On Sun, 21 Mar 2004 18:01:16 -0600, "D. Strang"
wrote:

"Lawrence Dillard" wrote

I'm going to keep my campaign right here in America."

Mr Bush had better start soon; he has quite a plateful of overseas issues
to explain away, and possibly as many tough internal issues as well.

The reason Bush won't be re-elected, is he has never vetoed a spending bill.

You state a fact but grossly over-simplify a conclusion. The Supreme
Court has over-turned the "line-item" veto making it necessary to take
bills in toto rather than excise specific pork items. The trend from
Congress is increasingly to load up popular bills with amendments
bringing home the bacon. Back-scratching between
representatives/senators to guarantee passage of the principal bill
means a load of budget-busters included.

If we start with the essential truism that appropriations bills start
in the house, the conclusion might be that it isn't the President that
is creating budget problems.

He did the tax cut to give back the surplus, and then signed bills to spend
the money anyway. Enron was an amateur comparably.

The Enron statement is a throw-away. A non-sequitur and inflammatory.

The tax cut was not to "give back the surplus" but to stimulate the
economy. The basic difference between conservative and liberal
approaches to the economy is that conservatives tend to believe that
individuals can best spend their own money.

Signing bills is only part of the process. Congress initiates,
debates, amends and then through passage reflects the "will of the
electorate" when they send bills forward to the President. Culpability
does not reside solely with the executive.

I'm trying to get my representatives to sponsor a constitutional amendment
that says basically, that the budget (as per the CBO) will be balanced two
years out of seven.

How very popular! But, impractical. First, the CBO is a suspiciously
political instrument and motivated by other factors than pure
accounting. Second, deficit spending is a necessary practice for both
long term capital investment and to respond to unforeseen
contingencies. Third, the ability to build infrastructure and pay it
off in future year dollars will often mandate defiict spending. (We do
it regularly in our personal budgets when we buy homes or cars.)




Ed Rasimus
Fighter Pilot (USAF-Ret)
"When Thunder Rolled"
Smithsonian Institution Press
ISBN #1-58834-103-8