"We worked all day yesterday, we had meeting after meeting, to get this $100 billion we promised we would cut," said Rep. Billy Long, R-Mo. "As Larry the Cable Guy would say, we got 'er done. Trouble is, $100 billion is like throwing a deck chair off the Titanic, so we've got to work harder."
The truth is Long and the Republicans didn't even throw the deck chair off the deck, they couldn't even lift the life preservers to throw over the deck. Let's take this 100 billion number that John Boehner included in the Pledge to America. It was after the Pledge to America was published that Republicans like Congressman Long began throwing out this meager number of $100 billion.
So, the assignment from the American people who bought into the Pledge to America as the new Contract for America in hopes of saving the Republic was to cut $100 billion from the federal budget. How did the new Republican House perform? Well, if this was grade school, the new House Republicans failed to meet expectations 39% of the time in their bill HR1. That means they were successful in completing 61% of the goals of the assignment. This totals a grade of a D-. That's about as close to failure as you can get without actually failing.
So, what have we learned from these new Republicans? They are willing to celebrate mediocrity and continue the status quo of the big spending Republican ways that began after George W. Bush took office. This isn't what the American people bought into when they decided it was time to change direction in this country. A D- grade isn't going to save this country from the threat of the national debt, nor will it put even a dent into that towering $14 trillion number that will be looking at $16 trillion by the end of the year.
If I were a "fed up" with wasteful spending Congressman, I would be embarrassed by the outcome of the Republican's efforts. Yet, not a peep from the "fed up" Congressman, other than he is still trying to pass off HR1 as $100 billion in cuts when only $61 billion was cut, according to The Hill, a number Senator Richard Lugar commented on.
So apparently, we can't even trust Congressman Long to tell us the truth about the actual cuts. Like we weren't going to find out Billy. I thought Long said he was going to read these bills. Apparently he didn't read enough to realize HR1 was far short of the $100 billion. So Billy Long and the Republicans in Congress get a D- for their budget cuts efforts.
From the Hill:
A senior Senate Republican on Sunday rejected the spending bill approved by House Republicans on Saturday.
Sen. Richard Lugar (R-Ind.) said the size of the $61 billion in cuts proposed by the House is "reasonable," but he wouldn't support the bill as it stands.
"I would not support the entirety of the House bill," Lugar said Sunday morning on CNN's "State of the Union."
Lugar didn't specify his concerns with the proposal, clarifying that the $61 billion in spending cuts approved by House Republicans "seems like a reasonable figure."
"We are spending money that we do not have," he told Candy Crowley.
Still, Lugar's opposition to the current proposal is indication that it's not only Democrats who are eying changes to the proposal as it makes its way over to the upper chamber.
Approved Saturday without Democratic support, the House proposal would cut $61 billion in spending through fiscal year 2011, which ends Sept. 30. The current law to fund the federal government expires March 4.
