I keep looking for it, but

I haven't yet seen the news story about the health of the federal budget

in the wake of Sept. 11.

It seems logical to assume

that the surpluses we were so happy about have evaporated and the government

has moved back into a place where it is snug and comfortable ... the red.

Much of the additional spending

is necessary, of course. Bombs and missiles aren't the bargain they once

were, and rebuilding New York and the Pentagon will be expensive too.

And on the other side of the

equation, even if the economic downturn turns out to be short-lived, revenues

for this year will be down.

But I suspect that if we don't

keep an eye on them, congressmen are going to be spend-happy in ways that

have nothing to do with 9/11.

They've already voted themselves

a $4,900 pay raise in spite of the weak economy, and the House passed

a farm bill that adds $73 billion in new subsidies, even adding new products

to the list of things subsidized.

Funny, but it's the Republican-led

House that approved the $170 billion farm bill a year before the old one

even expires, and it's the Democrat-controlled Senate that is considering

phasing out the obsolete farm subsidies and replacing them with programs

designed to help farmers manage the risks they face.

Unfortunately, the Agriculture

Committee has approved a mirror of the House version, so it looks like

good money will follow bad.

All of Georgia's representatives,

including our own Mac Collins, voted for the pay raise, except for Bob

Barr. Cynthia McKinney didn't cast a vote, so if her opponent next year

accuses her of voting for a pay raise, she'll be able to say she didn't.

It's not a huge raise, and

those few hundred thousand dollars certainly won't have any effect on

the overall budget. Then again, a hundred thousand here or there and pretty

soon you're talking about real money.

But if they're willing to give

themselves a raise now, I think our leaders are signaling that they are

in a spending mood, which is another way of saying they're in a power-grabbing

mood. Every time they jack up spending, they take over more of the economy.

It makes me nervous, because

it's coupled with a trend toward trampling civil liberties in the name

of security. That's a one-two punch we can do without.

Congress passed the airport

security bill using the argument that the airline industry will suffer

if people don't "feel" safe. On the contrary, the airline industry

is suffering because people don't want to put up with the security hassles.

So I suppose we'll have a never-ending

cycle of more and more stringent security measures to try and create that

feeling of safety, which will drive more and more people away from airports,

creating the perceived need for more and more security measures ...

A friend of mine says it's

time to rebel. I don't agree. But it's certainly time to start making

some noise and letting our leaders know we don't like the direction they've

taken.