As a candidate, President Barack Obama promised to go through the budget “line-by-line” and eliminate programs that don’t work. Yesterday he announced the results of that process with his budget proposal. The cuts account for just ½ of 1 percent of the $3.4 trillion budget, so many will argue that a savings of just $17 billion is a drop in the bucket. But if you work on one of those 121 programs, you probably care more than the average taxpayer.
Watch OhMyGov! for details of the cuts in each department in the days to follow. For now, here are some highlights.
The Defense Department tops the list with a total of $8.8 billion in cuts. The administration proposes ending production of the F-22 fighter plane for a savings of $2.9 billion. The budget also cancels the program to replace Marine One, the President's helicopter, and cuts funds for service contracts by $900 million in 2010.
The much smaller Education Department stands to lose $4.1 billion. Even Start, which provides grants to local literacy projects, would be eliminated. Interestingly, President George W. Bush also tried to cut this program but faced fierce Democratic opposition to his attempts. (Things that make you go hmmm...)
In the Energy Department, the controversial Yucca Mountain program to store nuclear waste in Nevada would be eliminated, as would an Agriculture Department program that pays cotton producers who store cotton until prices rise. Few consumers would opt for rioting over this last one.
An Interior Department program that spends $142 million paying states to clean up abandoned mines even though that task has been completed seems like an obvious choice to cut. Also being eliminated is a Homeland Security $35 million-a-year long-range radio navigation system that officials say has been made obsolete by Global Positioning System devices.
Of course, most of these programs have supporters in Congress, many of whom are in the President’s party. It now remains to be seen how many of these proposed cuts survive the fight and how many other programs will face the chopping block. If the U.S. budget is undergoing surgery, thus far, Obama seems poised for mole removal only when many are calling for amputations.
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