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Senator’s Coburn’s Budget War

By: chrysostom15 (Diary)  |  September 29th, 2011 at 11:58 AM  | 

RESIZE: AAA

Senator Tom Coburn is one of the most conservative members of Congress.  Well known for his battles with Speaker Gingrich (Coburn believed Girngrich was moving the GOP too far to the left and not cutting government enough), and for beating-out the establishment candidate to win his Senate seat, followed by his crusade to cut wastefull federal spending.  Senator Coburn recently wrote an article for the Washington Examiner where he advocates against cutting a government agency.  My first thought at the idea of Senator Coburn ever suggesting a cut to a federal agency is too large is to wonder whether or not H___ had frozen over.  That is something I never thought would happen.  After reading it; it turns out I agree with him.

His article is at: http://washingtonexaminer.com/opinion/op-eds/2011/09/senate-appropriators-secret-war-against-oversight

The reason I agree with him is because of what the agency is:  GAO.  GAO is the small legislative agency that managed to save $87 for every $1 of funding it recieves.  It is called the Government Accountability Office and its mission is to find and propose cuts to fraud, waste, and abuse within the federal government.  It is the agency that discovered and reported on the House banking scandle, and with a budget of 1/2 a billion, identified $50 billion in cuts that were implemented by Congress.  It recently issued a report commissioned by Senator Coburn identifying $200 billion in potential cuts that could be made to the federal government. 

Frankly, it is clear to me why Senate Democrats would want to cut the agency (as they don’t want their pork projects exposed), and I commend Senator Coburn for fighting for good government, small government, and one of the few organizations — and perhaps the only government agency — that is actually fighting to cut government.

COMMENTS

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  • defenseconservative

    Coburn is an utterly discredited anti-defense libertarian who has singled out the defense budget, AND ONLY THE DEFENSE BUDGET, for significant cuts.

    Under his “back to black” plan, the defense budget would be cut by a whopping $1 TRILLION $6 bn over a decade, i.e. over $100 bn per year on average, while all other agencies would escape almost unharm, with small, statistically insignificant budget cuts that would constitute mere rounding errors in their budgets. Meanwhile, the DOD under his plan would have to dramatically cut the existing arsenal of strategic and conventional weapons (which are already inadequate, but these cuts would invite a Russian nuclear first strike), almost completely cancel modernization, and make dramatic cuts to force structure. Nothing that this utterly discredited Oklahoma fool says is credible.

    • kestrel

      Here’s $200B in non-defense cuts that can be bipartisanly agreed upon. The more we can make these types of cuts, the less likely we’ll have to cut defense. Making these cuts and implementing Paul Ryan’s tax reform are constructive things we can do now that are passable and will help our situation. Coburn isn’t perfect, but he is still one of our best.

      • defenseconservative

        On top of that, Coburn also proposed $1 trillion of defense cuts over a decade, i.e. $100 bn PER YEAR.

        Coburn is, for that reason alone, one of the WORST Republicans serving on Capitol Hill.

        As for Paul Ryan’s “tax reform” – don’t make me laugh. His ridiculous “tax reform plan” would keep a Marxist progressive tax code and the IRS. No flat tax and no FairTax. Reagan tried that in 1986; four years later, there were four tax rates.