{"id":490,"date":"2010-01-27T18:19:39","date_gmt":"2010-01-27T23:19:39","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/hushbeck.com\/blog\/?p=490"},"modified":"2010-01-27T18:19:39","modified_gmt":"2010-01-27T23:19:39","slug":"obama-and-scaling-back-the-federal-bureaucracy","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/hushbeck.com\/blog\/2010\/01\/obama-and-scaling-back-the-federal-bureaucracy\/","title":{"rendered":"Obama and Scaling Back the Federal Bureaucracy"},"content":{"rendered":"

President Obama and the Democrats may be setting the nation up to accomplish something conservatives have been advocating for decades, the scaling back of the federal bureaucracy, and\u00a0on a scale more massive than conservatives may have even wished.\u00a0 This is not, of course, Obama’s intention. Far from it.\u00a0 Nor will it be for the reasons\u00a0or in a fashion conservatives\u00a0wanted. \u00a0 But it may very well be the result of his heretofore unimaginable budget deficits and the looming short falls in Social Security and Medicare.<\/p>\n

It is hard to believe that only a few short years ago democrats were railing about the deficit spending under George W Bush.\u00a0 Personally, I and many other conservatives agreed with them, and excessive spending was a significant factor in the Republican’s loss of Congress in 2006.\u00a0 But while we agreed that spending under Bush and the Republican Congress was excessive, it was still hard to take the Democrat’s complaints seriously. After all, many conservatives characterized the Republican spending as Republicans acting like Democrats.\u00a0 I was firmly convinced that if the Democrats regained control, spending and therefore deficits would go up, not down.<\/p>\n

Still in my wildest dreams, or nightmares, \u00a0I did not imagine the deficits would rise to the levels they are now.\u00a0 I thought they might go up some, maybe 10% – 50%, but never did I imagine they would go up 3-4 times.\u00a0 Last year’s budget deficit was 1.42 trillion, This year’s is projected to be 1.35 trillion<\/a>.\u00a0 That is $4,500 for every man woman and child in the country, and that is just one year.\u00a0 That means in just the last two years the Federal government has saddled the average family of four with over $36,000 in debt.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n

This just cannot go on.\u00a0 Even if the President’s projections hold up, after 5 years the deficit will still be $480 billion, well above the norm that Democrats were railing\u00a0against \u00a0just a few short years ago. \u00a0But some budget experts see Obama’s projections as wildly optimistic and “most budget experts see deficits nearing or exceeding $1 trillion each year over the next decade once tax cuts and other policies are factored in.”<\/p>\n

The cost just to service this rapidly growing debt is likewise growing. Combine this with the fact that within a few years the surplus generated by Medicare and Social Security will change to a deficit, and the Federal Government will have to start redeeming all those IOUs it has been filing away and there is going to be a huge money crunch.<\/p>\n

Future Presidents and Congresses will not really have a choice but to\u00a0drastically scale back or even\u00a0eliminate a\u00a0whole range of federal\u00a0programs.\u00a0\u00a0Sure they can, and undoubtedly will, raise taxes, and a lot.\u00a0\u00a0But\u00a0taxes depress the economy and thus there is a limit to how much money can be raised.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n

Programs such as the National Endowment for Arts and Public Broadcasting are sure to go.\u00a0 There simply will not be\u00a0enough money.\u00a0 But those will be\u00a0just some of the visible casualties.\u00a0 There are hundreds and\u00a0probably thousands\u00a0of smaller programs buried in the budget that are also certain to go,\u00a0scarified to feed the ever growing debt.\u00a0\u00a0Even if the\u00a0current deficit is\u00a0finally brought\u00a0under control, there will still be\u00a0the ever increasing burden of Social Security and Medicare as\u00a0it falls deeper and deeper into the red, and demands more\u00a0and more IOUs be repaid.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Eventually\u00a0even departments will be drastically cut back and perhaps even eliminated.\u00a0 First in line will be the Department of Education, which was only created in 1980. But other departments will take serious hits as well.\u00a0 So will the states, as monies to the states are cut back as government continues to strain just to meet the demands of the debt, \u00a0Social Security and Medicare.<\/p>\n

So the Democrats under Barack Obama may be setting up the country for the paradox of the both the largest increase in federal spending, and the greatest cutback in federal programs\u00a0in\u00a0our history.\u00a0 Anyway you look at it, it will not be a pretty sight.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

President Obama and the Democrats may be setting the nation up to accomplish something conservatives have been advocating for decades, the scaling back of the federal bureaucracy, and\u00a0on a scale more massive than conservatives may have even wished.\u00a0 This is not, of course, Obama’s intention. Far from it.\u00a0 Nor will it be for the reasons\u00a0or […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[12,13,35,36],"tags":[204,393,403,507,846,901,934,1054,1184],"class_list":["post-490","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-domestic-policy","category-economy","category-social-issues","category-taxes","tag-budget-deficits","tag-deficits","tag-democrats","tag-federal-bureaucracy","tag-medicare","tag-national-endowment-for-arts","tag-obama","tag-public-broadcasting","tag-social-security"],"yoast_head":"\nObama and Scaling Back the Federal Bureaucracy - Politics and Religion<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/hushbeck.com\/blog\/2010\/01\/obama-and-scaling-back-the-federal-bureaucracy\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Obama and Scaling Back the Federal Bureaucracy - Politics and Religion\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"President Obama and the Democrats may be setting the nation up to accomplish something conservatives have been advocating for decades, the scaling back of the federal bureaucracy, and\u00a0on a scale more massive than conservatives may have even wished.\u00a0 This is not, of course, Obama’s intention. 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