Rep. Paul Ryan (R-Wisconsin), center, who was the 2012 Republican vice presidential nominee, now serves as the Speaker of the U.S. House of Representatives. Photo from Facebook

Omnibus: A big budget for the nation
By Mark Trahant
Trahant Reports

Omnibus is a Latin word that means “for all.” In legislation it means cramming everything into a bill that you think can pass.

That’s exactly what the House did with its two-year $80 billion spending bill. That bill lifts caps from the Budget Control Act, or the sequester, and it raises the debt limit until March 2017. The Senate passed the measure early Friday morning. This bill awaits President Obama’s signature to become law.

The best part of this bill is that ends distractions such as defunding Planned Parenthood until after the election. The worst part of this deal is that the spending details still have to be written.

As Molly E. Reynolds of Brookings puts it: “What it does not do, however, is push actual government dollars out the door to pay for discretionary federal programs—including major health, education, and science initiatives—after December 11, when the temporary funding measure passed at the end of September expires. Under the terms of the deal, members of the House and Senate appropriations committees will have until that December deadline to choose exactly how to spend according with the broader framework.”

Yay.

The politics of this deal (and another House action) are stunning, but, unfortunately, probably only temporary. More Democrats voted for the bill than Republicans. So the Leadership picked a bipartisan course. That happened again with individual members who used a parliamentary measure to bring the Export-Import Bank up for a vote.

The Senate still has to weigh in on the Export-Import Bank and there is no indication when that debate will occur or if the votes are there to pass it. Folks who want to shrink government want this international financing program to go away, calling it corporate welfare. Supporters say that the competition is from other countries and failure to re-establish the bank will put U.S. interests at a disadvantage.

Total Deficits or Surpluses: Because outlays are projected to grow faster than revenues after 2018, projected deficits increase to almost 4 percent of gross domestic product from 2022 through 2025. Source: Congressional Budget Office

Of course any budget that passes with more Democrats than Republicans is considered awful. The new Speaker of the House Paul Ryan said the process stinks. But the bill will make it easier for Ryan to govern his caucus because it takes away the threat of government shutdowns and general chaos. Ryan’s goal will be to unite the Republicans so what ever measures come forward next will be debated within the party caucus and then sent to the floor with more unity. So Democratic votes will not be needed. At least that’s the theory. We will see if it works.

Critics of the spending bill (including those Republican candidates in Wednesday’s debate) say this shows how government spending is out of control. The problem with that argument is the numbers. The deficit is shrinking. What’s missing from the discourse is that the United States has a long-term spending problem. Not a budget crisis.

The Congressional Budget Office says: “This year’s deficit will be noticeably smaller than what the agency projected in March, and fiscal year 2015 will mark the sixth consecutive year in which the deficit has declined as a percentage of gross domestic product (GDP) since it peaked in 2009. Over the next 10 years, however, the budget outlook remains much the same as CBO described earlier this year: If current laws generally remain unchanged, within a few years the deficit will begin to rise again relative to GDP, and by 2025, debt held by the public will be higher relative to the size of the economy than it is now.”

So the question remains can Congress, can the next president, can the public, think long term?

Mark Trahant is the Charles R. Johnson Endowed Professor of Journalism at the University of North Dakota. He is an independent journalist and a member of The Shoshone-Bannock Tribes. For up-to-the-minute posts, download the free Trahant Reports app for your smart phone or tablet.