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Politics : PRESIDENT GEORGE W. BUSH -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Kenneth E. Phillipps who wrote (508786)	12/13/2003 8:55:39 AM
From: Kenneth E. Phillipps	Read Replies (2) \| Respond to of 769667

Official: Bush plan would halve deficit in 5 years WASHINGTON (AP) — President Bush's next budget will propose spending restraints and other steps as part of a plan to slash federal deficits in half in the next five years, a White House budget official says. The election-year goal, which the Bush administration has been touting for months, will be featured at a time when conservatives have been chastising the White House for allowing too much spending. It also comes as the government reported a $43 billion deficit for the month of November. A month earlier, the red ink totaled $69.5 billion. Bush's predecessor, President Clinton, presided over four straight years of budget surpluses. White House budget officials have said they expect this year's deficit to be around $500 billion — shattering last year's record shortfall of $374 billion. That means the goal would be around $250 billion in red ink by 2009, they said. In an interview Friday, Joel Kaplan, deputy director of the White House budget office, said Bush would halve the deficit "by pursuing very aggressively his pro-growth economic policies, and by leading the Congress toward overall policies of fiscal restraint. And if the Congress adheres to those two programs, we'll be successful in halving the deficit from its '04 peak within that time period." Bush will unveil his 2005 budget in early February. Kaplan provided few specifics about how the deficit would be cut in half. The president will once again propose that tax cuts first enacted in 2001 be made permanent, instead of expiring as this decade ends, Kaplan said. That could cost $1.4 trillion over the next 10 years, boosting the deficit, according to congressional budget analysts. In interviews this week, lawmakers, aides and lobbyists have said administration officials are trying to keep overall spending increases for agencies at very low levels next year, perhaps at or below the 4% range that Bush said last year should be adequate. Because the economy is expected to continue its rebound, most budget projections in recent months have shown deficits peaking in fiscal 2004, which runs through next Sept. 30, and then gradually growing smaller. Last July, the White House forecast a deficit of $475 billion in 2004, falling to $238 billion — half the size — in 2006. In August, the nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office projected shortfalls peaking at $480 billion in 2004, dropping to $225 billion in 2006. But such estimates assume lower rates of spending growth than have occurred in recent years, no major setbacks for the economy and no new tax cuts. They also exclude expenditures that are now unforeseen, such as a major new war. And the congressional estimates did not include the 10-year, $400 billion cost of the expansion of Medicare to include prescription drug benefits, which had not yet been enacted. Conservatives have been angered by bills like Medicare and the year-end $373 billion spending package that the House approved this week and awaits the Senate when it returns in January. "The big story is Republicans have become a big spending party," said Stephen Moore, president of the conservative Club for Growth. "And I think the White House is really the ring leader of the spending spree." Administration officials have blamed the recession and the costs of fighting terrorism at home and overseas for the returning budget deficits, while Democrats have said Bush's tax cuts have made the situation far worse. Last year's deficit was $374 billion. Until then, the worst shortfall was $290 billion in 1992. Administration officials say deficits of the current sizes are manageable because the nation's $11 trillion economy can afford it. Critics say the shortfalls are draining the Treasury of money it will need later this decade, when the baby boom generation starts retiring and putting enormous financial pressures on Social Security and other support programs. -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Copyright 2003 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.