Posted on 02/27/2011 10:17:58 AM PST by Qbert
ABC News’ Devin Dwyer reports: Iowa Republican Rep. Steve King says he wants to penalize the Obama administration for its decision to drop a legal defense of the Defense of Marriage Act with fresh budget cuts for the Department of Justice.
“We have the authority to do a few things, and one of them is to control the budget,” King said in an interview with ABC News from Frankfurt, Germany, where he has been attending trade meetings this week.
[Snip]
“The resources that they would be using to defend the DOMA law in court are not necessary to appropriate to them," he said. "So with open rules on appropriations, that’s an opportunity to bring an amendment that will reduce their budget by an appropriate amount.”
King acknowledged that it is too late to raise the issue in the continuing resolution debate and declined to speculate on the size of his proposed cut, but promised to pursue the idea during negotiations over the FY 2012 budget in the weeks ahead.
(Excerpt) Read more at blogs.abcnews.com ...
If congress wants to have DOMA repealed then it's up to them to send a repeal to the president's desk, or for the courts to declare it unconstitutional. Short of that the executive must enforce it.
I agree. If they refuse to enforce most of our laws, what do they need the money for?
Over the past 20 years most private sector companies have gone through waves of downsizings and the remaining employees have seen significant benefit cuts including the end of defined benefit pension plans and retiree health care. New CEO’s of trouble companies in the private sector begin their jobs with across the board cuts of 10% to 20% of headcount and expenses. In my corporate career I’ve lived through many of these downsizings and seen the organization respond with a significant increase in productivity from the remaining workforce. At the same time the organization typically drops projects and programs having little or no benefit to the bottom line that consume significant management time and financial resources.
During the same 20 year period the federal government has grown at an accelerated rate. It is now time to attack the federal bureaucracy with the same type of austerity cutting that works well in the private sector. The Republican House of Representatives should pass a budget for 2012 cutting the spending of every federal agency and department by 20% across the board. The screams from the media and the Dems will be loud but no louder than if much more modest cuts are attempted.
It’s worse then them Justice Department not doing their job — they have become a criminal mob on their own. They are criminal, committing criminal actions.
Predicted reply from the left:
“Why, we still need funding to pay for all the costs (including salaries of our staff of lawyers) associated with defending our decisions to not enforce our laws or even sue states that pass state laws intended to enforce what we choose not to enforce (eg Arizona). Don’t you fiscal conservatives understand anything???
We are the Department of Justice, so what is it you have against justice anyway?”
Excellent. This is the path to a smaller Federal Government. Libertarians rejoice.
But 2 out of 3 ain't bad
Agreed. Despotism is the result if the government only enforces the laws it agrees with and not all of them.
Congressman Gingrich was right when he noted what the liberal outrage would be if a Republican President no longer defended the liberal’s sacred “right” to abortion. There would be worse protests than in Wisconsin about a horrible government trampling on the rights of the communists...I mean people.
JoMa
It’s worse than the Justice Department not doing their job — they have become a criminal mob on their own. They are criminal, committing criminal actions.
“They obviously don’t need the money if they’re not going to do their job.”
They could start by cutting Holder’s salary in half since he is doing a half azz job.
I hope they just do it!
I think you are right. I have a question. Which law will Obama set aside next? The 2nd amendment? Maybe the entire Bill of Rights? Maybe Obozo is simply testing the waters, to see how much he can get away with.
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