Richard Spencer

May 09, 2008

Since the GOP didn’t feel many pangs of conscience over No Child Left Behind or the 500 some-odd billion dollar Medicare extension package, it’s rather surprising to be reading passages like this from the Post:

House Minority Leader John A. Boehner (R-Ohio) yesterday called the domestic add-ons ‘unnecessary extra spending’ and denounced Pelosi’s decision to bring the bill to the House floor without first letting the Appropriations Committee review it. To show their displeasure, Republicans forced procedural votes this week that delayed consideration of the bill.

What is this pork-barrel bill? A big corporate bailout? A new welfare program? Appropriations for Hillary’s Woodstock Museum? No, it’s Jim Webb’s new 21st-century G.I. Bill, which provides 11 billion for benefits to veterans of the Iraq and Afghanistan campaigns, including one year of college tuition. 

Webb added his program on to a $195 billion bill, 162.5 billion of which was allocated to continuing both wars well into 2009. The added benefits and tuition credit amounts to around 5% of the total expenditure.

McCain made it clear a while ago that he wouldn’t back Webb’s bill, and now the GOP is threatening a filibuster. 

Our “big government conservative” love to spend, spend, spend on programs that make them feel really “conservative”—like federal marriage counseling or abstinence training in Africa. They become tight-fisted, however, when a bill comes up that might serve as a constant reminder of the f%cking mess they’ve made of soldiers’ lives.