This week President Obama released his budget proposal for fiscal year 2011. Just a few days prior the president spoke at a meeting of House Republicans, promising fiscal discipline and a renewed commitment to tackling our rising national debt. These were also themes in the president’s State of the Union address and on both occasions I was encouraged to hear the president talk about the economy and commit to focusing on job creation. Disappointingly, a review of the president’s fiscal year 2011 budget shows the administration has chosen more of the same reckless and unsustainable taxing, spending, and borrowing.
The president inherited a deep recession and a national debt driven up by the last administration, but no longer can this president point fingers at the previous administration for the deficit and skyrocketing national debt. In just two years this administration has piled $4.5 trillion on to our national debt and in eight years under the previous administration the debt grew $4.9 trillion. Additionally, the proposed deficit in the president’s budget is 3.5 times larger than the biggest deficit under any past president. Leadership is not pointing fingers, it’s solving problems.
If the president is serious about providing leadership to solve our nation’s fiscal crisis, I hope he has another plan. Announcing $20 billion in cuts to fix a $1.56 trillion deficit is not a serious solution. Even with a brand-new trillion dollar tax increase, this proposal leaves us with a record deficit.
My Republican colleagues and I support strict budget caps which would limit spending. At our meeting with the president last week House Republicans presented him with our “Better Solutions” document outlining specific pro-growth policies, including the strict spending caps measure. The provision was also included in the Republicans’ budget alternative last year.
Tellingly, the president’s spending freeze only applies to one-sixth of the federal budget and will freeze spending at the bloated levels of the last few years. The accounts the freeze would apply to were inflated by twenty percent last year alone. While his announced “freeze” looks good, a closer examination reveals how toothless it is.
In addition to the announced freeze, a renewed focus on pay-as-you-go (PAYGO) budget rules and the president’s executive deficit commission are all red herrings which the administration will use to justify a tax increase. This administration has announced the budget is not a partisan budget, but a “common sense” budget. After reviewing this proposal it is clear the president’s meaning of common sense is vastly different from the American people’s definition.
I also strongly support a federal balanced budget amendment that would require Congress to act responsibly and make the same difficult choices that every family has to make huddled around the kitchen table. If the president is serious about reducing the annual deficit he should take up the fight for a balanced budget amendment.
I look forward to working with my colleagues on both sides of the aisle to reduce the deficit and bring more accountability and fiscal responsibility to the fiscal year 2011 budget.
The president may have reiterated his campaign message of “change” in the State of the Union but his address, and the administration’s budget proposal, is just more of the same.
U.S. Rep. Mike Coffman represents Colorado’s 6th Congressional District.
