Conservatives hate Bush's spending - 31% incr. in discretionary $

Conservatives simmer as spending mushrooms under Bush


WASHINGTON (AP) — Conservatives wait warily as President Bush makes final decisions about his election-year budget, three years into an administration on whose watch spending has mushroomed by 23.7%, the fastest pace in a decade.
While Bush has emphasized repeatedly the need to rein in spending, overall federal expenditures have grown to an estimated $2.31 trillion for the budget year that started Oct. 1. That is up from $1.86 trillion in President Clinton's final year, a rate of growth not seen for any three-year period since 1989 to 1991.

Much of the increase stems from the fight against terrorism and wars in Afghanistan and Iraq. Also expanding relentlessly have been huge programs such as Social Security, Medicare and Medicaid, which grow automatically with inflation, higher medical costs and more beneficiaries.

What has vexed conservatives most is the 31.5% growth since Bush took office in discretionary spending. That is the one-third of the budget lawmakers approve annually for defense, domestic security, school aid and everything else except Social Security and other benefits.

Such spending grew by an annual average of 3.4% during Clinton's eight years

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Bush will run as a compassionate conservative, then in a second term destroy the social safety net. Been his plan all along. Principled conservatives (an oxymoron today, I know) may be concerned about the spending, but the radical Right that is in control through Bush (not conservatives by any stretch) knows exactly what it is doing - win election in 2004 (not that they would allow themselves to "lose"), then let the fangs come out, continuing to drive control into the hands of an elite and make the rest of us dependent on them for handouts.

I wonder what kind of effect this will have on the moderate republicans? Since he is alienating conservatives with his immigration plan, maybe we are at the beginning of the division of the rethuglican party.

They vote lock-step for whatever the "Liberal Media" tells them to vote for. My question to any conservative that is tempted to vote their wallet is to name one Democratic President that had a recession in their term in office. Name just one.