Funding Federal Government Operations

Open letter to Representative Neugebauer:

I have read your latest newsletter.

You have said that the present lame-duck Congress will likely pass a Continuing Resolution (CR) to fund continued operation of the federal government in the absence of a budget. That resolution will likely extend funding of government operations for only a few weeks. The lame-duck Congress will pass this CR, because they have the votes in the present session.

The House of Representatives holds the purse strings. In the present session, that is in the hands of the big spending Democrats. Starting in January, it will be in the hands of the Republicans, who have claimed fiscal conservatism. We will see what they do.

I suggest that you immediately start preparation of a bill, which will become effective when the House votes on it in January. That bill should not be an attempt to establish a budget, but should contain provisions to fund only those departments and segments of the federal government, which are deemed necessary for continued reasonable operation. For starters, approve funding for the military, but let's have a 10% reduction. Fund the IRS, because we need to collect tax money to pay for operations which we approve. Stop all funding for the EPA, National Science Foundation's, and other government segments which have become political footballs. Continue funding the Justice Department, since we must maintain law enforcement at the federal level. Maintain the CIA and the FBI. Drop the Department of Energy. Cut funding for Homeland Security. Eliminate all subsidies and grants for research and development, which will quickly lead to the death of dire catastrophic claims from climate change. I am sure that your staff can come up with an appropriate list with cuts to the bone and funding maintenance for only those operations which are considered significant to avoid society collapse.

We are familiar with the above technique from private industry. This technique is called zero budgeting. It requires that anyone who claims to need even one dollar must submit a compelling need for that dollar. Notice it does not start with an existing budget, which would then be considered for either percentage increase or percentage decrease.

President Obama has suggested freezing federal salaries. Immediately jump on that, but be sure that you leave yourself an opening for future cuts. Freezing does nothing to equalize private industry and federal salaries, of which the latter are considerably higher and have given us our bloated government.