The Bush legacy: A budgetary landmine that could blow up just as the next president moves into the Oval Office. - Thanks Dubya, we didn't need that.
After Bush Leaves Office, His Budget's Costs Balloon
For President Bush, the budget sent to Congress last week outlines a painful path to meeting his promise to bring down the federal budget deficit by the time he leaves office in 2009. But for the senators and governors already jockeying to succeed him, the numbers released in recent days add up to a budgetary landmine that could blow up just as the next president moves into the Oval Office.
Congress and the White House have become adept at passing legislation with hidden long-term price tags, but those huge costs began coming into view in Bush's latest spending plan. Even if Bush succeeds in slashing the deficit in half in four years, as he has pledged, his major policy prescriptions would leave his successor with massive financial commitments that begin rising dramatically the year he relinquishes the White House, according to an analysis of new budget figures.
Bush's extensive tax cuts [and] the new Medicare prescription drug benefit . . . . balloon in cost several years from now. New Medicare figures likewise show the cost almost twice as high as originally estimated, largely because it mushrooms long after the Bush presidency.
By the time the next president comes along, some analysts said, not only will there be little if any flexibility for any new initiatives, but the entire four-year term could be spent figuring out how to accommodate the long-range cost of Bush's policies.
Tax cuts approved in 2001 and 2003 were held to $1.7 trillion through an array of slow phase-ins, phase-outs and a Dec. 31, 2010, end date when all of the tax cuts would vanish. Now, Bush wants them made permanent, but according to White House numbers, a five-year extension beyond 2010 would cost nearly $1.1 trillion.
(2-14-05 The Washington Post.)
For President Bush, the budget sent to Congress last week outlines a painful path to meeting his promise to bring down the federal budget deficit by the time he leaves office in 2009. But for the senators and governors already jockeying to succeed him, the numbers released in recent days add up to a budgetary landmine that could blow up just as the next president moves into the Oval Office.
Congress and the White House have become adept at passing legislation with hidden long-term price tags, but those huge costs began coming into view in Bush's latest spending plan. Even if Bush succeeds in slashing the deficit in half in four years, as he has pledged, his major policy prescriptions would leave his successor with massive financial commitments that begin rising dramatically the year he relinquishes the White House, according to an analysis of new budget figures.
Bush's extensive tax cuts [and] the new Medicare prescription drug benefit . . . . balloon in cost several years from now. New Medicare figures likewise show the cost almost twice as high as originally estimated, largely because it mushrooms long after the Bush presidency.
By the time the next president comes along, some analysts said, not only will there be little if any flexibility for any new initiatives, but the entire four-year term could be spent figuring out how to accommodate the long-range cost of Bush's policies.
Tax cuts approved in 2001 and 2003 were held to $1.7 trillion through an array of slow phase-ins, phase-outs and a Dec. 31, 2010, end date when all of the tax cuts would vanish. Now, Bush wants them made permanent, but according to White House numbers, a five-year extension beyond 2010 would cost nearly $1.1 trillion.
(2-14-05 The Washington Post.)
posted by Sid Cottingham | 6:40 AM
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