Budget, Schmudget

[Note: I'll have something on the Florida school shooting later; have to think about it!]

Shenanigans abound in Washington, DC. Also in many state legislatures. All of these acts revolve around budget making. What programs are funded? Which are whittled down, or massively cut? What new programs are slated for more funding? What do these questions mean for policy and priorities of the nation or state? And where is the political power – votes – to get the proposals enacted?

It also matters who is doing the proposing. Is it the president or leadership in congress? Or the governor or political leadership in the state legislatures?

Of course, all of this matters, but in the end, what comes out of the budget process is very different than what goes in. It reminds me of sausage making; you don’t want to know how it is made! It just is, and it tastes pretty good! But what mysteries are contained in it? Hmmm.

The White House occupant proposes two major initiatives: massive agency cuts and immigration reform last chance. Immigration reform is not a last chance as I covered earlier this week. Immigration has been played as a football. There is no immigration problem other than the harm done to immigrants by countless acts of omission by congress over the decades. Grant all immigrants citizenship quickly and easily. Be done with the ‘problem’. If other issues are conflated with immigration, they are false. Border security is just that; not immigration related.

So, remove immigration from the budget battle. It has no bearing on anything real. The border wall is another canard; it should not be built. Save those funds for other things that are more important. Walls separate peoples; they don’t unite them. Study the Berlin Wall for pointers on what not to do.

Infrastructure improvements are needed in our nation; in our states, too. Actually, infrastructure is a constant management issue. We need to maintain, refurbish, replace and expand public infrastructure continually. Like our homes, things wear out, become obsolete or need expansion. Public infrastructure is much the same as our homes. It needs to be managed continuously and planned.

If Artificial Intelligence revolutionizes personal transportation – then highways, roads, garages, police functions, city planning, public transportation and a host of other things will change – we need to include these factors in our planning. And budgeting.

Other changes we can map for the future will affect how we organize our lives and plan our infrastructure. Revolution in energy is a key factor; most likely fossil fuels will fade away and electric power will increase but produced from renewable resources. Changes in education will spring forth and focus on adaptability of human abilities. We will learn to learn; we will learn how to change with the flow of discoveries and shifts in major trends. Work will evolve and morph many times in each of our lives. Therefore schools will change, educational methods will change, whole systems will change.

With all that change comes infrastructure changes, too. And the budget mechanisms that support all of this will shift in form and function, too.

Playing political games with the short-term budget process in both federal and state governments is foolish and shortsighted. It’s about time we require our elected representatives to deal with the real world, not the imagined world of political games and power.

We the people are in charge of this, not them. So, when do we get back to work and address attention where it is most needed?

Budgets are a time for leadership, not fudging.

February 15, 2018