Never one to be shy or retiring, my frequent-commenter NeoMom has a few ideas for the (R) Congress.
I'll give them a place to start.
1) The United States Institute of Peace - in its entirety (we have a State Dept folks). Then they can sell their fantabulous building on some prime real estate overlooking the Lincoln Memorial for condos.
2) All non-profit organization funding. The cream will rise very quickly to the top on which ones are working and worthy.
3) The Department of Education. Everything except student loans/grants... for now. Probably better handled by the states.
3) The Department of Energy. Everything except the NRC.
4) The Department of Agriculture. Everything except actual food inspection.
5) The Department of Commerce. Everything except the Census.
6) The Department of Housing and Urban Development. In its entirety. Better handled by the states and localities.
7) The Department of Homeland Security. Break it back apart and get rid of TSA before they unionize. They made it worse and spent more. Like, something close to a Billion dollars just on a freaking building?
8) The Department of the Interior. Everything except mine and equipment inspection.
9) The Department of Labor. Everything except OSHA... for now. Our state has its own "star" program that is every bit as stringent as the feds.
10) The Departments of Defense, State, and Justice. 10% across the board cuts.
11) The Department of Transportation. Keep the "I" system and the FAA. Amtrak can live or die on its own.
12) The Department of Health and Human Services. CDC and NIH can stay. The bureaucrats can all go. This would effectively kill ObamaCare on its own.
Other biggies like Social Security Admin, Medicare, and the USPS should be stand alones. Much easier to keep the budgets straight and visible. Welfare and food stamps etc should be handled by the states.
I would also massively reform taxes - lower rates across the board and get rid of all the loopholes and shelters. The IRS agents that get laid off can go look for Medicare/Medicaid fraud.
(Moved from a combox.)
Well. It's a start!
Do you still advocate that we "buy more ammo" tonight, DaddyZero?
ReplyDeleteBut it's Medicare we most need to cut. Everything else is more-or-less sustainable; Medicare and Medicaid are the two things we must get a handle on to survive.
ReplyDeleteAgreed Grim. That's why I said it was a start.
ReplyDeleteBut, with the exception of means testing, we can't make immediate major cuts to Medicare. Although having those IRS geeks go after fraud there would be nice.
The above cuts would buy us some time.
Would the above cuts buy us more ammo?
ReplyDeleteThanks Neomom, My sentiments exactly. It's a good place to .
ReplyDeleteBarb
Tell us, Dad29 - which of these programs do you presently benefit from?
ReplyDelete