Kansas Republicans Rep. Todd Tiahrt and Sen. Sam Brownback have a fascinating idea for helping end ineffective government programs. They want to establish a Commission on the Accountability and Review of Federal Agencies, which would be modeled after the successful Base Realignment and Closure process. Only rather than addressing military bases, this commission would recommend federal agencies and programs that should be closed, subject to an up-or-down vote from Congress. “It is unfortunate that we would need an independent body such as this to help keep government in check,” Tiahrt has written, “but reality leads me to this conclusion.” After all, as Ronald Reagan once noted, a government program is “the nearest thing to eternal life we will ever see on this earth.”
Posted by Phillip Brownlee
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13 Comments
The BRAC commission was successful? You gotta be kidding me.
They didn’t close down but less than 1/4 of the facilities and bases that the Pentagon recommended for closure.
The BRAC commission was suppose to look at the recomendation and bases it on non-political motives. Yet, there was nothing but politics involved in every thing.
Too many non stratigic bases were left open because of what the politicans called a devestation of economic impact. So they kept them open, because they want the jobs to be there.
Ellsworth Airforce Base was suppose to be shut down. But since the whole Senate race campaign was centered around saving the base from BRAC, it suddenly gets saved because Dashile is out of office.
New London is a pithole, but we can’t shut that down because too many civilians work there.
There is so many examples.
They can go ahead and do their Commission on the Accountability and Review of Federal Agencies, but it isn’t going to amount to crap and any recommendations won’t ever be taken.
Department of Agriculture tried to shut down 40% of their exentention offices last year. But the farmers and the farm lobby got so upset and persuaded Congress to save them. So there they stick. Even though the DOA said it would save the government money and they can do more with less, but that doesn’t matter.
Congress has become such a rubber stamper, we could eliminate bothe branches.
Congress has become such a rubber stamper, we could eliminate bothe branches.
Joe, you are CORRECT. DING DING.
I have worked at the KAAP, which was closed by BRAC AGAIN!!They have been closing this piece of crap since the end of the VietNam war, and the damn thing is STILL OPEN.And Brownback has no business getting this crap started. After the KAAP was voted closed unanimously, with no provisions for any continued operations, Sam got another 10 MILLION dollars allocated for the place with one of the infamous ‘earmarks’. Ten million for WHAT? NOBODY knows.The entire place is decrepit and dysfunctional, and still open and limping along.
What we need is a Congress who doesn’t accept pay raises while spending exceeds revenue. What we need is a Congress who has to balance their budget like Kansas families and businesses must do. What we need is a President who will use his veto pen to veto a spending bill, instead of making hundreds of petty, childish notes that say “I don’t have to obey. I’m above the law.” What we need is a real president.
Kelly, Kelly, Kelly – you seem to forget the overspending by the Democrat run Congress. You seem to forget the raises they gave themselves. You seem to forget that if Clinton had handled Osama we probably would not be at war today. But he seemed to ignore the first bombing of the World Trade Center and the bombing of one of our ships. He was also responsible for reducing our military and their equipment to pitiful levels. The list goes on and on.
The Repugnican list would go on and on much longer.So says I. Ha.
Yeah, Clinton just ignored bin Laden and especially that first WTC attack.
Where are those WTC 1 guys, anyway? Huh? Where?
sts, answer the above question.
May I ask, SoTheySaid, from what decades old time-warp are you posting from? Congress under Clinton balanced the budget and created the largest economic expansion that benefited all sectors of society in recent history! And the last raise in the minimum wage came in 1997 – let’s see – oh yea – under the leadership of President Clinton. And what has happened under Bush? Need I say more?
Right you are, Kelly.
Republicans are just Democrats who don’t know the facts yet.
The justice department under Clinton captured, tried and convicted all the perpetrators of the first World Trade Center bombing, despite the fact that Clinton didn’t have a CIA warning “Al Qaeda Determined to Attack inside the US” a month in advance. Ring leader Ramzi Yousef is still in jail for that crime.
They also stopped an Al Qaeda car bomb attack (Ahmad Ressam) on the Canadian border.
The only excuse that the right-wingers can come up with for this President is that “things would be worse under a Democrat.”
The fact that things were much better under eight years of Clinton has no effect on their preconceived ideas reinforced daily by Rush, Hannity, O’Reilly, Fox News, Michael Savage, G. Gordon Liddy and all the others . . .
BTW, RD, sts can’t answer your questions.
Rush doesn’t talk about that hour after hour . . .
Iraq gave medical assistance to one of the first WTC bombers.
Per Toddy’s website:
“CARFA (Congressmen Against Repercussions From Abramoff?) would establish a disciplined spending review process for non-defense, non-entitlement programs whose results would require Congressional consideration under expedited legislative rules.”
Hmm. Now why would “Tanker Todd” be excluding defense programs?
He continued: “It is unfortunate that we would need an independent body such as this to help keep government in check, but reality leads me to this conclusion.”
“Reality?” Now there’s a first!