The spending reductions under the baseline in the budget sequester are days away from taking effect. Unless there is a dramatic change in the political situation, there will be a reduction of about $85 billion in budget authorization spread out over some domestic programs and a healthy whack out of national defense. This translates into about five percent of the affected programs on a fiscal year basis.
Note, that a few items before we go on. The federal deficit will be nearly a trillion dollars this year again. The government borrows more than $3 billion a day to fund its operations; the national debt has increases nearly 6 billion since January 2009.
President Obama has hit the campaign trail again to rally against his own makings, really the warpath to denounce the sequester. Denounce an idea which originated in the White House in the summer of 2011 and which he signed into law.
Continue reading "Obama on Warpath: For the sequester before against it. " »