Communications

Today’s NYT <http://www.nytimes.com/2010/01/26/us/politics/26budget.html>  points out that the estimated “savings” in the president’s “budget freeze” proposal would amount to less than 3% of the “roughly $9 trillion in additional deficits the government is expected to accumulate” over the next 10 years.

In defense of this underwhelming figure, an administration official offers that “limiting the …discretionary domestic budget would have symbolic value <http://www.nytimes.com/2010/01/26/us/politics/26budget.html?pagewanted=print> .”

Any “symbolic” gesture to instill fiscal discipline rings hollow though, especially considering the president’s proposal comes after a year which saw the largest one-year increase in discretionary spending over three decades <http://www.gop.com/index.php/briefing/comments/only_in_washington> .

One can hope that the president’s intention is sincere and that he will lead Democrats away from the unprecedented spending that characterized his first year in office. For now, this announcement seems more reminiscent of the president’s proposal last year to enact cabinet spending cuts <http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/04/20/AR2009042000641.html> , which, announced with great fanfare, was also characterized as symbolic <http://online.wsj.com/article/SB124023269185434863.html>  and turned out to be even less than that.