By
Sheila Bapat
Like a mother who won't let her children go outside and play until they finish their homework, President Clinton wouldn't let members of Congress go home early to campaign until they finished his homework assignment: spend the budget surplus.
Hilarious, considering that conservative members of Congress will now go home to their conservative districts and promise that they still believe in "low taxes and less spending." Ha.
Even more hilarious is that less than six months ago Congressional Republicans were drooling over an $800 billion dollar tax cut. They raised hell when Clinton vetoed its ass out of there. And now they're close to approving a budget that is nearly $300 billion more than what Clinton had demanded.
Obviously, reality negates rhetoric.
As soon as news of the budget surplus hit front pages and pundit shows last year, Republicans got the rhetoric going. They touted the silly idea that they should give the extra money back to the American people instead of using it to pay off the national debt, fund education, social security and a slew of other government programs. They were attempting to ride on a Reaganesque message of low taxes and low spending.
But Reagan's not the man right now; and Reagonomics doesn't apply when there's actually money in the bank.
It's about time Congressional Republicans woke up to that.
They seem to have turned a 180, and now believe that paying down the debt is most important. After a meeting with President Clinton on Tuesday, Republicans proposed that they set aside 90 percent of the surplus to pay down the debt instead of using the surplus to fund new programs.
Clinton, however, wants to use the surplus to raise minimum wage, assist states suffering from wildfires, give tax cuts to small business owners and increase spending for farmers. He claims that the debt can begin to be paid down with next year's budget.
Congress is giving Clinton what seems to be an ultimatum: pay down the debt or use the money for new programs. In this respect Congressional conservatives haven't changed; they would still rather avoid spending anything on government programs, even if that means using the surplus to pay down the debt instead of giving it back to Americans.
But they're also realizing that pragmatism pays off. Toning down the anti-spending message and realizing that the government could actually use the surplus to help run the country is a message that Clinton has been able to send home with Americans.
And Congress is finally buying into it as well.
It is partially due to President Clinton's influence over Congress. Despite his current lame-duck status, Clinton has spent the past eight years putting pressure on Congress to fund programs that are unpopular to the majority party. That effort is finally paying off.
And it is also due to House Speaker Dennis Hastert of Illinois. While Hastert has been a quiet figure for the past two years and was considered to be a "puppet" for the Republican party's right wing, he has been critical in negotiating with Congressional moderates and liberals. Were it not for his moderate status, Congressional Republicans might not be getting anything done.
Whether or not the surplus money will be used for what Clinton wants to use it for remains to be seen. But actually getting Congress to spend the surplus is a victory in itself.
Hopefully Congress will realize that while fiscal conservation is a nice idea, it isn't always the best way to go when there are so many fund-starved government programs that actually deserve more money.
So after six years of being in Congress, the class of 1994 conservatives may finally stop crooning their "down with taxes, cut the spending!" chant. Promising a tax cut when what this country could use is refunding and rebuilding of its most valuable programs was nothing but punditry and sound-byte babble.
And the rhetoric isn't working anymore.
Sheila Bapat is a Political science junior. She can be reached at sheila.bapat@wildcat.arizoa.edu.
