Snarky McSnarkerson Examines the Bush Budget

Another bit of appalling news released on a day when no one will be reading it:

Bush has said his budget will assemble federal resources for war, domestic security and other priorities and cull inefficient or redundant programs. Administration officials have said he will hold overall nondefense spending — excepting domestic security — to less than next year's expected 2.3 percent increase in inflation, meaning the programs will lose purchasing power.

You might be wondering, as I was, what the “inefficient or redundant programs” to which Bush was referring are. It turns out, his choices finally clear up what he really means by “compassionate conservative”—basically, conserving all your compassion in favor of pork barrel spending and unjust wars. Let’s take a look:

The budget, the toughest he has written since entering the White House four years ago, seeks about half the increase for school districts in low-income communities he requested last year and a slight reduction for the National Park Service.

First of all, perhaps if he had written a reasonable budget in any of the last four years, or made any attempts to control the outrageous spending in Congress, we might not even be having this discussion. Secondly, I wonder if, per chance, giving less money to poor schools might actually end up leaving a child or two behind…?

The details obtained Saturday are the latest in a budget that will also seek savings from programs ranging from Amtrak and farmers' subsidies to Medicaid, the federal-state health program for the poor and disabled.

Well, that’s fair enough. We’ve been spending way too much money on health programs for the poor and disabled for years. We probably ought to just euthanize them. Sure, the upfront costs for the crematoriums will be kind of hefty, but once they’re built, they’ll be paying for themselves with all the money they save us in funding health programs for the poor and disabled. One, two generations max, and we’ll probably be turning a profit.

According to figures obtained by the AP, Bush would slice a $600 million grant program for local police agencies to $60 million next year. Grants to local firefighters, for which Congress provided $715 million this year, would fall to $500 million.

That’ll teach ya to make heroes of yourselves during a terrorist attack which will later be cynically used as the centerpiece of an opportunistic and exploitative presidential campaign.

He would eliminate the $300 million the government gives to states for incarcerating illegal aliens who commit crimes. It's a proposal he has made in the past and one that Congress has ignored. Also gone would be assistance for police departments to improve technology and their ability to communicate with other agencies.

Dear Red States: How you feeling about your choice of who will keep ya safer now? Love, Shakespeare’s Sister

The Environmental Protection Agency's $8.1 billion would drop by $450 million, or about 6 percent, with most of the reductions coming in water programs and projects won by lawmakers for their home districts.

Drinking water schminking water. Who needs it? Especially when the Kool-Aid is so widely available for mindless consumption.

The Bureau of Indians Affairs would be sliced by $100 million to $2.2 billion. The reduction would come almost entirely from the agency's effort to build more schools.

Who needs schools when you’ve got tribal sovereignty?

The $2.2 billion program that provides low-income people — in large part the elderly — with home-heating aid would be cut to $2 billion.

See: health programs for the poor and disabled. Also, with the polar icecaps melting, I’m sure there are plenty of little icebergs available on which we can send the elderly out to sea.

The park service's budget would drop nearly 3 percent to $2.2 billion, largely due to a reduction in its construction account.

The problem with expanding national parks is that, if you ever want to drill for oil in one, it becomes, like, this huge hassle. So better not to build them at all anymore, in case we want to rape the land for its natural resources instead.

There is, as one would expect, some good news, too:

The Coast Guard — now part of the Homeland Security Department — will get $8.1 billion, $600 million over this year. Included will be a healthy increase for its plans to buy more oceangoing vessels, a boon to the new chairman of the Senate Appropriations Committee, Sen. Thad Cochran, R-Miss., in whose state many of the ships are built.

That’s great. I’m really happy for Thad. And now when he’s puking up the gallons of cum he swallowed getting that “healthy increase,” he can just blame it on seasickness as he stands astride the decks of one of our brand spanking new oceangoing vessels.

Community health centers would grow to over $2 billion, an increase of $304 million, or almost 18 percent, over this year. Bush said he wants to every poor county to have one of the centers, which are used heavily by the poor.

Because they don’t have jobs or insurance. But hey—a community health care center is just as good for treating malnutrition or patching up a slit wrist as a fancy schmancy hospital.

Many proposals face an unclear fate in Congress, where members of both parties are sure to defend favorite initiatives. Democrats blame the cuts on the tax reductions Bush has enacted and say that other items his budget omits — a Social Security overhaul and costs for wars in Iraq and Afghanistan — will only make matters worse.

"What it will lead to is growing pressure for draconian cuts," Sen. Kent Conrad of North Dakota, the Senate Budget Committee's top Democrat, said Saturday. "It's inescapable, the course he's led us on, whether it's this year or next year, is for very, very heavy cuts."

Oh, these aren’t heavy cuts? Never mind then.