Buyer's Remorse

From the Pittsburg Morning Sun

Dear editor,

I wonder if other Southeast Kansas voters are beginning to have buyer's remorse concerning the new Democrat representative Nancy Boyda. A remark attributed to her in the Tuesday Feb. 6, Morning Sun ought to cause such remorse.

It was reported that she has concerns about the Medicare cuts in President Bush's proposed budget for next fiscal year. The truth of the matter is that there are no cuts in Medicare or Medicaid proposed by our president's budget. Here are the facts, according the the Wall Street Journal, Tuesday, February 6, 2007, page A13. Our president has proposed to slow down the rate of growth of Medicare spending from 6.5% in 5 years to 5.6% in 5 years, That's an increase in funds, (5.6%), not a cut. The only thing being slowed is the rate of growth. According to the same article our president's proposed budget slows the rate of growth of the Medicaid budget from a projected 7.3% per year to 7.1% per year. Again, that's an increase, not a cut.

One would have hoped that the first time our new representative, Boyda, opened her mouth in public she would not have contributed to the budgetary confusion already out there among the voters. An increase in a budget is NOT a cut. A decrease in the rate of growth of a budget is NOT a cut in the budget. Our president is proposing a 2.9 trillion dollar budget for next fiscal year. What, isn't 2.9 trillion dollars enough? If the Democrats can't buy a slow down in the rate of growth of some expenditures then it seems that last November the voters only might have replaced big spending Republicans with pathologically big spending Democrats. I know that I have buyer's remorse.

Elwyn Davis


From those of us who believed Ryun's commercials about Nancy Boyda, we told you so.