Everyone is talking about the budget these days, so I figured I should, too, because I have more than a few ideas on how to balance the budget, and cut the federal debt. It’s at $18 trillion right now, so I don’t think anyone is going to argue that it needs to be reduced. What we can’t agree on is, how? The conservatives want to do it by cutting government spending. Seems sensible enough, to me. Let’s axe some unnecessary spending, and to make the conservatives even more happy, I’ll even cut some taxes while I’m at it
Item number one on my budget cut proposal, military spending. The US spends around $600 billion per year on it’s military funding, more than three times as much as any other country in the world. I’m pretty sure we can cut this number in half, and be just fine.
Item number two, congressional retirement pay. Members of congress, no matter how well they did, or how many times they got reelected, get their full congressional pay, for the rest of their life. I sure wish my job did that. I’ve even been tempted to run for congress, just so that I wouldn’t have to work, any more. Who wouldn’t want that? It’s probably about as pork-barrel as you can get. So, how about this, let’s make it so that for the house, they get 10% of their congressional pay for each time they get reelected, and senators get 23% for each term they serve, up to 70%. Congressmen get a salary of $174,000 a year. 70% of that is $121,800, which is still plenty, and they have to work harder for it.
Item number three, just do away with the TSA. All they’ve really done is make flying from New York to LA a bigger hassle than flying to the moon. If airports and airlines want security check-points, they can pay for it themselves, and the quality of service will actually have to be beholden to the desires of the people. Sure, the cost of flying may go up a bit, but I think it will be worth not having to be herded like animals, and treated like criminals.
Item number four, the tax brackets. I said I was going to cut taxes, and here it is. I propose that we eliminate federal income tax on the lowest tax bracket, which is $12,950 or less, for a head of household. To counter ballance this, however, I propose a tiny increase to the highest tax bracket, $432,201 and more, raising it from 39.6% to a full 40%. It’s the only tax bracket with a decimal place, I’m just rounding up.
Item number five, stop requiring the post office to pre-fund all of it’s worker retirement benefits. It’s not going to help the budget any, since the post office is self-funding, but it’s a ridiculous requirement, and needs to be done away with.
Item number six, reduce funding for the NSA. The amount is classified, but is estimated to be around $11 billion. It won’t make anywhere near the dent in the budget as my previous proposals, but if it makes it harder for the government to spy on it’s citizens, I’d be willing to increase the budget. I’d say, cut it to $7 billion.
Item number seven, reduce funding for the Department of Homeland Security. I know this will upset some liberals, but the DHS is also guilty of warrant-less spying on American citizens, they need to be punished, somehow. I say reduce their budget from $61 billion to $51 billion.
Item number eight, stop minting the penny. It costs almost twice as much as it’s worth to make, and it’s hardly worth having. It’s worth less than the half-penny was when we stopped minting it, and it’s not like I’m suggesting getting rid of the pennies already in circulation.
So, there we go, I’ve cut taxes, and reduced the budget by over $500 billion. That should make me a conservative hero, right? Not only that, but democrats will probably vote for it. So that makes me a bi-partisan hero! No? The republicans are furious? Why? Because I cut military funding in half and didn’t touch social security and obamacare? I already explained why I cut the military budget, and even eliminating social security and obamacare won’t make as big of a dent as that did. Ok, fine, how about we eliminate social security and medical coverage for all members of congress? The republicans are even more furious, now? I give up...