Senate Republicans Pass Sweeping Earmark Ban

"Senate Republicans launched a full-scale assault on deficit spending Tuesday evening, approving an earmark ban and a flurry of other belt-tightening resolutions, while challenging Democrats to do the same."

"Senate Republicans went far beyond just banning earmarks Tuesday. Their other austerity moves:

• They approved a resolution by Sen. Lamar Alexander placing a moratorium on “creating new unfunded mandates and new entitlement programs.” It opposes burdening state and local governments with new unfunded federal mandates, such as healthcare reform, which shifts huge costs to provide health insurance to the uninsured to state governments.
• Another Alexander resolution was passed opposing the creation of any new entitlement programs. Federal entitlements make up 56 percent of the total budget — a percentage expected to rise steeply if Obamacare is enacted.
• A resolution from Sen. John Cornyn supported a balanced budget amendment to the U.S. Constitution. It would require that, before each fiscal year begins, the president must submit to Congress a proposed budget “in which total federal spending does not exceed total federal revenue.”
• Cornyn’s measure also would require a supermajority of both houses of Congress to increase any federal taxes.
• Sen. Kay Bailey Hutchison offered a resolution that all unspent stimulus funds should be canceled immediately, to avoid “saddling taxpayers with more debt.”
• Sen. Jon Kyl proposed a resolution stating that there should be a federal hiring freeze on employees not associated with national security efforts. Kyl’s resolution points out that in the past two years the federal civilian workforce grew by 20 percent to 1.43 million.
• According to a GOP news release, Sen. John Thune submitted a resolution calling for all non-discretionary spending to be reduced to inflation-adjusted FY 2008 levels. Republicans estimate this move alone would save about $450 billion over the next 10 years."