When President Barack Obama submitted his proposed budget one year ago, he claimed he wanted to do away with the “mindless austerity” of the sequestration, which provided some measure of limitation on government spending. Then in December, aided and abetted by a Republican-controlled Congress, he eradicated those minor restrictions and replaced mindless austerity with clueless profligacy.
When President Barack Obama submitted his proposed budget one year ago, he claimed he wanted to do away with the “mindless austerity” of the sequestration, which provided some measure of limitation on government spending. Then in December, aided and abetted by a Republican-controlled Congress, he eradicated those minor restrictions and replaced mindless austerity with clueless profligacy.
Now, he puts forth a budget for the 2017 fiscal year, which begins Oct. 1, that calls for $4.15 trillion in spending, a $223 billion increase compared to the current year’s budget. His proposal, curiously released while all eyes were focused on the New Hampshire primary, spans more than 2,300 pages, which, in itself, serves as a testament to the federal government’s bloat and overreach.
The president’s budget contains $3 trillion in proposed tax increases through the next 10 years, according to the Committee for a Responsible Federal Budget. The most controversial of these is a $10.25-per-barrel oil tax, which would be used to fund “clean” transit projects and low-carbon technologies such a self-driving cars, which the private sector already is developing. With oil prices hovering at about $30 a barrel, that is a roughly 35 percent tax, which experts project would translate to a price hike of about 25 cents per gallon at the pump. Fortunately, this is a nonstarter for congressional Republicans.
The president’s budget message reads like his State of the Union addresses, espousing his wish list, from “green energy” subsidies to universal preschool to high-speed rail and increased transit funding to $4 billion for a K-12 computer science program to two years of “free” community college — none of which is the province of federal, state and local governments.
Obama’s budget would, once again, expand government control over our lives and further burden current and future generations with debt. It is understandable that a lame-duck president with a somewhat hostile Congress would advance a budget sprinkled with fairy dust, but Obama’s proposal should not be taken seriously with regard to fiscal responsibility.
— The Orange County Register