Judging from the press reports, President Obama’s FY12 budget is not a serious document to address our nation’s fiscal situation. Rather than use this opportunity to fix the problems in the federal budget, Obama kicks the can down the road yet again. Rather than propose a responsible balanced budget like most American families do, Obama offers a bill to keep the country running an annual deficit every year for the next ten years.
On the revenue side, rather than repealing the Alternative Minimum Tax, he wants to patch it up for three years and finance it with higher taxes elsewhere. There are no specifics on reforming the corporate-tax rate, and he wants the Bush tax cuts to expire after two years.
On the spending side, rather than let the states take over education spending, Obama wants to plus up federal control by 11 percent using money we don’t have. He wants to freeze discretionary spending, rather than take on the tough fight of actually cutting overall spending like Republicans are attempting to do. He’s also virtually silent on how America should reform its entitlement programs, which contain the lion’s share of spending in the budget.
— Chris Chocola is president of the Club for Growth.