Public Budgets

House Majority Leader Steny Hoyer spoke Tuesday morning in a large private room (the Columbus Room) at Union Station in Washington, D.C. and took questions. He had no answers for the questions I put to him.

Hoyer's topic was fiscal responsibility, and he said that his proposals -- which were all pure vagueness -- would be appropriate to enact "as soon as the economy is fully recovered." Don't hold your breath.

Hoyer, as is the custom, bragged about cutting and trying to cut particular weapons systems. So I asked him how he could have neglected to mention two closely related points (as is the custom):

1-He's been increasing the overall military budget.
2-He's been funding the escalation of war completely off the books.

By David Swanson

The U.S. military budget, and the add-on war budget, and the total of the two have all been headed upwards for years and have been headed upwards for the past year and a half. Yes, I know, all you hear about is the one airplane that the so-called Secretary of Defense doesn't want but that Congress insists on giving him anyway. But he and the President have twice asked for a larger overall budget and twice been given it. And almost none of it has anything to do with defense.

Flyers to take to teabag rallies:

Large jpg. PDF. Word. Old Word.

Book Can Now Be Ordered, Book Tour Being Planned

You can now pre-order my book at Amazon.com at http://tinyurl.com/daybreakbook

It's a thick book containing everything I know - and then some - for $10 (pre-order discount price).  And you can support a good cause by pre-ordering it now.

You can also call or visit your local bookstore right now and ask them to be sure to stock the book.

If you're in California, Pennsylvania, Florida, New Mexico, Texas, Oklahoma, Kansas, or Ohio please see below.  I'm only coming once to any given state, so please schedule more events for the times I will be in yours! Please don't ask me later why I didn't come to your town!

If you're in another state, please contact me re dates in 2010. -- David Swanson

CLICK FOR PDF.

By David Swanson

Seventy-one members of Congress, all Democrats, most House Members, two Senators, belong to the Congressional Progressive Caucus. For a couple of years now, the CPC has had a staff person. More recently it created a website http://cpc.lee.house.gov