Feinstein letter re: budget (* to loot SS to balance budget!)

[CountAllVotes]

March 10, 2005

Dear ________:

Thank you so much for writing me to share your views
regarding President Bush's federal budget proposal. I appreciate
hearing from you on this important issue.

As you may know, we will soon be considering the Budget
Resolution. I wrote to the President in November 2004 to share
with him the budget priorities for California. I have attached my
thoughts on the President's budget as it was introduced to
Congress on February 7th. I hope that this will give you some
insight of what this proposed $2.57 trillion budget will mean for
our nation.

Once again, thank you for writing. As we continue to study
the budget, please continue to share your thoughts and ideas with
me. If you have any further questions regarding this issue, please
feel free to call my Washington, D.C. staff at [phone].


Senator Feinstein's Statement
on President Bush's FY2006 Budget

"With the extraordinary costs of the war in Iraq and
Afghanistan and making his tax cuts permanent, the only way
President Bush can even provide an appearance of bringing the
budget into balance is to make substantial and dramatic cuts in
domestic spending.

As a result, local law enforcement, health care, education,
community development block grants and transportation -
programs that are vital to our nation and provide the mainstay of
our infrastructure, refurbishment and expansion - experience major
cuts in the President's budget.

President Bush claims to be taking our nation down the
road toward cutting budget deficits in half, but an examination of
his budget demonstrates that when all the costs are included the
deficits will grow even larger under his spending plan, burdening
our children and their children with huge tax bills to pay down the
debt.

On one hand, President Bush, has declared that Social
Security is in a crisis because long-term costs could top long-term
revenue, however, he proposes taking $170 billion from the Social
Security trust fund to help balance the budget in FY2006 alone -
and more than $2.5 trillion over the next decade. I find this form
of budget balancing deeply troubling. If these funds were left in
the trust fund, they would go a long way toward helping preserve
the program for seniors.

At the same time, the President wants to make his tax cuts
permanent at a projected cost of more than $1.9 trillion over the
next decade, and $11 trillion over the next 75 years. I strongly
oppose making these tax cuts permanent and believe it is fiscally
irresponsible and will result in huge, ballooning deficits.

Overall, this President has presided over the greatest fiscal
reversal in our nation's history - leading us from a $5.6 trillion 10-
year budget surplus when he took office to a projected $6.2 trillion
projected debt at the end of five years, based on the new budget.

In FY2005 alone, the White House Office of Management
and Budget believes the deficit will be $427 billion. Add in the
upcoming Supplemental Appropriations request of $80 billion for
Iraq and Afghanistan and the nation's annual budget deficit soars
past a half-trillion dollars. When President Bush presented his first
Budget in 2001, he committed to retiring $1 trillion in debt over
the next four years, but this commitment has turned to dust.

The President says he is committed to trimming the annual
deficit to $390 billion in FY2006 and by half in the next five years.
But this is based on ever-growing diversions from the Social
Security Trust Fund and does not include any expenditure for his
proposal to partially privatize Social Security, at an estimated cost
of $4.5 trillion over its first 20 years in operation or make the tax
cuts permanent."


Sincerely yours,

Dianne Feinstein
United States Senator

http://feinstein.senate.gov

Further information about my position on issues of concern to California and the
Nation are available at my website http://feinstein.senate.gov. You can also
receive electronic e-mail updates by subscribing to my e-mail list at
http://feinstein.senate.gov/issue.html.

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Note the words IN BOLD ABOVE! So this is the social security plan - * is going to try and loot the social security trust fund to balance the budget on the backs of the we the American people!

We must write to our senators AGAIN! Let them know we are on to this scam!

This is a SHAMEFUL AND REPREHENSIBLE DISGRACE!!!!

:grr: :grr: :grr:

:dem: