Bigger Isn’t Always Better
The Democrats who control the U.S. House came out with a new, fourth COVID-19-related spending bill yesterday…and it’s a whopper.
A total of three trillion dollars in new spending is proposed. Keep in mind that in the next fiscal year, projections were only for $3.86 trillion of revenue. This new three trillion is in addition to the more than two trillion already approved…so when in doubt, spend more money.
I’ve long said that simply throwing money after a problem or situation is not the answer. Money may be part of an answer, but the inclination to simply approve money and feel like the job is completed is short sighted.
Plus, and I hesitate to mention this since no one in Washington seems to care…who is going to pay for all this?
Let’s ignore for the moment that the House plan includes direct payments to illegal immigrants, those who are violating the law by virtue of being in this country. Even if that amount were removed, along with all the other partisan pork, it’s still huge money.
There used to be a humorous saying, “I must have money because I still have checks left.” The federal government goes one better…”We have plenty of money, because if we ever run out, we’ll just print more.”
Some of this spending is like a person who is isolating at home buying a new couch and calling it COVID-related. “Well, I’m sitting on the couch at home, and I’m home because of the virus, so it counts.”
Senate Democrats said last week that there needed to be laser-focus on only those things which are coronavirus-related. Guess their colleagues in the House didn’t get the memo, because much of the identified funding is a stretch.
But you can’t blame them, they held Senate Republicans hostage with the first large spending bill this spring and got their way mostly…it’s laying out to be the same thing again.
