Fiscal farce...

     farce  n. -  ludicrous empty show; mockery; ridiculous sham -  far-ci-cal  adj.
     Sometimes there's not enough soap at the end of the day.
     Let's recap the spending tug-of-war among the Keystone Cops in Washington, shall we?
     Federal discretionary spending must have annual approval from the House of Representatives. "No money shall be drawn from the treasury, but in consequence of appropriations made by law." Article 1, Section 9, U.S. Constitution. (Mandatory spending is built in to certain laws and needs no yearly approval. All spending in this budget deal was discretionary, meaning it needs reauthorization each year.)
     Congress is required by law to pass a budget every fiscal year (October through the next October).
     Before last year's midterm elections, Congress was under complete control of the Democrats. They refused to pass any budget at all for Fiscal Year 2011, which we are now halfway through. This is one of their major responsibilities, and they bailed because spending America into oblivion, as they have been doing, would have been unpopular right before the midterm elections.
     In the absence of an annual budget, the now-Republican-controlled House has been passing a series of continuing resolutions to keep the government funded.
     The president proposed 1.6 trillion dollars in spending for this fiscal year. That's up from last year's spending. The Democrats could have passed that budget easily last year.
     So a week or so ago, we had a so-called "big budget battle," because now the more fiscally responsible Republicans are in charge.
     Mm-hmm.
     They had a clear mandate to cut spending. And. They. Blew. It.
     In this "historic deal" the Republicans agreed to "historic cuts" amounting to what they claim was about 38 billion dollars.
     1.6 trillion dollars is equal to 1,600 billion. So, out of 1600, the Congress agreed to cut 38.
     38/1600 = .02375. That comes to less than two and a half percent.
     As the week unfolded, we learned that the 38 billion was actually only about 350 million in new cuts. Wow. That is some belt tightening.
1,600,000,000,000
-          350,000,000
 1,599,650,000,000
     It is actually more like a rounding error.
     It's as if you were looking to purchase a car for 16,ooo dollars, and the guy offered you three dollars and fifty cents off... And then you paraded around the neighborhood claiming that you got some kind of unprecedented deal of a lifetime. You would look like what you are. A fool.
     Or worse.
     Have you seen the National Debt clock? It's in my sidebar. Take a long look. No way we pay that back with more of these great $3.50 deals.
     Oh, and by the way, not raising spending by an additional 350 million is not actually a cut... it is just spending more... but just not as much more. Only in the twisted minds of self-serving politicians is that a cut. Because the president proposed so much of an increase over last year... and those savvy fiscal hawks didn't quite give him all he wanted... they refer to it as a cut.
     Be sure of this: We are spending more this year than last year. That is an increase. Not a cut.
     The Republican leadership failed to do what the voters last November sent them there to do.
     Instead, they agreed to more reckless spending. We told them we have had enough. They did not listen. And they must think we are fools, too. Because they tried to spin it like they did the responsible thing.
     They are weak. They are fearful. They are irresponsible. They are miserably and contemptibly inadequate.
     Not all of the Republicans, but to be sure, the leadership.
     And to make matters worse, they agreed to keep funding the slaughter of hundreds of thousands of babies this year.
     The Democrat leadership are completely complicit in their destruction of our economy and the promotion of the culture of death. But the Republicans were supposed to stand against this. They did not.
     The media looks at this all through the lens of political winning and losing. First, they said Boehner and the Republican leadership won, because of the "historic cuts." Then they said that the president won because he got pretty much all of his spending.
     They still don't get it.
     More spending is winning? In that case, We the People lose.
     There really is not enough soap at the end of the day.
     Stay tuned. The president will soon go to Congress and ask them to raise the debt ceiling. I won't hold my breath that the leadership on either side will do the right thing. I wonder how they will spin it anyway.