President Obama’s proposed 2012 budget will cut several billion dollars from the government’s energy assistance fund for poor people, officials briefed on the subject told National Journal.The Low Income Home Energy Assistance Program, or LIHEAP, would see funding drop by about $2.5 billion from an authorized 2009 total of $5.1 billion. The proposed cut will not touch the program’s emergency reserve fund, about $590 million, which can be used during particularly harsh cold snaps or extended heat spells, three officials told National Journal.
Nobody ever said Winning the Future was going to be easy.
Of course, we don’t have to completely lose our heads over all this deficit reduction stuff. Oh no. No, sir! Our evolution toward a more efficient capitalism, free of government interference, will be gradual enough prevent too much shock to the system:
Since 2003, some of the world’s biggest financial companies, including Goldman Sachs Group Inc., U.S. Bancorp, JPMorgan Chase and Prudential, have taken advantage of a federal subsidy that will cost taxpayers $10.1 billion — and most of the public has never heard of it.Investors have used the program, called New Markets Tax Credits, to help build more than 300 upscale projects, including hotels, condominiums, office buildings and a car museum, on streets far from poverty, according to Treasury Department records released through a federal Freedom of Information Act request.
“Some of the subsidized luxury projects,” we are informed, “may not have required federal aid at all.” Would that have been the car museum or the condos? It doesn’t say.
No doubt the deficit hawks will target this egregious example of government waste after they slash the Low Income Home Energy Assistance Program. They’re probably just moving slowly and with caution. It’s called gradualism.
Rome wasn’t built — or destroyed — in a day.
2 comments:
What do you mean, "there's no other way"? We're paying less taxes today than in any year since 1950. Bring taxes back up to the Bad Old Days of Bill Clinton, that horror of peace and prosperity that we had at the end of the 1990's, and the deficit is gone. Kaput. Fini. Over.
I realize math is hard, but this whole "OMG the sky is falling because we're spending too much!" nonsense is just that -- nonsense. We're running deficits because we're running the level of taxes that existed before the Interstate Highway System, the level of taxes that existed before Medicare, the level of taxes that existed before Medicaid, the level of taxes that existed before Pell Grants and student loans... and expecting that same level of taxes to pay for all these. Dude. If you aren't making enough money to pay for all the stuff you need to pay for, do like my daddy did when he wasn't making enough money to support our family -- man up and TAKE A SECOND JOB or whatever else it takes to make enough money to take care of the family's basic needs! Same thing applies to government. But then, my Daddy was a *MAN*, and there doesn't seem to be too many of them around nowadays, just a buncha sissies whining about how their government doesn't make enough money and they want a free lunch (Interstate highways, Medicare, etc.) but don't want to pay for it....
- Badtux the Rude Penguin
Great column you have posted. Can't wait to read more. Keep it up!
Arrielle P
Post a Comment