Tag: waste

Congressional Democrats want to go party using YOUR tax money, and never MIND those sick kids!

Say what you like about House Majority Leader Eric Cantor, but this is a carefully-designed stiletto.

While the House ties up some legislative loose ends this week before adjourning for the year, there is one suspension bill the public — and House Republicans — might be surprised to find many Democrats opposing: a measure aimed at boosting pediatric medical research at the National Institutes of Health.

The “Gabriella Miller Kids First Research Act,” named after a 10-year-old girl who died in October following an 11-month battle with an inoperable brain tumor, would end $12.5 million in funding for party nominating conventions and authorize the money for pediatric research grants instead. It’s the latest iteration of a proposal House Majority Leader Eric Cantor, R-Va., unveiled in April and is sponsored by Rep. Gregg Harper, R-Miss.

Continue reading Congressional Democrats want to go party using YOUR tax money, and never MIND those sick kids!

Senate Budget Bill held up in Congress, delayed until Monday.

We may be at wafer-thin mint time.

Repeat: “may.” Congress has an impressive talent at somehow managing to find new and exciting ways to spend your money.

Senate bogs down over $410 billion spending bill

WASHINGTON – The Senate, tied up in a fight over a huge omnibus appropriations bill, will have to pass a stopgap spending measure Friday in order to avoid a partial government shutdown.

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The huge, 1,132-page spending bill awards big increases to domestic programs and is stuffed with pet projects sought by lawmakers in both parties. The measure has an extraordinary reach, wrapping together nine spending bills to fund the annual operating budgets of every Cabinet department except for Defense, Homeland Security and Veterans Affairs.

The measure was written mostly over the course of last year, before projected deficits quadrupled and Obama’s economic recovery bill left many of the same spending accounts swimming in cash.

And, to the embarrassment of Obama — who promised during last year’s campaign to force Congress to curb its pork-barrel ways — the bill contains 7,991 pet projects totaling $5.5 billion, according to calculations by the GOP staff of the House Appropriations Committee.

Continue reading Senate Budget Bill held up in Congress, delayed until Monday.