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Go Barry!

Yea... he could reduce the spending on the left of the 'white line' but he won't.

Sure, but to do that, he'd have to disband the military, parole all Federal prisoners, close the National Parks and National Laboratories, and terminate NASA.

Where to start?

Personally, I'd start by knocking down the IRS building. Then closing the Fed.

Well, from your list I'd shutter NASA and probably Natl Labs. I'd release non-violent drug offenders and remove all drug laws. I'd also look into disbanding all branches of the service and creating a single unified .mil.

But I think that the pennies to the left of the white line also included SS, food stamps and welfare. I'd reduce those drastically. And make lots of other cuts to programs that the .gov likes to say are 'untouchable.'

DEA and ATF come to mind. Admitting that the War on Drugs is a miserable failure and freeing the resources engaged in it would probably be fairly significant.

Department of Education

Congress. Everyone of them. Even the good ones. Start fresh with new folks and pay them minimum wage.

I'd start by pulling out my dog-eared copy of the Constitution, then going through each program and seeing if I could find explicit authorization for that program in those fine, old documents. If I found the authorization, the program stays. If I don't, out it goes.

If, at the end, I find some programs that I think are worthwhile but not authorized, I go back to the PEOPLE to see if we can come to consensus on authorizing that program and enact additional amendments as required.

It's simple really.

You'd pay them? Weakling!
Let them work for free.


(And remove the minimum wage laws.)

What was the reason given for developing the Department of Energy during the Carter administration?

We have spent multi-billions of dollars in support of this agency and I am willing to bet not one person who reads this will remember the reason given. It was very simple.

"THE DEPARTMENT OF ENERGY WAS INSTITUTED TO LESSEN OUR DEPENDENCE ON FOREIGN OIL."

NOTE: IN 2008, THE BUDGET FOR THIS DEPARTMENT IS NOW AT $24.2 BILLION A YEAR.
THEY HAVE 16,000 FEDERAL EMPLOYEES AND APPROXIMATELY 100,000 CONTRACT EMPLOYEES.

We have a winner.

But that is a nice broad stroke of some other worthy ideas, namely axing NASA, what White Horseradish said "DEA and ATF come to mind. Admitting that the War on Drugs is a miserable failure and freeing the resources engaged in it would probably be fairly significant."

I do believe Congress should be paid, but I also believe the founders never intended it to be a full time job. I like the idea of getting rid of min wage, but reckon there still has to be a poverty line. Congress should be compensated exactly what the poverty line is for their family size.

I agree that the federal Department of Education is useless and should be cut. They haven't been living up to their mission statement "Promoting educational excellence for all Americans" for a long time, actually they have been failing and getting progressively worse. Sometimes, when there is a storm at sea, you have to throw stuff overboard.

While several of ya have made specific suggestions and I might add some of my own . .. . I think Lenny put it mopst concisely.

How about part of the National Institutes of Health's 29 billion dollar study budget?

http://northernmuckraker.blogspot.com/2009/05/but-obama-could-only-find-100-million.html

Don't tell me you didn't wish to get to the bottom of why drug-addicted hookers in Thailand have a higher rate of HIV infection?