Working to restore fiscal sanity
Although the Senate has yet to enact the will of the people and pass these bills, our work to restore fiscal sanity continues.
 |
Agency by agency, I have worked with my colleagues to force the government to do more with less. For example, to combat wasteful spending at the Department of Education, I have cosponsored H.R. 1891 which would repeal ineffective or unnecessary education programs in order to restore the focus of Federal programs on quality elementary and secondary education programs for disadvantaged students.
The Department of Education is a prime example of the out-of-touch mentality within Washington Bureaucrats - the average salary of a Department of Education employee is over $100,000 per year – more than twice what most classroom teachers make. I believe that states and local school boards should decide education spending and policies, not bureaucrats in Washington.
Unfortunately, these budget cuts alone will not solve our budget crisis. As you can see in the graph, entitlements make up a significant portion of our total debt. While it is important to eliminate wasteful and duplicative programs within government agencies, doing so will not solve our budget crisis. We must look at strengthening entitlement programs to control the out-of-control costs associated with Medicare, Medicaid and Social Security if we truly want to tackle our spending.
The federal government’s wild and excessive spending has jeopardized the future of these programs. We must take action now to protect and preserve these important programs for today’s retirees and future generations who will depend on Medicare, Medicaid and Social Security. The most dangerous plan that these programs face is to keep the status quo - which is guaranteed to fail. The President’s own National Commission on Fiscal Responsibility and Reform has even said that we must take steps to ensure the long-term viability of these programs.
To ensure that we stop spending beyond our means, I have supported the passage of a balanced budget amendment. I believe that the federal government should live by the same rules that we do in Idaho, to ensure that in the future we don’t have to agonize about the debt limit or borrowing money.
Recently, while in Boise, the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, Mike Mullen, told a large crowd that among all the threats to our national security, our debt is the most grave. I want assure you that I share his concern and understand the severity of our country’s fiscal problems and the tough decisions that must be made. I have taken every decision for funding for government programs extremely serious, keeping in mind what is in the best interest of Idahoans as well as the country we will leave to our future generations.