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Editorials
Monday, July 31, 2000Spending binge could
scrap budget surplusesThe issue: The Republican Congress has increased nondefense domestic spending despite its pledges to cut back.
WITH a vibrant economy generating vast amounts of tax revenues, the Republican Congress has gone on a spending spree that belies the GOP vow to trim the size of the federal government. This recklessness casts a large shadow of doubt over forecasts of huge budget surpluses in the outlying years, even if it assumed that the current prosperity will continue.
Stephen Moore and Stephen Slivinski of the Cato Institute, a libertarian think tank, write that the 106th Congress is on its way to becoming the biggest spending Congress on domestic social programs since the late 1970s.
Total federal nondefense spending, they say, is estimated to grow in real terms by $33 billion, or 11 percent, from 1999 to 2001 under the budget resolution approved last April. Moreover, they warn, "as the election gets closer, Congress and the White House are almost certain to add billions more to a budget crammed with special interest spending for just about every constituency in Washington."
From 1998 to 2000, nondefense domestic spending has grown more than 14 percent, after adjusting for inflation.
Since the "spending caps" were set by Congress in 1995, it has violated the caps almost every year, Moore and Slivinski found, even after the caps were revised upward in 1997.
In their 1995 "Contract with America," the Republicans pledged to eliminate more than 200 programs. But the authors say many of them now have bigger budgets than before the GOP gained control of Congress -- even more than what President Clinton requested.
The Republicans started out in their first year in power by making progress in downsizing the federal government. Domestic discretionary spending actually dropped in real terms from $259 billion to $250 billion.
But since then the domestic budget has risen "at an increasingly rapid pace," growing 14 percent from 1996 through 2000.
The Republicans deserve some credit for battling for spending restraint against a Democratic administration -- although not hard enough, and with many pork-barrel excesses of their own. If the Democrats had been in control of Congress there would probably have been even more spending. So the picture could have been worse, but it's bad enough.
THE authors gloomily conclude that "the culture of spending in Washington has prevailed over Republican promises to cut the budget."
Without the restraint in spending that is so conspicuously missing -- and the presidential candidates trying to outbid each other in their tax-cut proposals, it's hard to believe that those enormous budget surplus projections will be realized.
Chaotic inauguration
HE was once tremendously popular, but Alberto Fujimori was reviled by thousands as he took the oath of office as president of Peru for the third time.
Protesters set government buildings in Lima ablaze. Street battles and fires left six dead and 80 injured.
Inside the heavily guarded Congress building, a beaming Fujimori ignored the unrest and celebrated the start of an unprecedented third five-year term. Opposition legislators walked out in protest as he began his inaugural address.
The protests had their origin in the presidential election in April, marred by charges of widespread fraud. Strong international criticism prompted the government to announce a run-off between Fujimori and challenger Alejandro Toledo, who claimed he had been cheated.
But Toledo withdrew from the May 28 runoff after the government rejected requests for a postponement to provide time for monitoring to be arranged, saying he suspected the election would be rigged against him. Even with no official opponent, Fujimori barely won the runoff with 51 percent of the vote. Many ballots were defaced or left blank in protest.
International monitors criticized the election as unfair and open to fraud. The United States and other nations issued condemnations. The State Department commented, "No president emerging from such a flawed process can claim legitimacy."
Fujimori, the son of Japanese immigrants, was an obscure university professor of economics when he ran for president in 1990 and, to the surprise of many, won. He took over a government ravaged by inflation and corruption and beset by political violence.
Fujimori transformed the economy through harsh reforms and crushed the rebels. But his authoritarian methods drew criticism and provoked a democratic opposition movement led by Toledo.
The president pretended to be unaffected by the rioting and international condemnation, but he begins his third term under a very dark cloud. This is a disappointing development in a political career that began so promisingly.
Fujimori has shown himself to be a man of great resolve but he could be headed for disaster if he does not soften his approach and try to accommodate his critics.
Published by Liberty Newspapers Limited PartnershipRupert E. Phillips, CEO
John M. Flanagan, Editor & Publisher
David Shapiro, Managing Editor
Diane Yukihiro Chang, Senior Editor & Editorial Page Editor
Frank Bridgewater & Michael Rovner, Assistant Managing Editors
A.A. Smyser, Contributing Editor
