Presidents -- United States -- Messages; United States -- Politics and government -- Sources
First, in my budget message, I will recommend a Federal spending freeze. I
know this is strong medicine, but so far, we have only cut the rate of
increase in Federal spending. The Government has continued to spend more
money each year, though not as much more as it did in the past. Taken as a
whole, the budget I'm proposing for the fiscal year will increase no more
than the rate of inflation. In other words, the Federal Government will
hold the line on real spending. Now, that's far less than many American
families have had to do in these difficult times.
I will request that the proposed 6-month freeze in cost-of-living
adjustments recommended by the bipartisan Social Security Commission be
applied to other government-related retirement programs. I will, also,
propose a 1-year freeze on a broad range of domestic spending programs, and
for Federal civilian and military pay and pension programs. And let me say
right here, I'm sorry, with regard to the military, in asking that of them,
because for so many years they have been so far behind and so low in reward
for what the men and women in uniform are doing. But I'm sure they will
understand that this must be across the board and fair.
Second, I will ask the Congress to adopt specific measures to control the
growth of the so-called uncontrollable spending programs. These are the
automatic spending programs, such as food stamps, that cannot be simply
frozen and that have grown by over 400 percent since 1970. They are the
largest single cause of the built-in or structural deficit problem. Our
standard here will be fairness, ensuring that the taxpayers' hard-earned
dollars go only to the truly needy; that none of them are turned away, but
that fraud and waste are stamped out. And I'm sorry to say, there's a lot
of it out there. In the food stamp program alone, last year, we identified
almost $1.1 billion in overpayments. The taxpayers aren't the only victims
of this kind of abuse. The truly needy suffer as funds intended for them
are taken not by the needy, but by the greedy. For everyone's sake, we must
put an end to such waste and corruption.
Third, I will adjust our program to restore America's defenses by proposing
$55 billion in defense savings over the next 5 years. These are savings
recommended to me by the Secretary of Defense, who has assured me they can
be safely achieved and will not diminish our ability to negotiate arms
reductions or endanger America's security. We will not gamble with our
national survival.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
Reviews
Reviews
No reviews yet
Be the first to share your thoughts on this work.
Join the Discussion
Join the discussion
Sign in to leave a comment or review.
Sign InorCreate an account