Paying for Hurricane Recovery

I caught this from Bainbridge. You should read his derisive remarks about Tom Delay. He's pretty much completely correct.

But the topic leads to a $$$ link at the WSJ. So you have to read Bainbridges quote.

This article, brief though it is, also points to pork that could be trimmed out of the Highway bill to pay for the recovery efforts. Though you'll laugh to see that they think that no one should touch that money.

Keep your hands off the estimated $24 billion in "pork" within the recently approved federal highway bill unless those projects are for national safety.

That is our recommendation to the U.S. representatives and senators whose 6,300 "district" projects are included in the $284 billion bill.

Just a bit irritating that they don't want to contribute with money that is already in place instead of tacking on another huge deficit bill. Of course, they have an alternate suggestion:

Eliminating the pork in the highway bill would be a start. Two other ideas have been floated that deserve discussion: Delaying the Medicare prescription drug benefit plan scheduled to become effective Jan. 1, and calling for across-the-board, 10 percent spending cuts in federal budgets. Conservative groups have said delaying the drug plan would save an estimated $40 billion to $50 billion.

Umm. Yeah, that's a bloody brilliant alternative.

I can think of better alternatives. Take a little look at the Transportation Bill and the Energy Bill. Those two are so laden with lard that it's hard to believe they wouldn't be looked at for a trim. (Entertainingly, neither bill's final content is yet in print.)

Fiscal responsibility was once something you hoped to see from a republican, because you knew you couldn't get it out of a democrat. Now, I'm failing to see much of a difference between the two on spending.