A Huge Omnibus Funding Bill: Another Means to Undermine the Democratic Process

Analysis: $388B spending bill full of surprises

Congress came to a final agreement Saturday night on a massive $388 billion measure funding 13 federal departments for fiscal 2005, but not without some last-minute problems for a bill that contained a host of surprises for lawmakers. As is typical of a catchall omnibus appropriations bill encompassing all unapproved annual spending bills, it contains a multitude of provisions unknown to lawmakers when the around 1,689-page, 14-pound document was passed by the House and Senate.

These surprises, along with other actions taken by conservative Republicans this week, demonstrate the power conservatives will hold next year to both help and potentially hurt the Bush administration and GOP leadership's agenda. Democratic Sen. Robert Byrd of West Virginia attacked the bill in debate before passage as a "monstrosity," only two parts of which where debated in the Senate.

"There is not a single member in this body who can say that he or she has read this bill," Byrd noted on the Senate floor.

The Republicans have found a pretty effective way to undermine the Democratic process. They've created major funding omnibus bill that simply can't be reviewed in any kind of meaningful way before passage. It will be months before the real implications of this bill will be understood. Very likely, only Republican leadership, staffers and Administration strategists have a good understanding of what was done.

Every week we witness another means our way of life is being undermined. And few people are listenning.


Complete Article

Analysis: $388B spending bill full of surprises





UPI - Monday, November 22, 2004



Date: Monday, November 22, 2004 5:20:29 PM EST By CHRISTIAN BOURGE, UPI Congressional and Policy Correspondent

WASHINGTON, Nov. 22 (UPI) -- Congress came to a final agreement Saturday night on a massive $388 billion measure funding 13 federal departments for fiscal 2005, but not without some last-minute problems for a bill that contained a host of surprises for lawmakers.

As is typical of a catchall omnibus appropriations bill encompassing all unapproved annual spending bills, it contains a multitude of provisions unknown to lawmakers when the around 1,689-page, 14-pound document was passed by the House and Senate.

These surprises, along with other actions taken by conservative Republicans this week, demonstrate the power conservatives will hold next year to both help and potentially hurt the Bush administration and GOP leadership's agenda.

Democratic Sen. Robert Byrd of West Virginia attacked the bill in debate before passage as a "monstrosity," only two parts of which where debated in the Senate.

"There is not a single member in this body who can say that he or she has read this bill," Byrd noted on the Senate floor.

Republican leaders in the House and Senate took no time in claiming success in making the budget more austere than in years past.

"I'm very proud of the fact that we held the (spending) line and made Congress make choices and set priorities, because it follows our (Republican) philosophy," said Majority Leader Tom DeLay, R-Texas.

While Republican leaders clearly were in total control of the appropriations process, the reality behind the 2005 federal budget bill calls into question just how much fiscal conservatism was at play when all spending is taken into account.

The fourth omnibus in the last five years and the eighth in the 10 years the GOP has controlled the House, it includes discretionary funding traditionally approved in nine separate funding bills that had yet to gain House and Senate approval and spending for most federal agencies excluding the Department of Homeland Security and the Pentagon.

Speaking on CBS's "Face the Nation" Sunday, Senate Majority Leader Bill Frist, R-Tenn., sought to play up the fiscal-discipline angle on the bill, noting that lawmakers did not break the $388 billion cap sought in discretionary spending as the federal deficit reached a record $413 billion in 2004, approving the lowest increase in discretionary spending in over a decade.

While a real decrease in federal spending is considered a pie-in-the-sky idea given what has become of the federal budgeting process, politicians often talk like they are holding spending back when in reality the rhetoric reflects the reality that they are just holding it down from how high it could get.

"It (the budget) shows that this president, this Congress, this House, this Senate, both now and in the future, is going to take fiscal discipline and restraining spending as very, very serious," said Frist.

The measure essentially has a freeze on non-military and homeland security domestic spending once inflation is taken in account due to a 0.83-percent across-the-board reduction in discretionary spending and more at some agencies.

For instance, the EPA will have hundreds of millions less to spend in 2005.

Where there are increases in funding, such as for NASA, congressional aides said many accounting tricks were used to mask the debt of the impact on the budget.

But domestic discretionary spending is only about one-seventh of the total $2.3 trillion federal budget, and with neither Defense Department nor Homeland Security spending nor entitlements -- Social Security, Medicare and farm subsidies -- included in the measure just approved, the actual level of federal spending control is not nearly as dramatic as it is being made out to be by the GOP.

Spending on entitlements is increasing dramatically with no signs of being cut in the future.

In addition, as Frist noted, despite all the talks of cuts, the bill is actually the least increase in spending in years.

While at only 1 percent -- which is lower than inflation and, in Frist's words "impressive" in a historical light -- it is not an actual overall decrease in federal spending.

In fact, spending in fiscal 2005 will be around $4 billion higher than 2004.

Lawmakers also found plenty of room for pork spending to increase the total.

According to Taxpayers for Common Sense, spending made at individual lawmakers' requests includes 11,772 projects worth $15.78 billion.

While Democrats decried a lack of adequate spending on education, healthcare and other areas, pork projects include $1 million for the Missouri Pork Producers Federation to convert animal feces into biomass energy, $225,000 to Auburn University to study catfish genomes, $335,000 to protect North Dakotan sunflowers from blackbirds and $2 million to buy back the Sequoia presidential yacht.

In addition, lawmakers approved a 3.5-percent increase in pay for civilian employees.

Complaints about funding priorities aside, the most contentious portions in the bill were additions unknown to most members that drew condemnation by both Democrats and Republicans on Capitol Hill when they became public.

The highest profile of the last-minute additions was a provision giving the chairmen of the House and Senate appropriations committees and their staffs access to individual income-tax returns without any privacy safeguards.

Added under the guise of Rep. Ernest Istook, the Oklahoma Republican said Sunday that the language was drafted by the IRS.

Before approval of the omnibus, Senate Appropriations Committee Chairman Ted Stevens, R-Alaska, apologized for the "wrong" move and promised to take out the provision that Democrats like Sen. Dianne Feinstein and House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi of California decried as an "egregious abuse of power."

Although met with surprise by members, the measure was reportedly discussed on the House floor by House Appropriations Committee Chairman Bill Young, R-Fla., a fact that only serves to underscore the unwieldy nature of the legislation.

The provision will ultimately be struck from the bill after the House acts Wednesday on a separate bill approved by the Senate Saturday in a deal struck to gain passage of the omnibus, but not without a good deal of finger pointing and denials by the GOP leaders in control of the budget process.

Frist said he did not know how the provision ended up in the bill and promised accountability on the issue while he promoted a biannual budget process to allow more time for deliberations.

"It shouldn't happen," said Frist.

Another provision decried by Democrats was added by Senate GOP negotiators after being pushed for by House Republicans.

It bars federal, state and local agencies from forcing physicians, insurers or healthcare entities to provide abortion-related services or referrals to patients who request them or not.

Republicans deny criticisms from Democrats that the move is part of a larger conservative plan to reduce abortion rights in the country piecemeal.

Instead, they claim the move is only intended to prevent intimidation of healthcare providers.

It is expected to mostly impact states that use funds to provide abortion services to Medicaid recipients.

For their part, Senate Democrats gained a promise from Frist for a vote on a bill by Sen. Barbara Boxer, D-Calif., to repeal the abortion language.

The two provisions show the power conservatives in the House and Senate are flexing even before the 109th Congress takes office in January.

Alth
ough Democrats like Pelosi raised a fuss about the provisions, they had no power to stop the moves in the House, and the minority party showed limited effectiveness in the Senate.

Even without the strengthened numbers the GOP will have next year, conservatives showed their control over the Senate and House and their ability to get controversial provisions through the body.

However, that power is not absolute, nor always working in President Bush's favor.

For one, the limits of power outside conservative forces have over lawmakers were displayed in their inability to scuttle the bid of moderate, pro-choice Sen. Arlen Specter of Pennsylvania to head the Judiciary Committee.

However, GOP leaders manage to get Specter to publicly agree to back any judicial choice Bush would offer to Congress as well as the potential use of a plan to end the ability of Democrats to filibuster judicial nominees, effectively giving up much of the independence he would traditionally have as chair of the committee.

As to the problems conservative can cause for the administration, House Republican leaders scuttled a deal on proposed intel reform pushed for by Bush rather than face approving the bill without the support of many conservative GOP members.

All the calls of bipartisanship and a united GOP front in recent weeks aside, conservative Republicans can clearly use their power both for and against broader party goals.

The only question is how it will be utilized.

If the surprises in the omnibus and other matters this past weekend are any indication, the only safe prediction is that there will be more.

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(Please send comments to <a href="mailto:nationaldesk@upi.com">nationaldesk@upi.com.)



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