Back to the basics.

If there is one thing that ties all Republicans (libertarian, gay, moderate, conservative, atheist, religious) together other than the war on terror, it's the belief that the government is too big. If we could point to one thing that Bush has disappointed us the most with, it would be the budget. The Captain breaks it down referring to Federal Spending - By The Numbers:

......Federal spending has kept the pace of the expansion in revenues. Last year's budget came in at $2.472T, and this year we expect to spend $2.77T, according to estimates released this week. Of that money, $969B comes in so-called discretionary spending, up $300B since 2001. But by far and away the worst of the bill comes in entitlement spending, which went to $1.32T last year, up from $1.009 in 2001. As a measure of the rate of increase in both areas, discretionary spending has increased 93% since 1990, but entitlements have gone up 132%, while revenues have increased by 109%.

Where has the increase come? Some of it has gone to national defense, but not all of it. In fact, the federal budget has grown across the board since 2001, outstripping inflation (12% overall) in several categories, such as Education (137%), Community and Regional Development (342%), Medicare (58%), Housing and Commerce (58%), Medicaid (49%), and Water Transportation (46%). Do you like the idea of nationalized health care? We may be heading there by default, as the federal budget for Health Research and Regulation has grown by 78% since 2001 and now consumes $76B of our budget.

And here is the money quote:

Federal programs have become an addiction, not just to politicians looking to pork up home districts to guarantee re-election, but to all of us. What started as noble programs to assist the truly disadvantaged have now become bloated socialist nanny-care programs, floating everyone and relying on a decreasing work force to prop up the Ponzi scheme for just one more generation before the collapse comes.

I think we conservatives have given Bush and congress a pass because of our support on the war on terror, but it is time to put our foot down. Being a compassionate conservative does not mean throwing out money to every program in the government. The above increases are unacceptable. It's time to make the hard choices. People have got to be more responsible for themselves and their own lives.

Let me give you a small example. A few years ago I had a family member (on my husband's side) tell me how she got free cheese and milk and shots for her kids from government programs. This was a married working middle class college educated family. When I expressed my dismay that these programs were meant for the very poor and it was things like this that made them not work, she justified it by saying that they paid so much in taxes that they deserved to get some of it back that way.

When I was volunteering for Health and Human Services many years back I saw this over and over. People who actually went agency to agency to get as much as possible while they spent their own money on booze and cigarettes. I remember once talking to a woman that was having surgery (on us the taxpayer) and because I was taking care of her kids during the surgery she told me I could reach her on her cell phone. This was even before everyone and their dog had a cell phone. I asked her how much she paid for the cell phone a month. She said about $50. I thought well, if she paid for her surgery at $50 a month for a few years then the taxpayer wouldn't have to. But that thought probably never crossed her mind.

This is why programs don't' work. People who shouldn't be getting the benefits do. Period. We have got to cut these people out of the picture and make them fly on their own. We all believe in a safety net for the poor, but that net is being weighed down by people taking advantage of the system. If we don't do something, that net will break and no one will benefit.