"Peter E. Pflaum, Ph.D. Institute for Human Resources (904) 428-9609
[EMAIL PROTECTED] [EMAIL PROTECTED]"
[EMAIL PROTECTED]
---------- Forwarded message ----------
Date: Fri, 6 Jan 1995 02:17:35 -0600
From: Brad Parsons <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Subject: ** A to Z Spending Cuts Congress Nov.8th **
---------- Forwarded message ----------
Date: Mon, 7 Nov 1994 06:57:43 -0600 (CST)
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**** A TO Z SPENDING CUTS COALITION CONGRESSIONAL TARGET FOR: 11/7/94 ****
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WE'RE BACK! The A to Z Spending Cuts bill will have to wait for
the next Congress, but we're not gonna let incumbents in Congress off
the hook. This last update on the A to Z Spending Cuts Campaign before
tomorrow's election begins the spending cuts campaign for the next
Congress, so that you will know that there is an alternative to the TAX
AND SPEND, BIG GOVERNMENT, current-services-baseline budgeting policies
of CLINTON and CURRENT, INCUMBENT CONGRESSIONAL MEMBERS.
The following is the beginning of a list of possible spending cuts.
We will be posting many more specific, potential spending cuts in the
months ahead:
1 Yr. 5 Yr.
Spending Cuts Savings Savings
* Cut by 50% federal spending on furniture and $1 billion $5 billion
decorations. Much of this spending is
extravagant and useless.
* Sell most of the government's civilian air $2 billion $6 billion
fleet, which far exceeds the cost of flying
commercial carriers.
* Sell most of the governments civilian, $2.65 bil. $9.25 bil.
non-postal vehicles.
* Cut back pork barrel projects. $6.2 bil. $31 bil.
(e.g. The Center for Western Hemisphere Trade,
also known as the 'Pickle Pork Center'
recently appropriated for $10 million)
* Eliminate weapons programs that are not $4.3 bil. $4.3 bil.
requested by the military.
(e.g. Seawolf sub for $1.1 billion)
* Place a 5-year freeze on construction of new $1 bil. $5 bil.
federal buildings. There are about 15 million
square feet of vacant federal office space.
* Prohibit the use of private consultants for $4.9 bil. $24.5 bil.
federal agencies.
* Over five years, implement a 10% across-the- $14.6 bil. $73 bil.
board cut in the administration costs of all
federal discretionary programs.
* Bring federal retirement benefits in line $3 bil. $13 bil.
with private sector benefits.
* Correct the U.S. lax tax treatment of foreign $4 bil. $21 bil.
companies operating in the U.S.
* Return to the Treasury foreign economic $5 bil.
assistance funds not expended in three years.
* Transfer all real property, facilities, and $2.4 bil. $2.4 bil.
equipment of the Tennessee Valley Authority
to private sector, states, or local entities. ----------- -----------
1 Year 5 Year
TOTALS: $46 billion $199.5 bil.
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(Sources: Congressional Budget Office, Citizens Against Government Waste,
United We Stand America)
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*********** THE STORY OF 'GRANNY MARJE' AND HER TOP SPENDING CUTS ***********
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Who is 'Granny Marje'?
Excerpted from an article
by Drew Moss
Taking a break from watching her two grandchildren, volunteering for
two separate campaigns and writing a dozen letters to each of Arizona's
members of Congress, UWSA member Marjorie Danielson appeared before a
congressional conference on July 12, 1994, to offer her ideas on federal
spending cuts.
Danielson, affectionately known as 'Granny Marje,' accompanied UWSA
National Policy Coordinator Russ Verney to the A to Z Spending Cuts
Conference.
Danielson's testimony focused on the Rural Electrification
Administration, the Appalachian Regional Commission, the Agency for
International Development, and the Department of Agriculture. The
members of Congress attending the hearing also received a copy of
her 55-page compilation of over 500 specific spending cuts that
range from $25,000 to over $1 billion each.
Regarding the need for government spending cuts rather than more
taxes, one Congressman at the conference stated, "The people need to
send that message at the polls when they vote."
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There is not space or time to transcribe all of Granny Marje's
spending cuts here, but I thought it timely to focus on the four above
mentioned:
RURAL ELECTRIFICATION ADMINISTRATION (REA).-- The REA was originally
established during the Depression to bring electricity to rural America.
In 1949, Congress gave REA a new mission: use subsidized loans to spread
phone service into areas where it did not pay for big companies to go.
By 1990, almost half of that loan money was captured by just 5 companies.
Some examples: Telecommunications giant GTE Corporation, e.g., borrowed
$30 million at 5% interest for its Micronesian subsidiary in the South
Pacific. REA is also financing electrification projects in Latin
America, $20 million in one case. All told, REA is costing U.S.
taxpayers $242 million a year in electrification projects alone.
But wait, Congress has added water projects to the REA to the tune
of $400 million a year. The Rural Electrification Administration
along with the additional water projects are no longer required.
Abolish the REA.
Quote, Representative Mike 'Syonarra' Synar (D-Oklahoma) said,
"We have learned again that when it comes to managing taxpayer
owned assets, the federal government should be called Uncle
Sucker, not Uncle Sam." That's you and I, people.
APPALACHIAN REGIONAL COMMISSION (ARC).-- In 1965, Johnson created the
Appalachian Regional Commission. The poverty in the coal counties of
four states - eastern Kentucky and Tennessee, southern West Virginia
and southwestern Virginia - was the reason for the creation of the
ARC. To date, the ARC has spent $6.2 billion to help build highways,
sewer lines, industrial parks and tourist attractions, but these
improvements have not created significant, long-term direct employment,
especially in central Appalachia. Instead, most of the money has been
given to the home states of politically powerful Congressmen and other
officials. Congressionally defined Appalachia originally consisted of
360 counties in 11 states from Alabama to Pennsylvania. But political
logrolling continues to swell the region, and today 399 counties in
13 states, with a population of 20.7 million, are eligible for aid.
In West Virginia, the ARC provided $26.3 million to help build the
spectacular New River Gorge Bridge near Fayetteville, but it has not
created any jobs for impoverished citizens of the coal counties farther
southwest. In Alabama, ARC gave $17,498.00 to the Alabama Music Hall
of Fame in Tuscumbia; taxpayer money contributed to a 10-by-20 foot
portable exhibit featuring a 12-foot-tall jukebox and makeshift
recording studio to promote the museum. In Mississippi, Marshall
County is getting a new water system and more than 70 fireplugs with
$250,000 from the ARC. Marshall County is not by any stretch of the
imagination a part of Appalachia. The GAO criticized the ARC for
continuing to make investments and approve "projects in metropolitan
and urban areas that had already achieved a self-sustaining growth
rate." The ARC gave $99,127.00 to the Knoxville College Library and
$374,000.00 to the University of Tennessee library. The ARC recently
gave $370,000.00 for a Huntsville research park, $500,000.00 for the
U.S. Space and Rocket Center tourist attraction, more than $1 million
for improvements near the Huntsville airport, $877,000.00 for a 9-hole
public golf course near Charleston, WV, $2,900,000.00 for an access
road serving a ski resort in Lackawanna, Penn., the list of porkbarrel
projects under the ARC goes on and on to the tune of more than $189
million a year. CONGRESS, YOU WORK FOR THE TAXPAYERS/VOTERS.
ELIMINATE WASTE, FRAUD AND ABUSE OF THE TAXPAYERS' DOLLARS.
U.S. DEPARTMENT OF AGRICULTURE (USDA).-- USDA offices are often
located at different addresses within the same community. Dillon,
South Carolina (pop. 6,000) has 4 USDA agencies scattered in 4
different locations. Most of the USDA's employees work out of its
estimated 11,000 offices, a remnant of a bygone era when farmers
lacked phones and dependable transportation. In today's world of
interstate highways, faxes and computers, the far-flung offices of
the USDA are an anachronism. Even the USDA does not know the exact
number of field offices. The field offices are located in 94% of
the nation's counties, only 16% of which are still considered
agricultural. In Nevada there are field offices where there are
no fields. Seven separate USDA agencies have offices in Las Vegas,
even though there are virtually no farms within 50 miles of the city.
A party to honor 900 employees of the Department of Agriculture in
DC cost $491,607.00, the previous year the same party cost $667,000.00.
The USDA purchased computers and information technology for $650
million - GAO auditors checked on that pilot site, they found the
computers sitting idle while staffers kept track of loans from boxes
of 3 x 5 cards. The department has announced plans to spend $2 billion
more on computer technology over the next 5 years. The exact number of
USDA employees is uncertain, but estimates range from 110,000 to more
than 150,000. Today, less than 2% of the nation's population live on
farms. With the help of Congress, the USDA has grown to a dispropor-
tionate size consuming an annual budget of $62.7 billion a year not
including an additional $12 billion a year for a wasteful Farm Subsidy
Program.
AGENCY FOR INTERNATIONAL DEVELOPMENT (AID).-- "Much development
assistance over the past 4 decades has not worked," a 1989 report
commissioned by the late AID administrator Alan Woods concluded.
"All too often, dependency seems to have won out over development."
Unfortunately, his report, like so many reform ideas before it,
was largely ignored by the AID bureaucracy and Congress. Congressional
members bombard AID officials with requests to consider companies
from their districts for products or services when overseas funding
programs are being devised. And if a phone call to AID doesn't
work, there is always a legislative option. Congressional earmarks
account for about 70 percent of AID's budget. AID directly employs
4,300 persons and keeps 7,450 others on its payroll as contract
employees. "We do not need all those people," says former AID
official, Brian Hannon, "Aid needs to cut two-thirds of those
bureaucrats." In 1991, Congress voted $20 million in aid to the
International Fund for Ireland requested, according to committee
sources, by House Speaker Thomas Foley (D-WA). Millions of dollars
worth of wheat donated by the U.S. each year went to a Haitian
government owned mill. Investigators found evidence that the flour
was sold at an elevated price and President Duvalier collected the
kickback. (Ron Brown, Commerce Secretary, lobbied for Haiti's
Duvalier, Wall Street Journal, July 30, 1993.) Two decades ago,
Egypt fed itself. Today, more than half of Egypt's food comes
from imports. About $700 million of that food was subsidized by
U.S. taxpayers in 1991. AID was given to Liberia in military and
economic assistance from 1980 - 1986 to promote economic growth
and political stability. A GAO investigation found that untold
millions of the $434 million had been diverted into the pockets
of Liberian officials. For the years 1946 through 1980 alone,
figures compiled by the Library of Congress, Congressional
Research Service pegged foreign aid expenditures at $2.3 trillion,
including $286.5 billion in principal and $2 trillion plus in
interest. WE ARE QUITE LITERALLY BANKRUPTING AMERICA TO BANKROLL
THE WORLD.
Sources that Granny Marje used to follow waste, fraud, and abuse
in the federal government include:
Citizens Against Government Waste - 1994 Congressional Pig Book Summary,
Citizens Against Government Waste - 1993 Congressional Pig Book Summary,
A Call For Revolution by Martin L. Gross,
The Government Racket: Washington Waste From A to Z by Martin L. Gross,
The Wall Street Journal,
The Heritage Foundation,
ABC World News,
Prime Time Live,
Reader's Digest,
The Arizona Republic,
The Phoenix Gazette,
and others.
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*** There is 1 day remaining until the November 8th elections. ***
**** Time is short, tomorrow we send a message to Congress. *****
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This message has been provided by FED-UP...Fight Every Damn Unaccountable
Politician. "We're FED-UP, and we're not gonna take it anymore!"
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WE'LL REMEMBER IN NOVEMBER!!!
OH YES, YOU CAN BE DAMN SURE WE'LL REMEMBER THIS NOVEMBER 8TH!
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