The Giving Season, Republican Style

It's the giving season, and our government is in the mood to give: to the Pentagon, that is. Military spending is going up 10 percent in 2005, to a dizzying $500 billion, while spending on domestic discretionary programs is creeping up only at about 1 percent. Congress was downright miserly when it passed its appropriations bill. It decided not to provide an extra $1 billion for the CHIP program that covers children's health insurance at the state level, even though this amount had been unused by the program last year. As a result, some 200,000 low-income children won't get covered by the program. And while Congress raised by 5 percent the amount the government can spend on Section 8 housing, Congress cut funds for housing the elderly, the homeless, and the disabled. Now that's the holiday spirit. Similarly, Congress boosted its home-heating assistance program to the poor by 15%, but the price to heat homes this winter has gone up, on average, by 24 percent, according to the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities. "Many poor households assisted by the program--the majority of which include a person who is elderly or disabled--may face considerable additional hardship during the coming winter," the center says. It will be a cold, cold winter for millions of Americans, thanks to Bush and the Republican Congress. [more]