claim at the Democratic National Convention that Romney wants to “spend more…

A new study by Douglas Holtz-Eakin of the American Action Forum finds that President Barack Obama's spending plan would raise taxes on the middle class.  "[T]axpayers making as little as $30,000 will carry $1,500 more in taxes annually over the next 10 years," the study finds.

It’s a couple days old, but nevertheless worth watching: Here’s the clip of President Obama’s interview with David Letterman (which Steve Hayes discusses in greater detail here), during which Obama shows that he apparently has no idea how big our national debt is — apparently even to the nearest…

Regardless of one's precise political peccadilloes, most of us agree this is one of the most important elections of our lifetime. However, one gets the feeling the Romney campaign, and even the RNC, either aren't aware of the stakes or, perhaps, just not sure of the best way to convey those stakes…

In an interview on March 22, two weeks before Mitt Romney would win the Wisconsin primary and effectively end the race for the Republican nomination, Milwaukee talk radio host Charlie Sykes asked about his embrace of Paul Ryan’s budget.

A major farm bill is now stalled in the House as members head back to their districts for their traditional break. This is a good thing. The measure approved by the Senate and by the House Agriculture committee with bipartisan support easily ranks as the worst major piece of domestic policy…

In a recent campaign television ad, President Barack Obama states, "I believe the only way to create an economy built to last is to strengthen the middle class. Asking the wealthy to pay a little more so we can pay down our debt in a balanced way." The last part--committing to pay down the national…

Just before breaking away for summer recess, the Senate Appropriations Committee voted 26-3 to approve $61.3 million in spending to fix the Capitol Dome. Only 3 senators on the almost 30-person body voted against the measure. 

It was earlier noted that the Obama campaign paid a whopping $2.6 million on polling in the month of June alone. It turns out, the president's reelection campaign has spent $15 million on polling--this election cycle alone.

Senator Mike Lee criticized President Obama's and the Democrats' plan to raise taxes, saying that "their proposal would leave 94% of this year's deficit intact, which makes it an inherently unserious proposal insofar as it relates to deficit reduction."

Thirteen years ago? Or thirteen years from now?

In a letter today in the Virginian-Pilot, Mitt Romney blasts President Obama for cutting the military: 

Amtrak, which has never made any money – and has, in fact, required subsidies for all of its surly, customer-unfriendly life – is now proposing to spend about $150 billion to make it possible for riders to go from New York to Philly in under 40 minutes.  Which is about how long it takes for…

The Wall Street Journal published a stunning story this morning, reporting that new analysis shows union political spending is about four times higher than previously thought. Moreover, union political spending now exceeds direct donations: 

A new chart, set to be released later today by the minority office of the Senate Budget Committee, finds that, in the next five years, "U.S. Per Person Debt To Increase 7 Times Faster Than Italian Debt."

As the Los Angeles Times reports, for every $1 that President Obama’s campaign has spent in support of Obamacare, his administration has spent another $65 in taxpayers’ money.  The Times writes that the Obama administration has spent $46 million of taxpayers’ money in support of Obama’s centerpiece…

The House Financial Committee just concluded grilling banker Jamie Dimon on risky financial bets his firm, JPMorgan Chase, made that resulted in losses of at least $2 billion last month. Today’s hearing follows up on last week’s Senate Banking Committee grilling of Dimon on the same bad bets.

Yesterday, I noted that we have generally had our strongest periods of economic growth coming out of our deepest recessions, and I compared FDR and Obama in this vein.  Another good comparison is a more recent one — between Obama and President Reagan.

In his speech yesterday, President Obama said, “[M]y plan would reduce our yearly domestic spending to its lowest level as a share of the economy in nearly 60 years.”  Such an amazing claim is made possible only by excluding the two domestic programs that have contributed the most to our nearly $16…

Senator Kelly Ayotte, a Republican from New Hampshire, took to the Senate floor—along with Senators John McCain and John Thune—to warn against looming Department of Defense cuts.

According to figures provided by the International Monetary Fund, and compiled into this easy to read chart by the Republican side of the Senate Budget Committee, America will "spend 60 percent more per person than Spain over [the] next 5 years."[img nocaption float="center" width="500"…

The eurozone might be cracking up, but as far as debt goes, America appears to be in worse shape than the entire eurozone in the long run. According to a new chart set to be released later today by the Republican side of the Senate Budget Committee, America is on track "to add three times more debt…

"We will lose some of our shareholders’ money — and for that, we feel terrible — but no client, customer or taxpayer money was impacted by this incident.  We have let a lot of people down, and we are sorry for it."  Mr. Jamie Dimon will utter these words to a panel of U.S. senators today. Nothing,…

New Jersey Republican governor Chris Christie blasted President Obama in a speech earlier today at a conservative conference in Chicago

A new chart produced by the Republican staff of the Senate Budget Committee shows that, according to Congressional Budget Office data released yesterday, debt per American is "on track to triple in a generation":

A striking chart showing that, over the last decade, 65 percent of federal expenditures went to pay for entitlement commitments, not wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, defense, or national security: 

The tide sweeping from Greece across Europe and into the United States is washing away support for austerity, in some cases reinforcing opposition to it, largely from the left. President Obama is delighted at this support for his refusal to cut spending in the face of mounting deficits, and the…

If you ever find yourself engaged in a debate over why our national debt — now $15.7 trillion —has risen $5.9 trillion over the past four years and $15.4 trillion over the past fifty years, NPR has released a useful chart (based on figures provided by the White House Office of Management and…

The Republican Senate Budget Committee will release this new chart later today, showing that the "U.S. Spends More Per Person Than Portugal, Italy, Greece, Or Spain."

Bloomberg reports: 

A joint statement from the defending defense group at the American Enterprise Institute, the Foreign Policy Initiative, and the Heritage Foundation:

A report issued last week by the OECD (Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development) finds that the average tax burden on income in the United States has been declining in recent years, in sharp contrast to the trend in the other OECD countries. Naturally, progressives have been quick to…

The 2012 Medicare and Social Security trustees’ reports have been released (see here and here). The headline is that the Medicare Hospital Insurance (HI) trust fund will have insufficient reserves to pay full benefits beginning in 2024 (the same year that was projected in last year’s report).…

Until last week, Mitt Romney had trouble getting potential voters to care so much that they would crawl over ground glass to get to the polling station and vote for him.  But now, the man and moment may have come together, thanks to employees of the General Services Administration and the Secret…

In today’s Wall Street Journal, Daniel Henninger writes about the similarities between President Obama’s campaign message and that of President Franklin Delano Roosevelt’s 1936 reelection message. Henninger argues that Obama won’t be nearly so successful as FDR was in championing a big government…

President Obama likes to say that a strong America abroad rests on a strong America at home. What he and his administration continue to ignore, however, is that a prosperous America at home has in no small way rested for decades on America’s global military preeminence.  

The Republican side of the Senate Budget Committee will release this chart later today, clearly showing that America's debt is greater than the combined debt of the entire Eurozone and the U.K.:

The latest chart from the Republican side of the Senate Budget Committee, showing that under President Obama's budget plan, debt would be $73,000 per American in 2022:

The Miami Herald's Marc Caputo reports that Florida congressman Connie Mack IV, a candidate for the GOP nomination for Senate in 2012, called the budget recently passed by the House of Representatives a "joke."

An alarming chart from the Republican side of the Senate Budget Committee showing the "rate of debt increase during presidents' 4-year terms." 

In a book review of White House Burning titled, "The Endless Spending Spree: America's debt is $15.6 trillion and growing. Instead of raising taxes, here's an idea: Let's try capitalism," James Grant writes: