Finally a conservative has woken up! It is about time.

Pay as you go is not a bad thing. If you believe that unlimited spending on a credit card and only make interest payments is a good fiscal policy, than pay as you go is bad. For six years the federal government has been spending like a drunken sailor. More pork has been put in the bills the last several years that would make a liberal blush. But we also had not one single veto on those bills. We have allowed the debt to be increased by over 3 trillion dollars, with no end it sight.

So if pay as we go is bad, who pays for the debt? I believe that what was voted on was a procedure that changed that credit card to a debit card. I think in a fiscal sense this a move in the right direction. I see that others disagree. In reading between the lines, it looks like if the tax rate stays low for now is more important than what the real spending is. If this is not true then “Where were you conservatives been hiding the last six years?” Were you the ones cursing Bill Clinton for having a surplus budgets before the end of his term, or did you forget that? Also where was the outcry about keeping the Iraq war costs off budget and separate funding. Was it because of the claim the president made that is would not cost us any money and would be paid for by the profits from Iraq oil?

I guess that would be a separate discussion. But we still have to pay those costs sometime! I thought that conservatives believed in smaller government, balanced budget, and moving government down to the lowest level so we as citizens' would have access. So far what we have seen was the largest growth in government in the history of our country. We are spending much more that we are taking in, For the last six years If this was baseball, I would say that this would be three strikes, maybe that is why so many candidates were voted out.
Norb, Norb. You are right on about the drunken sailor spending. Not good. But what's not good about Rep. Petri's vote is that it opens the flood gate to higher taxes to fund programs Republicans don't think the federal government should be involved in. Yes, many Republicans were complicit in ever-increasing spending. But it's that spending that needs to be brought under control, not more taxes levied. Jo