Has somebody dumped gallons of hallucinogens into the drinking water on Capitol Hill? How else can we explain why Congress is slashing the operational budget of its most effective weapon against wasteful federal spending? That weapon, of course, is the Government Accountability Office, the green-eyeshade agency that for decades has been the bane of every wasteful bureaucrat in Washington.
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One of the Senate's staunchest fiscal conservatives put forward his own plan to resolve the debt ceiling crisis and rein in the nation's massive deficit and debt.
Sen. Tom Coburn, R-Okla, released a 600 page document that would cut the deficit by $9 trillion, and he does it through both spending reduction and revenue increases as well as entitlement reform.
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A letter from a transpartisan coalition of advocates for greater transparency in government are appealing to congressional leaders not to drastically reduce the budget for a federal program they say is critical to improving government accountability.
The letter was initiated by the Sunlight Foundation and is addressed to House Speaker John Boehner and House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi, Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell and Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid.
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Sens. Jim DeMint, R-S.C. and Tom Coburn, R-Okla., introduced a bill Friday to stop federal funding of NPR and the Corporation for Public Broadcasting.
Conservative Republicans have been itching to defund the two programs for years and they've now compiled evidence they believe shows overcompensation of the organization's executives as well as a trail of donations leading to the doorstep of liberal financier George Soros.
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Eleven GOP senators are appealing to House Speaker John Boehner to insure that Republicans in the lower chamber pass a spending bill that cuts at least $100 billion from the previously approved continuing resolution for the 2011 federal budget in preparation for even deeper reductions in succeeding years.
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Sen. Tom Coburn, R-OK and "Dr. No," has been taking lots of heat this week for his insistence that Senate proponents of the bill providing federally funded health care benefits and compensation to 9/11 first responders allow amendments to the measure designed to reduce its cost.
But Coburn's resistence has yielded fruit in the form of a compromise that, among much else, reduces the measure's estimated total cost from more than $6 billion to about $4.2 billion.
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Ever wonder what would be the 13 worst examples of how government officials wasted tax dollars in the past year? Sen. Tom Coburn, R-OK, took a detailed look back at the past 12 months and found many more than a baker's dozen illustrations.
But here's the 13 Coburn emphasized in a statement releasing his full report, entitled "Wastebook 2010." Just remember as you read the following that the people responsible for them are from the government and they are here to help us:
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Senate Democrats ought not think they are immune to the earmarks issue because Oklahoma Republican Sen. Tom Coburn promises to attach a ban to the first available piece of legislation in the lame duck session that started this week.
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Looks like the action on the Republican side in the House and Senate is being watched more carefully by Democrats than might be expected.
Well, by at least one of the Senate Democrats, Mark Udall of Colorado, who tweeted this statement to supporters this afternoon: "I’m calling for an end to the wasteful and influence-laden process of earmarking."
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With earmarks shaping up as the first significant battle of the 112th Congress, lots of sense and nonsense is being thrown around about the issue.
Sen. Tom Coburn, R-OK, is always a source of sense on earmarks - and most any other issue, for that matter - has tackled the nonsense in a superb piece in National Review Online that tackles the major myths about earmarks.
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