Federal TABOR

Actually being proposed as a balanced budget amendment, this proposed constitutional amendment (complete item here) has been rewritten to allow for overspending in fairly carefully specified circumstances.

Overspending in time of war for example, would require only a simple majority with the caveat that borrowed monies be spent to prosecute the war. Of course this would set up a situation in which the Pentagons entire budget is derived from borrowing, and the remainder of the money is spent on alternative-fueled monorails. Still, it might be an improvement in that it requires the congress to declare an actual war in order to spend all that money.

Also:

On that note, three-fifths of Congress would need to approve deficit spending during military conflicts — “an imminent and serious military threat to national security” — and the deficits would be limited to “outlays . . . made necessary by the identified conflict.”

Read the rest of this commentary here.

Being the devils advocate, I suppose it would only take 51% to declare N. Korea an "imminent and serious threat" or to declare a permanent state of war with Luxembourg. I also have to wonder about the efficacy of an amendment supported by both Ron Paul and Olympia Snowe.

Still hope springs eternal, and you were looking for a topic for your next letter to your Federal reps, right? Don't forget to ask that the ATF be abolished. By now several Senators are willing to admit having heard about Project Gunwalker.