Journalist @baltimoresun writer artist runner #amwriting Chaplain PIO #partylikeajournalist

Journalist @baltimoresun writer artist runner #amwriting Chaplain PIO #partylikeajournalist
Journalist @baltimoresun writer artist runner #amwriting Md Troopers Assoc #20 & Westminster Md Fire Dept Chaplain PIO #partylikeajournalist
Showing posts with label US Congress fiscal discipline. Show all posts
Showing posts with label US Congress fiscal discipline. Show all posts

Wednesday, March 06, 2013

The Tentacle: How I learned to love the sequester by Kevin E. Dayhoff Mar 6, 2013 http://tinyurl.com/a4s5zu8


The Tentacle: How I learned to love the sequester by Kevin E. Dayhoff Mar 6, 2013 


Last Friday, March 1, the much ballyhooed and overhyped “sequester” of the federal budget began. A key and critical provision of the Budget Control Act of 2011, sequestration was signed into law on August 2, 2011 by President Barack Obama.

In August 2011 “bipartisan majorities in both the House of Representatives and Senate voted for sequestration as a mechanism to compel the Congress to act on deficit reduction,” according to a March 1, 2013 Office of Management and Budget memo to Speaker of the House, John A. Boehner (R., OH).

The letter further detailed that “As a result of the Congress's failure to act, the law requires the President to issue a sequestration order today canceling $85 billion in budgetary resources across the Federal Government for FY 2013…”

This latest artificial governance-by-crisis has been unfolding for a number of weeks – err, months… http://www.thetentacle.com/ShowArticle.cfm?mydocid=5658

*****

Tuesday, March 05, 2013

The Farm Credit Council “The Insider”: USDA Faces 5% Cut Due to Sequester; FCA Exempt

The Farm Credit Council “The Insider”: USDA Faces 5% Cut Due to Sequester; FCA Exempt

An article in The Farm Credit Council “The Insider, reports:

http://kevindayhoff.blogspot.com/2013/03/the-farm-credit-council-insider-usda.html 


The White House late last week issued its orders for the sequester cuts, which includes a reduction of approximately 5% for USDA for the remainder of fiscal 2013. The cuts are to take place over seven months and amount to about 13% from defense spending and 9% from non-defense programs.

The plan calls for furloughs of meat inspectors for the Federal Safety and Inspection Service. FSIS is expected to reduce its spending by about $53 million out of a $1.05 billion budget. Commodity programs are to be cut by $329 million and disaster spending is to be reduced by about $70 million.

USDA Secretary Vilsack said the budget cuts could disrupt the agricultural economy by as much as $8 billion, affecting as many as 60,000 jobs, and could prevent as much as $35 million in USDA loans being made to as many as 1,500 farmers.

Vilsack added that USDA is prepared to continue distributing direct payments and is committed to giving farmers in the Average Crop Revenue Election program options to stay in or withdraw from ACRE.

“Sequester may impact the amount of payments, but I don't think it will affect whether people get payments,” Vilsack said. He added that he believes it would be difficult for Congress to reduce or modify direct payments this year, either in response to the sequester or as part of a new farm bill.

The Senate last week failed to pass either of two competing bills to address the sequester. The plan favored by Senate Democrats, urged by Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-NV) and Agriculture Committee Chairwoman Debbie Stabenow (D-MI) would have included a number of cuts to agriculture spending, including elimination of direct payments. Chairwoman Stabenow said this would spare agriculture from a new round of sequestration cuts in the future.

House Agriculture Committee Chairman Frank Lucas (R-OK) said it was disappointing that the Senate failed to pass a replacement, but that he was pleased that the Reid-Stabenow plan was rejected because it would have unfairly targeted agriculture.

“The agriculture portion of their proposal called for a 50 percent cut to a single title in the farm bill that accounts for six percent of overall agriculture spending and less than one percent of overall federal spending,” Chairman Lucas said.

Complicating the picture for a new farm bill is the fact that the current continuing resolution funding government operations is set to expire March 27. Without an extension or a replacement, the federal government will be unable to spend money to keep certain operations running. House Republicans are expected to introduce their plan this week for extending routine government spending through September, the end of the current fiscal year.

In addition, the Congressional Budget Office last week released new estimates substantially downgrading the promised savings from the House and Senate farm bills.

The report says the Senate-passed farm bill would save only $13.1 billion over 10 years, compared with a promised $23.1 billion last July. The House Agriculture Committee plan would save $26.6 billion compared with $35.1 billion estimated last year.

The Farm Credit Administration is exempt from the cuts required by the sequester. Because FCA’s funding comes from assessments paid by Farm Credit System institutions and not from appropriated funds, FCA’s budget will not be reduced.
[20130304 sdosm The FCC Insider USDA faces 5 percent cut]
*****

Friday, December 30, 2011

News from The Hill: White House delays $1.2T debt hike to allow votes in Congress




News from The Hill:

White House delays $1.2T debt hike to allow votes in Congress 
By Peter Schroeder 
The White House has agreed to hold off on formally requesting a $1.2 trillion increase in the debt limit to give Congress time to vote on it. The Obama administration had said that the the Treasury Department could formally request the debt increase as soon as Friday. Officials say the federal debt is nearing the maximum permitted under the law.

Read the story here.


For all the latest news:
Visit TheHill.com 
Follow @TheHill on Twitter
Like The Hill on Facebook

*****

Wednesday, December 21, 2011

The Hill: Obama calls Boehner, urges him to pass two-month payroll tax extension - By Amie Parnes


News from The Hill:

Obama calls Boehner, urges him to pass two-month payroll tax extension 

By Amie Parnes 

President Obama called Speaker John Boehner (R-Ohio) on Wednesday and urged him to allow a vote on the two-month payroll tax extension, calling it it "the only option" to ensure taxes don't go up.

In a phone call made late Wednesday morning, Obama urged Boehner to take up the Senate's bill, White House spokesman Jay Carney told reporters.

In the call, Obama told the speaker he was committed to working with Congress for extending the payroll tax for the entire year. He also reminded Boehner that "the short-term bipartisan compromise passed by almost the entire Senate is the only option to ensure that middle class families aren't hit with a tax hike in 10 days and gives both sides the time needed to work out a full year solution," according to a White House readout.



Labels: 
*****

Tuesday, December 20, 2011

Dr. Coburn Releases New Report on Wasteful Government Spending in 2011: "Wastebook 2011"


(WASHINGTON, D.C.) – U.S. Senator Tom Coburn, M.D. (R-OK) today released a new oversight report, “Wastebook 2011” that highlights over $6.5 billion in examples of some of the most egregious ways your taxpayer dollars were wasted. This report details 100 of the countless unnecessary, duplicative and low-priority projects spread throughout the federal government.
“Video games, robot dragons, Christmas trees, and magic museums. This is not a Christmas wish list, these are just some of the ways the federal government spent your tax dollars. Over the past 12 months, politicians argued, debated and lamented about how to reign in the federal government’s out of control spending. All the while, Washington was on a shopping binge, spending money we do not have on things we do not absolutely need. Instead of cutting wasteful spending, nearly $2.5 billion was added each day in 2011 to our national debt, which now exceeds $15 trillion,” Dr. Coburn said.
“Congress cannot even agree on a plan to pay for the costs of extending jobless benefits to the millions of Americans who are still out of work. Yet, thousands of millionaires are receiving unemployment benefits and billions of dollars of improper payments of unemployment insurance are being made to individuals with jobs and others who do not qualify. And remember those infamous bridges to nowhere in Alaska that became symbols of government waste years ago? The bridges were never built, yet the federal government still spent more than a million dollars just this year to pay for staff to promote one of the bridges.”
Examples of wasteful spending highlighted in “Wastebook 2011” include:
• $75,000 to promote awareness about the role Michigan plays in producing Christmas trees & poinsettias.
• $15.3 million for one of the infamous Bridges to Nowhere in Alaska.
• $113,227 for video game preservation center in New York.
• $550,000 for a documentary about how rock music contributed to the collapse of the Soviet Union.
• $48,700 for 2nd annual Hawaii Chocolate Festival, to promote Hawaii’s chocolate industry.
• $350,000 to support an International Art Exhibition in Venice, Italy.
• $10 million for a remake of “Sesame Street” for Pakistan.
• $35 million allocated for political party conventions in 2012.
• $765,828 to subsidize “pancakes for yuppies” in the nation’s capital.
• $764,825 to study how college students use mobile devices for social networking.
Read the full report: here
###
12/20/11Current record
12/17/11Dr. Coburn Votes "No" on Omnibus Spending Bill
12/7/11The �Taxpayers Right to Know Act� Introduced in Both Chambers of Congress Today
11/30/11Dr. Coburn�s Statement on the NAT GAS Act
11/22/11Dr. Coburn�s Statement on Failure of the Super Committee
11/16/11Coburn Exposes Congress� War on Oversight; Appropriators Target Taxpayer Watchdog
11/13/11Dr. Coburn Releases Report Exposing Billions in Giveaways for Millionaires
11/9/11Drs Coburn and Barrasso Release a Doctors� Perspective of �Medicare & You 2012� Handbook
11/1/11Senate Rejects Savings Amendments to �Minibus� Appropriations Bill
10/21/11Senate Passes Coburn Amendments Ending Welfare for Millionaire Farmers, and Prohibiting Repayment of Federal Grants with Federal Loans, but Protects Greedy Slumlords
9/29/11Help Balance the Budget: Vote in the Back in Black Spending Cuts Poll
9/29/11Sens. Carper, Coburn Urge Joint Committee on Deficit Reduction to Focus on Medicare and Medicaid Waste, Fraud and Abuse
9/22/11Dr. Coburn Supports Senator Ron Johnson for Senate Republican Leadership
9/15/11Senate Votes to Compound Nation�s Financial Crisis Instead of Cutting Spending
9/8/11Dr. Coburn�s Statement on President Obama�s Jobs Plan
9/8/11Senate Votes to Protect the Diversion of Patent Fees
8/9/11Dr. Coburn to Host Town Hall Meetings in Oklahoma
8/6/11Dr. Coburn�s Statement on U.S. Credit Downgrade
7/28/11Senators Coburn, McCain, Vitter, Hatch, Cornyn, Isakson, Coats, Lee, Portman & Representatives Lankford and Flake Introduce Bill to Give States Freedom to Manage Federal Highway Tax Revenues
7/25/11Dr. Coburn�s Statement on Breakdown in Debt Talks
7/21/11Dr. Coburn's Report Exposing Wasteful Government Spending in Oklahoma
7/18/11Dr. Coburn Releases $9 Trillion Deficit Reduction Plan
6/29/11Senators Coburn, Udall, McCaskill and Paul Propose Senate Rules Change, Requiring Review of All Legislation for Duplication, Overlapping Programs
6/28/11Lieberman, Coburn Reveal Bipartisan Proposal to Save Medicare, Reduce Debt
6/23/11Dr. Coburn Urges House to Reject Modified Patent Bill

*****