Republicans Back Off Pledge To Cut Budget By $100 Billion

Part of the Republican “Pledge to America” was the vow to cut $100 billion from the federal budget:

If we’ve learned anything over the last two years, it’s that we cannot spend our way to prosperity. We offer a plan to stop out-of control spending and reduce the size of government.

With common-sense exceptions for seniors, veterans, and our troops, we will roll back government spending to pre-stimulus, prebailout levels, saving us at least $100 billion in the first year alone and putting us on a path to balance the budget and pay down the debt.

But that’s not working out so well for Republicans who are now backing off that pledge (h/t firedoglake). They are weaseling away from the pledge by claiming that a full 2011 budget wasn’t enacted; rather, there was a stopgap spending bill; thus, they don’t have to live up to their promise.

They say the GOP will remain true to its pledge to try to return non-security discretionary spending to 2008 levels, but that their pledges to reduce the budget by $100 billion do not apply to the budget being developed for the second half of fiscal 2011, which ends Sept. 30.

And it’s the Democrats’ fault, according to a spokesman for the House Budget Committee:

“Unfortunately, Democrats refused to take action and oversaw an unprecedented breakdown in the budget process, with stopgap spending bills that provide a different benchmark than President Obama’s initial fiscal plan.

By: Alan

Alan Colmes is the publisher of Liberaland.