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Social programs target of reductions as funds boosted for Pentagon
By Andrew Taylor
Associated Press
Published on Saturday, Feb 02, 2008
WASHINGTON: President Bush wants to cut funding for teaching hospitals and freeze medical research in a $3 trillion budget for 2009 that is still likely to generate a record deficit once war costs are tallied up.
The Bush plan to be submitted Monday would cut the budget for the Health and Human Services Department by $2 billion, or 3 percent.
By contrast, the Pentagon would get a $35 billion increase to $515 billion for core programs, with war costs additional.
With tax revenue falling as the economy slows — and with the deficit-financed economic stimulus bill adding more than $150 billion in red ink to federal ledgers over 2008-09 — the White House acknowledges that the budget deficit for this year and next is projected to reach $400 billion or more.
Bush has promised his budget will keep the government on track to run a surplus in 2012.
But the steps required to do that — and keep his promise to extend tax cuts enacted in 2001 and 2003 beyond their expiration at the end of 2010 — aren't likely.
For starters, his budget contains no war costs beyond 2009 and does not address the huge cost of keeping more and more taxpayers from feeling the bite of the alternative minimum tax.
Bush's budget plan will also, on average, freeze most domestic programs funded by Congress each year.
Some gain, some lose
Since departments such as Veterans Affairs and Homeland Security will be getting increases, that means other agencies will be cut.
These reductions would be in addition to almost $200 billion in cuts to Medicare and Medicaid over the next five years that administration officials acknowledge are in Bush's budget.
Within Health and Human Services, Bush would eliminate a $302 million program that gives grants to children's hospitals to subsidize medical education.
A $300 million program for public health improvements would be eliminated, while grants to improve health care in rural areas would be cut by 87 percent.
Congress rejected a smaller package of cuts last year, and there's no reason to think it would not do so again in an election year.
WASHINGTON: President Bush wants to cut funding for teaching hospitals and freeze medical research in a $3 trillion budget for 2009 that is still likely to generate a record deficit once war costs are tallied up.
Get the full article here.
