Moving with surprising speed, the House gave final approval Friday to a more than $1 trillion budget bill that fills in the blank spaces of the August debt accords and sets a new template for government spending through the 2012 elections.
The giant appropriations bill is remarkable for its reach, covering the heart of the domestic budget, the Pentagon, and foreign aid plus tens of billions more related to the war in Afghanistan. It?s over 1,200 pages were only released Thursday, but debate was compressed and the 296-121 vote never in serious doubt with members eager to go home for the holidays.
Continue ReadingIn contrast with the burst of stimulus spending at the beginning of President Barack Obama?s first year, the image now is of a government very much retrenching after a year of real cuts that have rolled back domestic appropriations to Bush-era levels when adjusted for inflation.
That translates into a roughly 10 percent cut from spending levels last January when Republicans took over the House, and under the August debt agreement, this will become a new plateau stretching into the future with annual growth pegged below the rate of inflation.
Conservatives remain unhappy that the change has not been greater, and the $1.043 trillion cap for 2012 is in fact a significant retreat from the much deeper cuts proposed by the House Republicans? budge resolution last April. But just a year ago, Democrats were proposing their own omnibus bill, complete with parochial earmarks and spending $73 billion higher for non-defense programs.
The change now is a real victory for the House GOP with two caveats.
First, to a surprising degree the leadership has replaced spending earmarks with often special interest policy riders that are earmarks themselves in many respects. Second, the party is still struggling to cope with the caps set in August for security funding and defense.
Overseas contingency funds, ostensibly for military operations in Afghanistan and other theaters, are being used as a safety valve to pay for core Pentagon costs. And much as Republicans have criticized Obama?s decisions to bring more American forces home, the resulting savings have helped the GOP sustain what has become a very costly military amid spending cuts elsewhere.
Indeed, well over half of the package now reflects these Pentagon and war-related costs and that may help to explain the strength of the vote. Republicans split 147 to 86 in favor of the deal; Democrats 149 to 35.
The healthy margins all but assure Senate passage and defuse any remaining worry of a government shutdown.
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