With growing public concern about the deficit and billions still backed up in President Barack Obama’s economic recovery program, just how do Democrats sell another 8 percent increase in discretionary spending this summer?
Not easily.
As the appropriations debate heats up in the House and Senate this week, one option is to spice the pot with real cuts, if only to show voters that not everything is on automatic pilot and at least some programs are being weeded out.
With each 2010 bill it reports now, the House Appropriations Committee includes a three-part list of terminations, program reductions and new White House initiatives that have been denied. The strategy takes a page from Obama himself — even lifting a few phrases from the administration’s rhetoric. But the results can catch even top Democrats by surprise.
North Carolina Rep. David Price, one of the dozen committee “cardinals,” rose mournfully at a recent committee meeting to protest a $41 million reduction in a favorite education program he helped to create at the National Science Foundation. - Politico Story
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