To Spend or Not To Spend?

Photo:President Obama address the press at the White House.

As more and more people compare our current national economic state to that of the Great Depression, the response of the Democrat controlled congress is clear to see… throw money at it. A Trillion dollars later, there is no true sign that the economy is turning around. So what does the President do? He takes a hard stand against over-spendin….ehr… inefficiency.

Today President Obama recommended to congress that 121 federal programs be cut from next year's budget. These cuts are not necessarily a bad thing. Spending millions on a long range navigation system that was made obsolete years ago by GPS technology is absurd, as is paying for two separate programs that provide the same services to the same people. What should concern us is the reason that President Obama wants to make the cuts, so that he can pay for his own programs. In a statement made by the President he states, "To put this in perspective, this is more than enough savings to pay for a $2,500 tuition tax credit for millions of students as well as a larger Pell Grant -- with enough money left over to pay for everything we do to protect the National Parks," both of these projects have been goals the President has been pushing for since the campaign.

I firmly believe that we need to control our spending. We must balance our budget and cut the programs that are a waste of money. The only way that we as a country can have a sound economy is to follow the same basic principles that ever fiscally secure person follows, make more than we spend and pay off our debt as soon as we can. We must not however, cut spending in one place so that we can simply spend it somewhere else. That would be like paying off some of our credit card, just so we can buy a new 57" flat screen TV. We still don't have the money to begin with, and when it comes time to pay, we are going to realize that maybe we could have gotten by with the 19" we had to begin with.

We need to focus on making do with what we have. Most new programs can wait. Sure, it's great to reduce our spending by $17 billion, but if we turn around and spend another $20 billion, was it really that great to begin with. Let's make cuts, but with the mindset that we are trying to live within our means and not that we simply are trying to free up some space on the MasterCard.