Saturday, February 17, 2007
All federal budgets contain a certain amount of fiscal fiction, and the Bush administration's budgets play faster and looser with the numbers than most. But without make-believe savings, there's no way the White House can make it appear that the budget will be in balance five years from now.
As people have time to delve into the budget's 2,186 pages, some of the dodgier assumptions are coming to light. For example: The White House is assuming, even as more and more wounded troops are returning from Iraq and Afghanistan, that the cost of veterans' health care will decline.
Says the Associated Press: "Even though the cost of providing medical care to veterans has been growing rapidly -- by more than 10 percent in many years -- White House budget documents assume consecutive cutbacks in 2009 and 2010 and a freeze thereafter."
No cuts to VA
No one, including the White House, seems to believe that's going to happen. "No one who is knowledgeable about ... budgeting issues anticipates any cuts to VA funding. None. Zero. Zip," one Senate Republican aide told the AP.
Indeed, the cost of veterans' medical care in 2012, the year the White House projects the budget to be in balance, is realistically expected to be 16 billion more than the administration's cheerily optimistic-- and unreal -- estimate.
Spending on veterans' medical care in the current fiscal year is 35.6 billion; the Bush budget calls for a 9 percent increase, to 39.6 billion, in fiscal 2008. That's probably close to accurate, although even honest estimates have proved too low in the past. There is no way, with the steadily increasing number of Iraq and Afghanistan veterans, that the cost of their care is going to decline.
The White House explained that the lowball projections do not reflect policy decisions. But they do make the budget appear in balance, and that's the whole point.
Scripps Howard News Service