Budget

The GAO report could have been used as a step-by-step instruction manual for producing real cuts to government spending. Why wasn't it?
"Because the constituency for spending is still strong in Washington," says former Rep. Pete Hoekstra, R- Holland, who has the perspective of three months as a private citizen. "Appropriators don't want to cut spending, and the bureaucracy is a big advocate for growing government."
So instead, Hoekstra says, Congress "worries more about how to gain a political advantage than actually solving the problem."
 
--Nolan Finley