Congress criticized for another short-term funding bill

 Washington Examiner:

This week, Republican presidential candidate Chris Christie took a swipe at Congress for congratulating itself for doing the absolute minimum requirement of its job, voting to keep the government funded for two more months, while a deadlock remains on major legislation, including 12 budget bills and emergency aid to Ukraine, Israel, Taiwan.

“You look at Washington. These jokers take a victory lap for not closing the government and think, like, they deserve a big round of applause for that,” Christie said at a town hall in New Hampshire Monday. "Congratulations, you didn’t close the government you’re supposed to be down there running."

The bill signed by President Joe Biden last week keeps the federal government fully funded until Jan. 19, with the Pentagon and various other agencies extended two additional weeks until Feb. 2. Even as the Pentagon heaved a sigh of relief, Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin lamented that the constant parade of continuing resolutions was doing real harm to national security.

“As we have long made clear, operating under short-term continuing resolutions hamstrings the department’s people and programs and undermines both our national security and competitiveness,” Austin said in a statement.

LOOMING 1% CUT: Last week, the Senate rejected an amendment from Sen. Rand Paul (R-KY) that would have cut discretionary spending by 1%, but that could happen anyway in just six weeks.

Under terms of the Fiscal Responsibility Act, the debt ceiling compromise passed and signed into law in June, if any discretionary budget account — defense or non-defense — is still funded under a continuing resolution as of Jan. 1, a mandatory 1% reduction will be imposed until regular Fiscal 2024 appropriations measures are enacted.

...

There do not appear to be enough people willing to vote for a reasonable spending package.  I suspect the defense department would be better off with a long-term package even if it was less they preferred.  The same is probably true of other government departments.

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